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NYTimes paywall easy to circumvent with bookmarklet - jrnkntl
http://euri.ca/2011/03/21/get-around-new-york-times-20-article-limit/
======
ultrasaurus
As much as I appreciate the link directly to my site, the discussion from the
Nieman Journalism Lab at Harvard ( submitted as
<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2352023> ) is a lot more insightful than
the snippet on my blog.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
MIT and IBM establish joint AI research lab - ffwang2
http://news.mit.edu/2017/ibm-mit-joint-research-watson-artificial-intelligence-lab-0907
======
blueyes
IBM bought visibility with its ad campaigns, and it's trying to buy
credibility with this sponsorship, but I'll bet you anything that the only
part of IBM that MIT will use is the brand. The tech will be open-source tools
that IBM didn't produce, and it certainly won't be Watson.
~~~
cs702
Yes, "Watson" is _really_ old technology coupled with costly consulting
services. And yes, IBM is _far_ behind Google, Facebook and other Silicon
Valley companies in AI research.
That said, for MIT, which in some ways is trying to catch up with schools like
Toronto and Stanford in AI research, particularly in deep learning, it makes a
lot of sense to take the $240 million from IBM to create a dedicated AI
research center.
I think they have a shot at becoming an important 'center of gravity' for AI
research in the East Coast.
~~~
johnchristopher
But today anyone can ask IBM for some Watson queries. Which AI services can I
buy from Google, Facebook and others ?
~~~
cma
Voice, image, video, text analysis, translation:
[https://cloud.google.com/products/machine-
learning/](https://cloud.google.com/products/machine-learning/)
------
aficionado
This is one of the many desperate moves that we will see from IBM trying to
deliver on the Watson overpromise and all their rocambolesque cognitive
computing. AI is a late project
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mythical_Man-
Month](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mythical_Man-Month)). So adding more
manpower (or brainpower) to a late software project only makes it later. Only
folks poorly educated on the topic (such as Elon Musk) really believe that
Watson-like AI is around the corner.
~~~
yequalsx
I don't think it's universally true that adding more manpower to a late
software project always makes it later. The Mythical Man Month takeaway is
that things don't scale up linearly when adding manpower but they clearly can
and often times do scale up.
Imagine one person given the task of rewriting the Windows operating system in
Java. This one person team won't benefit from more programmers? Of course the
project will be completed faster, in this case, with more manpower.
~~~
dragonwriter
> I don't think it's universally true that adding more manpower to a late
> software project always makes it later.
It _always_ results in a period of reduced progress due to drag on the
existing staff to onboard the new staff; and the bigger the scale up, the
_longer_ that period where you are behind where you would have been without it
is. And the more you scale up, the more you need to reorganize and build new
coordination infrastructure to make use of new resources even once they are up
to speed technically, which also takes time to set up _and_ time to acclimate
staff to the new organization and teams, which creates its own drag.
In realistic scenarios, this pretty invariably means late project + more
resources = later projects.
But, sure, there are extreme situations where that wouldn't be true, but I
don't think they pop up often in practice. One should be _extraordinarily_
skeptical of any claim (or interior intuition) that the rule doesn't apply to
your project.
~~~
yequalsx
What I presented was an extreme example but the point stands. Obviously things
like Windows OS, iOS, etc. are projects that benefitted from an increase in
manpower and this increase in manpower did not stifle development or cause
delays. It is true that doubling the manpower does not double progress. It's
not a linear relationship.
------
fatjokes
I use to collaborate with IBM Research. Basically anyone worth a damn
eventually goes to Google/FB/MSFT. IBM pays less than half of their
competition and doesn't provide a fraction of the resources. Their only appeal
is that they have a lower bar for the "research scientist" role, which appeals
to a lot of PhDs who may not have enough top publications to their name.
------
uptownfunk
You really have to give IBM credit for their marketing.
Then again, it's always going to be this debate of engineers clamoring for
better engineering and consultants clamoring for flashier powerpoint decks,
animations, and other gimmicks.
Good technology (executed with an end-business goal in mind) delivers real
value, and that real value is what will sell in perpetuity. Otherwise, you can
only go on fooling people for so long...
I would be curious to see how the MIT academics play with the IBM consultants
/ engineers. Would be curious to hear anyone's comment on the inside of this
closely connected.
~~~
kitd
> I would be curious to see how the MIT academics play with the IBM
> consultants / engineers.
Almost certainly, the IBM engineers they play with won't be the typical
contractors customers normally see. They'll be high-quality and knowledgeable.
------
altotrees
This is super interesting. I know there is much heated discussion here on HN
about IBM in terms of the Watson project and some of the claims made vs.
reality etc. I am pretty far removed from the trajectory of IBM's AI research,
but can only figure a joint effort with MIT will bolster their reputation by
association if nothing else.
Just finished reading about Facebook and Microsoft launching a joint AI effort
not five minutes ago. To those enmeshed in or working in AI research: are
these joint efforts a response to Tensorflow and Google?
~~~
et2o
My cynical take: For a company like IBM it doesn't take a lot of money to
sponsor an institute. It's likely a marketing effort. They've seen all of the
bad press.
~~~
mathattack
Indeed. $24 million a year is pocket change compared to the advertising budget
of Watson. Additionally, if it nets them a little academic credibility and a
few MIT student grads per year, all the better.
------
bluetwo
All due apologies to the late Marvin Minsky, but has MIT really been a leader
in AI lately?
~~~
bbctol
No, and that's why they're taking this deal.
------
gaius
Got to wonder why MIT would shackle themselves to the albatross that is
Watson. Or given Google's antics with think tanks, be willing to take the risk
that unfavourable results will be career-limiting.
~~~
randcraw
240 million reasons. No doubt MIT will mention IBM in their reportage of this
collaboration. But I bet they use the word "Watson" as little as possible.
------
Thriptic
Is this only going to be at IBM's new facility on Binney or are they going to
have space in the facilities MIT is building now?
------
briga
I wonder if it's a good thing that the new norm is for entire AI research labs
to be gobbled up by giant tech companies.
~~~
yeukhon
You do need a lot of computational power and sufficient test bed in the long
run. You certainly can fo AI research on a dozen computers, but would be far
better if someone else handle the infrastructure and you just do the research.
It makes sense to partner with the giant tech. Also, well-known researchers
almost always do joint research with researchers at giant tech because they
know each other already.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
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How to speed up LZ4 decompression - zX41ZdbW
https://habr.com/en/company/yandex/blog/457612/
======
alesapin
Usage of multi-armed bandits for low-level optimizations looks fairly unusual,
I cannot remember any other examples in open-source codebases.
------
kochetovnicolai
Have you considered other integer compression algorithms like
[https://github.com/lemire/FastPFor](https://github.com/lemire/FastPFor)?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
The Internet of Things has a dirty little secret: it's not really yours - tdrnd
http://www.theverge.com/circuitbreaker/2016/7/12/12159766/internet-of-things-iot-internet-of-shit-twitter
======
ankurdhama
Welcome to the "innovation" era of all time. Our innovations are cool.. yeah
that's it.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Is Entrepreneurship a Management Science? - dwynings
http://blogs.hbr.org/cs/2010/01/is_entrepreneurship_a_manageme.html
======
jbarciauskas
The mere title (but the article as well) begs the question, to what extent is
management a science at all? While there's a lot of pseudo-science in pop
business nonfiction, there's very little rigor - see a summary of this
critique here:
[http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2009/04/12/...](http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2009/04/12/luck_inc/)
In particular, "In a paper currently under review, the three argue that not
only are business gurus bad at identifying the causes of success, they have no
way of telling true greatness from mere luck - if enough people are flipping
coins, someone is likely to string together an impressive run of heads.
According to their analysis of 13 of the most influential business success
books, three quarters of the purportedly great companies had track records
that could just as easily have been explained by the vicissitudes of random
chance - performances that looked impressive on first glance were simply akin
to being the lucky person in a stadium full of coin-flippers."
Maybe HBR is more rigorous than the pop business press as a whole, but this
article doesn't seem to be.
~~~
tjic
> The mere title (but the article as well) _begs the question_
I don't think that that phrase means what you think it means
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Begging_the_question>
~~~
camccann
I don't know, that was a more valid use than most. The question "Is X in
category Y?" implicitly assumes, among other things, that X exists and that Y
is a valid category.
If the validity of category Y is not established, then to argue whether
something is or is not in Y is not too far from begging the question of Y's
validity.
~~~
skmurphy
Entrepreneurship is not a synonym for management science. Asking if it is
equivalent or a member of the set of "management sciences" does not "beg the
question."
If by "the validity of category Y is not established" you mean that the
validity of management science is not established I think you are ignoring a
body of work dating to the 1940's in applying mathematics to decision making.
Disciplines like industrial engineering or operations research are normally
considered members of the set of management science. They substitute decision
making based on models and simulation for naive methods based on intuition and
rules of thumb. Examples would include inventory control theory, queueing
theory, game theory, decision analysis,...
See for example <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Management_science> and
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operations_research>
------
skmurphy
"I often saw the best practices of general management fail startups."
Even a quick reading Peter Drucker offers a lot of wisdom for managing a
startup.
"The Effective Executive" and "Innovation and Entrepreneurship" have a lot to
say about managing time, priorities, and posteriorities (what you are NOT
going to do or organized abandonment) that are highly relevant to getting a
startup off the ground and growing.
For a shorter piece that talks about value creation and the need to focus
outside of the corporation to create value, his "The Next Information
Revolution" (published in ASAP but available here
[http://www.versaggi.net/ecommerce/articles/drucker-
inforevol...](http://www.versaggi.net/ecommerce/articles/drucker-
inforevolt.htm) ) is worth a quick read.
~~~
eries
That's a fair point. I did not mean to imply that Drucker's work has no
relevance for startups. For one, I've been profoundly influenced by his
writing.
Rather, I'm trying to work towards a new theory of entrepreneurship that can
help us figure out _which_ practices from general management are transferable
and which fail. Most MBA's and general managers that I've seen enter startups
seem to assume either "all of them" or "none of them." Both answers are
incorrect.
~~~
skmurphy
I think the use of "management science" in the title is problematic as
management science is normally defined operations research or industrial
engineering. Many of the techniques that you espouse, such as A/B testing, are
examples of "management science."
I think what you are taking aim at that's "non-transferrable general
management" is the bureaucracy of large organizations. Part of it goes back to
the "startup dollhouse fantasy" which is a term you coined that I really like.
But I think what you are ridiculing with it is the imposition of formal
control structures on teams that are small enough that social process and peer
pressure is an adequate substitute.
In "Corporation Man" Anthony Jay talks about 'hunting groups' or 'ten groups'
having different rules from 'the camp' or the full tribe. Startups are like
hunting groups, but every corporation has many "hunting groups." If you take a
manager of a hunting group and put them in charge of a startup they will be
right at home. General managers run the camp or the tribe and are less
suitable for the special needs of the hunt.
------
yannis
_My most recent startup created a marketplace for customers to buy and sell
virtual goods for their 3D avatar_
The author in a way has answered his own question, when he wrote the above.
Entrepreneurship - the way understood by the rest of the world is developing
the skills to make a profit out of a business. Entrepreneurship the way
understood by most us here at HN is developing the skills to create and
sustain 'start-up' that will make f*ck money!
You can use Science as part of your product development and management of the
Company but Entrepreneurship itself is not Science.
------
wslh
Yes, sure, just we don't have enough information to see the "continuum"
instead of the discrete parts.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
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Calling it quits? When do you think enough is enough HN? - Stonewall9093
Hey HN. I'm a budding entrepreneur, with a team equally as enthusiastic as me. We're still in college, which makes things a bit different in various regards. Nonetheless, we've been working on a startup for about two and a half years now (www.criticrania.com).<p>We still like the idea, and think we have executed on the concept decently well. The problem? We have no substantial business plan to entice supporters, and we are experiencing the ever dangerous chicken and egg problem.<p>We always have more ideas, and we have the time, but when do you know when enough is enough?
======
gregpilling
I went to the site and hit the 'random' button in the menu bar. I was
surprised that after two and half years that so many popular music albums had
only one or perhaps zero reviews. I would suggest that you become more active
on your campus and within your social network to get more reviews on the site.
If nothing else, you and your team could do all the reviews. I recall Newegg
did this in the beginning, but I could not find a link to prove it.
As for a business plan there is always affiliate links to sites that sell the
music/movies/etc like trueblueponies suggested, as well as ads. You can always
think of a more exciting monetization strategy later, but the first trickle of
cash would be enough to keep the interest going even it it may not amount to
much.
This is the most reviewed album I found
[http://www.criticrania.com/content.php?type=music&id=30](http://www.criticrania.com/content.php?type=music&id=30)
Pink Floyd Dark Side of the Moon. It has only 6 ratings, yet is still a best
selling album almost 40 years since it was released. Surely there could be
more reviews and comments than that just from your social circle?
Never give up, never surrender. Never fool yourself either - if between you
and your friends you can't write a dozen reviews[1] (or many more) for every
album/book/whatever you like then maybe you don't have what it takes to make
that site a success. There are always other ideas if this one doesn't work,
just give it a fair shot.
1\. maybe put links to reviews on other sites like Amazon, with an affiliate
link. I am sure you could find many reviews of everything around the internet
to link to, or to quote with attribution.
------
AznHisoka
If you've been working on this for 2.5 years, with little traction, I think
that's more than enough. Noone is expecting Facebook-like success of course,
but after 2.5 years, you should have at least a good thousand regular users a
day (do you?)
I think the first rule is you need to build something people want. Focus first
and foremost on that. It sounds easy, even too simple, but people make the
mistake of doing the opposite.
For you, I don't know what people are getting of value from signing up for
your site. They get to express themselves, but they can do that anywhere they
go. How are you providing value to people? Why should they invest more than 5
mins in your site? In today's world, ppl have their fingers ready to click the
back button. You need to come up with a compelling reason for them to stay.
------
silentscope
You should love what you do. Idealistic, I know. But if you don't get up in
the morning and don't feel a certain level of gut certainty that you like
doing this, regardless of success, than re-evaluate.
The passion for what you do will lead to success. On that there is no
question. How you define success is very much in the air. But if you're doing
what you love, it really doesn't matter, does it?
Keep in mind that at the end of the day you are more valuable than the idea.
You're still in college, it's early in the game. You can create new ideas,
change the world in ways you haven't even thought of yet.
~~~
Stonewall9093
See and therein lies the problem! I love working on the idea (Far more than I
like doing school, that's for sure). It's practically my baby. But of course I
like my idea...
But you raise very good points. I am quite stuck on this one, as you can see.
"You can create new ideas, change the world in ways you haven't even thought
of yet." - What if this one isn't it. When do I move on? Haha
------
timmm
Why must your first business idea be some sexy grandiose social network that
requires perhaps millions of users to reach the critical mass required for it
to generate one iota of value?
When did you wake up and say "oh I NEED a social network just for media?".
Find something people NEED that doesn't require all this ancillary bullshit to
be useful and sell it. Then when you can finally put the money problem aside
you can dive into your big social network idea, if you even care to at that
point.
------
kalpakd
It's great that you started early. If you really (and i mean really) like your
idea and still feel that this is going to be great, then you seriously go with
it.
------
jnorthrop
Spend some time to write a business plan and try with all you've got to pitch
it. Success or failure that is a worthwhile learning experience.
~~~
Stonewall9093
Thanks jnorthrop.
I guess I should have added more detail. We've written out a full business
plan, it's just very weak (knowingly). We've pitched a few different times and
just finished up a Business Plan competition at our school.
It was a fantastic experience and we learned an absolute ton (a lot of it
being how much we did wrong from the start, but still very valuable). It's
just so hard to tell the difference between "quitting" and spending your time
more wisely, i.e. on a new idea.
~~~
salemh
Are you validating any of these ideas with even 10x random strangers of your
target demo? I mean with potential users vs pitching the plans to schools or
potential investors.
5x different ideas x10 targets = 50x engagements, not out of the realm of an
intensive time-suck. Could eventually lead to an alternate plan point of
focus.
------
trueblueponies
Never give up. You should use affiliate links to sell the products that are
getting reviewed.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Smart grid with time series and tick database Kerf - IDanceOnAPole
https://getkerf.wordpress.com/2016/05/16/kerf-meets-the-smartgrid/
======
eggy
Kerf looks to be a more readable contender in the KDB+/Q market of time
series, columnar, in memory databases with built-in language. IOT, will and
already is providing, all sorts of real time data that grows in value the
faster and more analytically it can be dealt with. From the examples I've seen
online, I like the syntax. It seems to strike a good balance between concise,
and powerful pre-defined analytic functions.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
The Day the MicroISV Movement Died - mtaber
http://www.singlefounder.com/2009/11/17/the-day-the-microisv-movement-died/
======
gacba
Everyone likes to trumpet the VC-backed companies--the drama, the turmoil, the
exit strategy....but what about all those single-founder companies? Eric
Sink's experiment has a lot of lessons for everyone, VC-backed or not.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Hacker Takes Responsibility for Wikileaks Takedown - tyng
http://mashable.com/2010/11/29/hacker-wikileaks/
11/29/10 by Stan Schroeder
======
raganwald
_obstructing the lines of communication for terrorists, sympathizers, fixers,
facilitators, oppressive regimes and other general bad guys_
And there, in plain sight, is the entire problem with his(?) approach. The
terrorists say that the US is an oppressive regime and that they're the ones
obstructing the bad guys. The Chinese government employs hackers to break into
computers. Hacktivist vandalism blurs the distinctions and makes it harder for
people to sympathize with your aims, not easier.
This especially true of Wikileaks. I will keep my own counsel of what I think
about Assange's activities, but I will point out the obvious: That
extrajudicial attempts to quash Wikileaks give the _appearance_ of attacks on
freedom of information and freedom of speech. This appearance is at odds with
the freedoms that the US used to champion.
Vigilante efforts like this do more harm than good even if you sympathize with
Jester's appraisal of who is a good guy and who is a bad guy.
------
Udo
" _While it is entirely possible for one experienced and resourceful hacker to
take down a site — even a fairly large one — by a DDoS attack on his own, it’s
not easy to prove whether the Jester is really behind the attack and, if he
is, whether he was working on his own or if he had help._ "
Pretty much any moron with a credit card can buy access to a botnet and take
anything down, it's not a big accomplishment. Also, there are some hints of a
nice personality disorder here in his/her mission statement:
" _obstructing the lines of communication for terrorists, sympathizers,
fixers, facilitators, oppressive regimes and other general bad guys._ "
...and again with the self-aggrandizing me-too agenda:
" _The Jester hints of having obtained some sensitive information about
Wikileaks itself, but said he decided not to upload it on Wikileaks as he
doesn’t believe the information would see the light of day. He then provides
an encrypted file of his own, claiming the information is contained within —
again, as “insurance.”_ "
That might impress media types, but somehow I just _know_ this is merely a
lonely guy sitting in his basement who hasn't been taking his medication for a
while and somehow believes himself a righteous paladin fighting the forces of
evil at the front lines in an international game of mystery and intrigue.
~~~
ratombim
"That might impress media types, but somehow I just know this is merely a
lonely guy"
You sure have a lot of certainties. You seem like an individual with deluded
self-aggrandizing views about his psychological insight aptitude. Seek
professional mental help fast.
~~~
loewenskind
You're certainly confident at your own pop psychological analyses. Perhaps
_you_ should seek professional mental help. See? We can all play this game.
~~~
ratombim
The difference is that I'm a psychiatrist and you judging from your comment
most likely aren't.
This means I actually know what I'm talking about.
~~~
shadowfox
> I'm a psychiatrist
And that too with incredible skill in analysing mental issues from a single
forum post
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
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Riak 1.1 Released - seancribbs
http://lists.basho.com/pipermail/riak-users_lists.basho.com/2012-February/007573.html
======
rb2k_
I love to go back to Riak every now and then and throw one of the bigger
datasets I have sitting around at a single node using Ruby. It is one of the
most interesting databases out there and it's a breeze to set up (especially
when compared to Cassandra).
It is kind of a shame though. Riak has awesome features, but some of them
(e.g. secondary indexes) are hard to use and documentation is somewhat
missing.
If you look at the official clients page (<http://wiki.basho.com/Client-
Libraries.html#Ruby>), you can see ripple
(<https://github.com/seancribbs/ripple>) but the page doesn't mention riak-
ruby-client (<https://github.com/basho/riak-ruby-client>) which was split from
ripple some time ago.
In theory, both of them support secondary indexes as far as I can tell, but
you won't find that feature in either readme. There are some specs available
that somehow describe parts of it though. I still don't see clearly how I
could search secondary indexes from either library.
The same goes for things like data vs raw_data and serializers (small
discussion: <https://github.com/basho/riak-ruby-client/pull/19>). While there
is a very informative screencast in Seans blog, there is no mention in the
readme file.
~~~
jbellis
Curious what you found so hard about setting up Cassandra. Counterpoint:
<http://www.screenr.com/5G6>
~~~
tolitius
I agree. Setting up Cassandra is simple. It is later when you get to things
like:
mutator.setColumnOrSuperColumn( ... )
mutationsMap = new HashMap<ByteBuffer, Map<String, List<Mutation>>>()..
compound column..
super compound family of super columns...
where it feels more of a senior project, rather than something simple as:
curl POST '{"red":2, "blue":4}' http://127.0.0.1:8091/riak/laundry/shirts
Although CQL fixes some of the problems with Cassandra complexity [Thrift does
not even sound good in all 3 languages I know], I still believe it will be far
more "desirable" (as the real <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cassandra> was) if
more forces are applied to simplicity and polish.
------
davidcollantes
For those, like me, who do not know what Riak is:
"Riak is an open source, highly scalable, fault-tolerant distributed
database."
Source: <http://basho.com/products/riak-overview/>
~~~
Ixiaus
It's a distributed multi-node key-value store. They built it using Erlang (I
almost consider that, alone, a "feature").
~~~
nirvana
If it claims to be distributed and its not written in erlang, don't use it.
Well, that's the filter I use when looking at anything. If its not written in
erlang I spend a lot of time trying to figure out exactly how it isn't really
actually a distributed system. Usually I find out that it isn't.
~~~
Ixiaus
While I _generally_ agree with you, there are some applications out there that
get distributed multi-node environments "right" without using Erlang. It's
just much harder to do because those problems are (for the most part) solved
BY Erlang for the programmer.
If something says it is parallel this, or concurrent that, _that_ is when I
filter it - thus far Erlang's concurrency model has been unmatched (in my
limited experience) by any other language I've used for efficacy and
simplicity.
------
rb2k_
Oh yay, I wonder how enabling Snappy on LevelDB changes the performance
characteristics.
I really liked the introduction of Snappy to CouchDB, especially for EC2
machines with their usually slow IO
------
ahi
I want to love Riak, but the documentation is a mess. At least the 'Fast
Track' is out of date and inconsistent: [http://wiki.basho.com/Building-a-
Development-Environment.htm...](http://wiki.basho.com/Building-a-Development-
Environment.html)
------
nirvana
Glad to see Basho putting out new releases at such a clip. I'm envious,
frankly.
It is really impressive how far Riak has come in the last year.
I don't think anything compares to it, and I think it should have an order of
magnitude more interest and users. (I think people just get scared off by
"erlang", which is silly.)
~~~
no-espam
how much does riak pay you?
------
jsavimbi
I'm very interested in seeing the new Admin console; is there a URL for that.
Finding the docs a little light.
~~~
cmeiklejohn
You can see a demo from Mark here:
[http://basho.com/blog/technical/2012/01/30/Riak-in-
Productio...](http://basho.com/blog/technical/2012/01/30/Riak-in-Production-
at-Posterous-Riak-Control-Preview/)
~~~
jsavimbi
Looks great. And reassuring. I just followed the instructions and restarted.
<https://github.com/basho/riak_control>
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Firebug Plugin: Illuminations for Developers - sroussey
http://www.sencha.com/blog/firebug-plugin-illuminations-for-developers/
======
mustpax
This looks like a useful utility but also underscores a problem with
Ext/Sencha. Namely that it is a tad overengineered and does not work well with
other tools in the web development ecosystem. Ext's giant widget library
creates and manages copious amounts of convoluted DOM nodes to provide desktop
like components that never quite make it out of the uncanny valley.
If you were starting out with some plain semantic markup and adding
interaction with jQuery (or Prototype or Mootools) you would do just fine
using plain Firebug.
I am wary of tools that brag about solving problems they've caused in the
first place.
~~~
sroussey
Well, first of all, this tool also works with Dojo Toolkit, SproutCore, YUI,
Google Closure Library, qooXdoo, etc. The key take away is that if you are
doing anything more than splashy webpages with animation, then you will need
to work with a framework (like all of these) instead of a toolkit (like
jQuery).
The same thing happened on the server side some time ago when people just
wrote some html home pages with some scripting tags (aka PHP). Eventually,
when you start to create something complex, people started using some
"scripts" and then eventually started doing MVC and the like on the server.
Keeping with PHP, this means that people started using Zend Framework,
CodeIgnitor, CakePHP, Symphony, YII, etc.
Some people complained that it was too much for lowly HTML, but time and
capabilities advanced anyhow. Now that time is coming to the client, thanks to
faster browsers, and HTML5 local storage. And mobile. Latency and offline mean
storing things locally, and that means business logic at the client.
Prepare to love our JS framework overlords.
To make this tool, I dealt with all the frameworks listed. All have some
flaws. ExtJS has copious markup (and CSS), and some non-optimal layout
choices. ExtJS4, which you can download a preview of, has dealt with them. I
admit, there is some of my ideas in there they ran with. One I did not
propose, but (like Closure) they are using in v4 is rendering based on
browsers. Old browsers get the copious markup so a real and good looking UI
will be possible. And where it can be done in CSS3 instead, they use far less
markup. The fast browsers become even faster.
~~~
edambauskas
No, thank you.
I have to deal with ExtJS at my current job and I know I would never use this
bloatware for any of my personal projects.
It is just bloat.
It tries to fool you by giving you a big library of pretty things that do
nothing but blind your eyes from the real stuff that is going on. It was
probably built by some people that don't understand the web, secretly hate it
and need some desktop-programming abstractions to deal with it.
This approach has one limitation: as soon as you try to do something that the
framework designers didn't plan for, you'll run into problems and have to
write more work-around code than you would need in a straightforward manner.
Also, its documentation sucks:
\- it uses JavaScript where it isn't necessary, \- it works slow, \- it breaks
normal browser navigation, \- it shows too much information on one page for
the components that are already bloated.
Instead of doing something useful, the authors of this documentation chose to
build something to show-off.
My advice: if you are building applications with dumb forms -- ExtJS is for
you. If you want to build rich applications, customized to your user needs --
avoid it.
~~~
kaylarose
I can't agree with you more - on _every single point_.
Even dumb forms don't work right with ExtJS. One example: there is no sane (or
even insane - but documented) way of setting a default option in a combobox,
or disabling individual options. Really?!
Seriously if you feel you need to use some big desktop-in-the-browser
framework, look at SproutCore, or YUI, or Dojo, or Cappuccino, or....
_anything_ else.
~~~
superstructor
Wow you guys are seriously just haters who obviously have little (if any) real
experience building commercial-grade rich internet applications.
If you go beyond a simple page you need a decent "heavyweight" framework,
otherwise you just end up with a big ball of mud or writing your own. Extjs
happens to work extremely well for experienced JS devs.
Illuminations is an outstanding plugin of serious pragmatic use. Its already
paid for itself many times over in my work.
Oh and btw my forms work great - your obviously just a fool who blames the
framework instead of your lack of ability which is the real cause.
~~~
DjDarkman
> Wow you guys are seriously just haters who obviously have little (if any)
> real experience building commercial-grade rich internet applications.
You just called a group of people haters because they didn't support your
ideals. I think this speaks for itself.
What does commercial-grade mean to you? How many users does that mean? How
many tested platforms?
Microsoft and Google uses jQuery and not ExtJS, is that commercial-gradish
enough for you? or they probably have "little (if any) real experience"
according to you.
> If you go beyond a simple page you need a decent "heavyweight" framework,
> otherwise you just end up with a big ball of mud or writing your own.
This is a dubious claim, because:
\- other people may actually be good at writing their own stuff
\- ExtJS may not save you from writing custom stuff, because you may need
stuff that aren't included
> Extjs happens to work extremely well for experienced JS devs.
> Illuminations is an outstanding plugin of serious pragmatic use.
Can you support these claims or you just wrote them down to justify your
ideals?
> Oh and btw my forms work great - your obviously just a fool who blames the
> framework instead of your lack of ability which is the real cause.
You are obviously someone engaged in a trollish behavior for some reason.
~~~
superstructor
> You just called a group of people haters because they didn't support your
> ideals.
No they are haters because they are spreading FUD about Ext.js with no true or
substantial points to support their claims.
> What does commercial-grade mean to you? How many users does that mean? How
> many tested platforms?
ONE of our apps has > 300k users. No major bugs or usability issues on
production. And is tested on every browser with over 5% usage share (too many
to list, the info is on the net anyway) on all the major platforms (Win, Lin,
OSX).
> Microsoft and Google uses jQuery and not ExtJS
This is laughable. Microsoft and Google use jQuery for web _pages_. Not
applications. Looks at Gmail and find jQuery there ???
> \- other people may actually be good at writing their own stuff
If they want to waste their time and be overtaken by the competition who are
making better use of resources they are entitled to make that poor judgement.
> \- ExtJS may not save you from writing custom stuff, because you may need
> stuff that aren't included
It takes less resources to extend Ext.js that is does to replicate it.
> Can you support these claims or you just wrote them down to justify your
> ideals?
Having worked on RIA for over 6 years and having had Ext.js apps in production
since Ext.js 2 my experience is that both Ext.js and illuminations work well.
I'm not going to write a review and give you cypto certificates to login to
apps that are not public. Its an observation from experience.
> You are obviously someone engaged in a trollish behavior for some reason.
Spreading FUD about a framework that is completely false is trollish behavior.
I did not do that.
~~~
DjDarkman
> No they are haters because they are spreading FUD about Ext.js with no true
> or substantial points to support their claims.
Does you claiming the opposite make your comment valuable?
> This is laughable. Microsoft and Google use jQuery for web pages. Not
> applications. Looks at Gmail and find jQuery there ???
Sorry, I can't take nobody seriously who uses meaningless buzzwords in this
context. Your comment is laughable.
> If they want to waste their time and be overtaken by the competition who are
> making better use of resources they are entitled to make that poor
> judgement.
Again: poor assumption.
> It takes less resources to extend Ext.js that is does to replicate it.
What if the functionality inside Ext.js is not what you need? You can extend a
hammer to make a tank, it's just not practical.
> Spreading FUD about a framework that is completely false is trollish
> behavior. I did not do that.
Your 1 day old account and your tone suggest otherwise.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Coinbase alternatives? - cft
I have an account that I opened in 2013, with several BTC transactions per year. I am carrying a decent BTC balance there. My linked bank account has been the same. I tried to buy 2 ETC. The transaction got declined by Coinbase and my account got limited with no explanation: buys are restricted. Support chat is a chatbot, an attempt to email support is unanswered.<p>I think that with their initial success, they decided to play by Google AdSense playbook: treat honest customers statistically, but not individually. The problem with this approach that unlike AdSense it will be harder to build an monopoly here: it's a good time to start a competitor, focused on decent customer service, like Amazon.
======
lwlml
Had you updated your contact information with a copy of a scanned ID? Was it
legitimate?
This is probably more due to regulatory pressures and any possible Coinbase
alternative in the USA is going to have the same problem.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: What kind of ad rates can I expect on mobile game apps? - sixQuarks
What kind of fill rates and CPM rates can I expect with mobile apps on ios? I'm particularly interested in your experience with full-screen video ads or interstitials.<p>thanks!
======
nhangen
Don't have game app data, but I have a lifestyle app that serves banners:
AdMob (iOS) - .09 eCPM | 99.87% Fill Rate AdMob (Android) - .54 eCPM | 99.95%
Fill Rate
iAd (iOS) - .56 eCPM | 84.41% Fill Rate
I won't share impressions, but iAD is by far the most profitable stream for me
after sales and in-app purchase.
~~~
sixQuarks
Thanks, this is actually very helpful. Would you mind sharing the name of your
app?
~~~
nhangen
Sure, it's called Zazen Suite/Zazen Lite. I only serve ads on the free
version, and while I haven't done a lot of experimenting with Android yet, iOS
makes so much more that it's not a contest.
[https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/zazen-suite-meditation-
timer...](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/zazen-suite-meditation-
timer/id378744626?mt=8)
[https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/zazen-lite-zen-
meditation/id...](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/zazen-lite-zen-
meditation/id386010310?mt=8)
[https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=zazen.activity...](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=zazen.activity&hl=en)
<https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=zazen.free>
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
There Are Plenty of Jobs Out There, America - hourislate
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-12-15/there-are-plenty-of-jobs-out-there-america
======
twoquestions
As someone else has already said, the biggest shortage is skilled labor, not
unskilled.
Trouble is, it's unwise to dedicate months/years of training for a single job
that may not be there when you graduate, and it's unwise to train someone when
they could get poached by the next company not willing to shell out for
training.
I also wonder how sticky their wages are. If a business can endure not filling
a position until they can find their person willing to work for peanuts, why
offer more? It's amazing how little bargaining power workers have even in this
extremely tight labor environment.
I'd be shocked if the Republicans that now control most layers of government
will be willing to step in and help this situation, and I doubt they'd know
what to do to help even if they were willing.
Does anyone here know a good way out of this situation?
~~~
AdmiralAsshat
Case in point: my employer has a vacancy that has been unfilled for the better
part of a year now because they want to hire a full-time Database
Administrator and not pay more than $65k.
My theory is that they're intentionally low-balling it so that no one will
apply and they can hire an H1B.
~~~
toyg
_> a full-time Database Administrator_
Do those even exist anymore, in the US? In the UK I very rarely encounter UK-
based DBAs, 99.99% are offshore.
~~~
pragmatic
I've mostly encountered them in banks where there is regulation or a strong
desire not to let developers access production data/systems (Sarbox or
something, I forget). However their use seems to be declining in most other
industries.
------
patrickg_zill
You can check this kind of stuff out by looking on your local Craigslist
postings.
Machinist wanted (with decent level of understanding multiple machines,
reading blueprints etc.) - 5 years experience - $25/hour in the Denver/Boulder
area. e.g.
[http://boulder.craigslist.org/trd/5902683986.html](http://boulder.craigslist.org/trd/5902683986.html)
(and you have to supply some of your own tools) ... this is not a cheap area
to live in BTW. $50-60K is barely middle class for this area.
We've been praising the guy who hires 10 plumbers and then automates his back
office (he is scaling), while looking down on the plumbers who do the actual
work. Then we wonder why it's tough to find plumbers...
~~~
sgnelson
I sometimes see job placements come in for machinists which demand almost
every machinist skill one can have. Manual machining on every available type
of machine, CNC machining on every type of machine, CNC programming, CAD and
CAM Design in all the main software, GD&T, Blueprinting, etc.
And for a list of requirements that takes up a full page, and frankly
sometimes even requires skills that you would earn with a bachelors in
mechanical engineering. All for $10/hour. And they wonder why no one has taken
them up on their offer. And this is also in a major Southern city, with an
ever increasing cost of living.
------
niftich
I'm trying to reconcile these two quotes:
> _a few good auto-glass installers, no experience necessary_
and,
> _commissioned a study of company shortages. Energy, water, and land came up,
> but the No. 1 answer around the world was skilled labor_
Perhaps no experience is necessary for the auto-glass gig, but the metal
stamping and machining? Are these all trades one can pick up on the job, by
walking in from the street? Because if so, potential workers are leaving money
on the table.
More likely, they have stopped looking for work altogether. Unemployment is
often discussed, but the Labor Participation Rate is less so, which fell
greatly [1] after 2008.
[1]
[http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12300000](http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12300000)
~~~
zhivota
Draw that graph back further before 2006 and you'll see that labor
participation was lower from 1948-1984, almost 40 years. It appears to have
peaked between 1990 and 2008, but even today it's not quite as low as it was
during a time of pretty solid prosperity (50s and 60s).
Even today's rate is only 3% or so lower than the 2006 rate, so if you add it
to the unemployment rate it's still not very bad.
Just another perspective on this as it seems to be something that comes up
over and over in these discussions.
~~~
madengr
I assume the low rate from 1948-84 was due to 1 person working in a married
household. Then it increased as both persons worked to maintain middle class,
followed by recession. So low labor participation with high prosperity back
then, and low participation with low prosperity now.
------
pc2g4d
The mismatch between available jobs and the skillsets of the workforce has
baffled me. Is it just that autoglass installers aren't in sufficient demand
for people to train to become autoglass installers? And so would it be
economically inefficient for the government to subsidize the education of more
autoglass workers?
But maybe it's not a question of insufficient demand for these skills. Maybe
it's a question of matching up job opportunities, workers, and the capital
necessary to train the workers for the jobs.
Imagine this: a site/app where employers post job openings with certain skill
requirements, and where workers apply for jobs. These sites already exist. But
add to it an element where workers can say they want to work a certain type of
job but need additional training to do so. Then investors can put forward the
money to train the worker, in exchange for 10% of the worker's future earnings
until the loan is paid back plus interest.
Microfinance not as foreign aid but as grease for the labor market.
~~~
insickness
The problem with this is that its often difficult to tell whether a person is
suited for a job or even would like a job until the person starts training in
it. You could decide you want to go into HVAC because there's a lot of money
in it. But six weeks into the training you hate it or you realize you suck at
it. Who foots the bill for that failure?
~~~
aharrison3
The debtor would. They can choose to stick it out until their loan is repaid
or find another way to pay it.
------
lkrubner
Let's do this experiment: let's have all businesses double whatever wage they
are currently paying. Is there still a shortage of workers? No? Ah, in that
case, we have solved the problem.
~~~
moxious
You miss the point. Labor is inelastic. If you double the wage, it might take
the market years to respond if the skill in question is not quickly acquired.
Buying high skilled workers is not like buying gumballs, where prices and high
demand can quickly stimulate supply, and the two meet in the middle.
Gumballs don't have to sell their house and move. Gumballs don't have to take
care of their kids while going back to school.
~~~
mason240
True, but this OP's scenario is very similar to what happened during the ND
oil boom in 2010. Guys with certain skills (heavy equipment operation, truck
driving, ect) could make two or even three times what where in their current
jobs.
What was the result? A flood of workers coming in how left their families,
homes, and everything to live in trailers (or even the truck cabs) for the
opportunity.
If the this had happened near a real city like Sioux Falls SD with available
housing and had been long term (like the OP's scenario), people absolutely
would have moved their families and put down roots.
------
hkon
Can't find workers means: can't find cheap skilled workers.
~~~
shams93
Exactly, there is a shortage of people with 20 years experience and a master's
degree willing to work for $14/hour.
------
onion2k
If we're generous and say that the auto-glass installer job pays a bonus of
$10,000 a year that leaves $60,000 earned at $12/hour ... which is about 96
hours a week. I can think of plenty of reasons why you'd have trouble finding
people to do that job.
~~~
brianwawok
I doubt the 70k makes $12 an hour. Likely a supervisor making say $20 an
hour.. comes to a base of 42k.
Other 28k he would make in 17 hours of overtime per week (Remember you get
time and a half for overtime), for a total of 57 hour weeks.
Not out of the question hours in a busy factory. I did some of those in
college summer days...
~~~
mturmon
But now you are working 57 hours a week in steady state to make that $70K and
it does not sound like such a good deal any more.
~~~
brianwawok
It's not a good deal! Thats why I code.
But that is how some working class people make enough to sound their kids to
private school. Working their tails off.
~~~
diyorgasms
I see that they have to do that as a moral failing of capitalism, both that
public schooling is insufficiently good for their children and that a worker's
base wage is insufficient to provide for that worker's child's education.
~~~
brianwawok
I mean your child gets an education either way, its do you get top 5% private
school or public school? You can't give everyone free access to a top private
school, or it is no longer a top by definition ;)
------
jwtadvice
America recently redefined what unemployment means.
It used to mean "the amount of people currently capable of working, who are
not employed in work."
The new definition is "the amount of people who want a job, but can't find
one".
Basically the difference between structural unemployment and transitive
unemployment. America used to track transitive unemployment, but through a
series of reforms have narrowed in on measuring structural unemployment.
Originally if you were not employed you would be unemployed. Slowly this was
altered so that if you were not employed and hadn't found a job in a month you
were unemployed (because you were looking and not finding, and therefore there
was no job for you). Slowly that got moved out. I don't have the most recent
numbers committed to memory, but an not employed person is not considered
unemployed unless they've been looking and have not found for a large amount
of time.
This article hits on that theme. The argument/opinion it expresses is that the
jobs ARE there - that structural unemployment is low - but that workers aren't
finding good work ("transitive unemployment is high").
There's been huge moves in the labor market as middle skilled jobs are
disappearing. The only move for the labor pool is down to low-skilled labor
jobs, work that masses of the labor pool are not only overqualified for, but
will be compensated significantly less for and which represent much less
socioeconomic mobility.
~~~
madengr
It seems like now binomial, people are making <$20/hr or >$60/hr. The middle
has been sucked out.
------
swolchok
I feel like I've seen a lot of articles about people who can't find jobs or
who are worried about their increasingly-outdated jobs going away in the short
term. This article says we also have a lot of jobs that can't find people.
What's the missing piece? Re-training? What does that actually look like for a
30- or 40-year-old person who has a family to support and doesn't much care
for government handouts?
~~~
goodcanadian
It's speculation, but my take would be that there are two missing pieces:
1) Inadequate pay.
2) Unwillingness to train.
If you don't have the exact skills that the company wants, they won't hire
you. But they will complain that they can't find anyone even though they are
really only offering unskilled level wages.
~~~
caseysoftware
And location.
If you're 30/40, odds are you have a family, roots somewhere, and maybe a
mortgage. Your ability/willingness to move - especially after being out of
work for a while - is near zero.
* I'm late 30s with all of the above.
~~~
dabockster
> If you're 30/40, odds are you have a family, roots somewhere, and maybe a
> mortgage. Your ability/willingness to move - especially after being out of
> work for a while - is near zero.
This is also true for someone like me as a recent grad with an older vehicle,
a student loan to pay off, and lack of sufficient savings to move too far away
from my hometown. One of the large issues of the education crisis that I don't
hear being discussed is that a lot of students, like myself, often spend
literally everything we have to get the degree after constantly hearing about
success story after success story in the K-12 system. In these cases, it is
implied that college is the _only_ way to get ahead in life and we need to get
there _by any means necessary_.
I mean, how the hell am I supposed to magically relocate halfway across the
country (or even commute >50 miles away from my house on a daily basis) when
the infrastructure doesn't exist and/or no benefits are offered besides "you
should be glad that we're even paying you"?
But hey, I'm just a whiny millennial brat who should be glad that
spanking/belt whipping is illegal.
~~~
falcolas
One important thing to add to this, is that in the US, halfway across the
country is somewhere around 2,000 miles, which can easily result in $2-3000 in
moving costs alone. I just bring this up since I had a conversation about a
very similar topic with a friend in the UK - where halfway across the country
can mean a leisurely 4 hour drive.
------
sien
This is a bit weird.
US unemployment is at 4.6%
[http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS14000000](http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS14000000)
US growth is about 2%
[http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.MKTP.KD.ZG?locati...](http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.MKTP.KD.ZG?locations=US)
That's really pretty good. Most developed countries would be happy with that.
~~~
toomuchtodo
2% growth is very low. Jobs =! well paying secure jobs.
~~~
sien
What developed country has sustained better growth?
~~~
toomuchtodo
[http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.MKTP.KD.ZG?year_h...](http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.MKTP.KD.ZG?year_high_desc=true)
Ireland, Luxembourg, Sweden, Iceland, Poland, Saudi Arabia, New Zealand,
Spain, the UAE, and Israel (although there are more depending on your
definition of a developed country).
~~~
sien
What definition are you using for sustained? 10 years? 20 years?
I didn't include this either. Just curious.
------
cbdfghh
The issue is that US workers now compete with the whole world.
Until the 70s, the US really had no competition. To compete, you need a stable
(legal) system - No one would invest money in a country where it's not far-
fetched that someone will overthrow the government, nationalizes your company
and throws you in jail.
Oh, and because of geo-politics, one couldn't invest in USSR friendly
countries (both from the US side and the other side)
So no one would invest in the USSR, Africa, the Middle East, China or India,
Europe and Japan were in shambles. So who built up industry? The US.
After the 60s, different countries started stabilizing. First Japan, then
China, now most of the world is actually quite stable, so now the average US
worker has to compete against all of India, China, Bangladesh, etc.
You have more supply and the same demand (the world).
And the problem is nothing can really be done about it.
~~~
rm_-rf_slash
US workers are having to deal with reality itself after an entire history of
avoiding it.
"Free land" from genocided native Americans. No equivalently armed and
organized opposition from Virginia to California.
"Free labor" from slavery.
Poverty wages during the gilded age; easy-to-access industrial fuels like
lumber and coal, and later oil. Again, all available on stolen land.
Early 20th century, Europe was beating itself up so often America became a
superpower by pure virtue of being the only power not bombed to shit by 1945.
Through mid 20th century, America artificially suppressed the domestic cost of
living at home through economic imperialism by, among other things,
overthrowing other regimes - including democracies - that threatened America's
economic dominance and control of natural resources, like Guatemala for food
and Iran for oil (although the U.K. started it).
So this is the first time the US has _ever_ had to compete on anything close
to an even footing.
------
michael_h
I'm always baffled by the people in these articles. From the anecdote at the
beginning: he's having trouble hiring people for $12/hour (up to $70K/year
with bonuses, etc).
I am also having trouble hiring people: I need a senior software engineer. Pay
is $12/hour. It's taking me a long time to find workers. I guess people are
just lazy and don't want to work.
~~~
maxsilver
So this job pays $12/hr. Which is $1,555.05/month after tax, assuming 40hr
work week. And the average 1-bed apartment rents in North Charleston, SC is
roughly $1100/month (according to Zillow), leaving the employee $450/month to
cover all food + medical + debt + transit + utilities and any other expenses.
I _can 't imagine_ why no one is taking the position. It sounds like a
fulfilling opportunity to install auto glass while living on the poverty line.
It's like employers don't even attempt to think about anything from the
employee's perspective -- _even after_ they've struggled to fill their own
positions. "Cheap business owners" couldn't be a more accurate byline.
~~~
MarkMc
$12 per hour is somewhat less than the median personal income in the US [1],
so I would not expect the auto glass worker to pay median rent. There may also
be an option to live in a cheaper area outside North Charleston.
I agree it's not a fulfilling job, but I wouldn't characterise it as "living
on the poverty line". The job pays $24,000 per year but for a single person
the official poverty line is $11,770 [2].
[1]
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_income_in_the_Unite...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_income_in_the_United_States)
[2] [https://aspe.hhs.gov/2015-poverty-
guidelines](https://aspe.hhs.gov/2015-poverty-guidelines)
~~~
falcolas
Personally, I'm not sure I'd like to live in a 1 BR apartment where the cost
was around half[0] the going rate. Something would have to justify the lower
cost - poor condition, a poor neighborhood, a large commute...
[0] Based on the recommendation your housing cost you around 30% of your gross
income.
------
logfromblammo
I wanted a _career_ , but all they were offering was _jobs_.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
The Putnam Mathematical Competition’s Unsolved Problem - alexyes
http://inside-bigdata.com/2014/07/20/putnam-mathematical-competitions-unsolved-problem/
======
chriscool
I think it starts like this:
1) at most nb of stone increase by one each time one player plays
2) nb of stone cannot decrease unless the board is full of stones
3) no one can lose unless the board has been full of stone at least once; this
is because until the board has been full of stones it is possible to increase
the nb of stone by adding one and this is a new position because of 2)
4) as soon as there are n - 1 stones, the player who puts the last stone wins;
because there are n - 1 different positions left with n - 1 stones and n - 1
is even
~~~
chriscool
Now a good strategy for Alice is to first play in the middle, and after that
use the following rules:
\- if Bob removes one stone and the result is that it adds a stone both on the
left and right side of the board, then Alice replays the stone that Bob just
removed,
\- otherwise whatever Bob plays, Alice plays the same thing on the other side
of the board (symmetrically regarding the middle of the board)
This ensures that:
5) the situation is always symmetrical after Alice played
6) when Bob plays once and then Alice plays once, if the nb of stone on the
board increased since before Bob just played, then it increased by an even
amount
~~~
chriscool
As after Alice first played in the middle, there was just 1 stone, then
because of 6):
7) when it's Bob turn to play, the number of stones on the board is always odd
Alice wins because of 7) and 4)!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Fixing Mobile Platforms - vnorby
http://philosophically.com/8-ideas-for-fixing-mobile-platforms
======
georgemcbay
"No default apps on a new phone"
Speaking as a user and not a developer (though I am a mobile app developer),
this is a horrible idea.
I would be so pissed if I bought a new Android phone and gmail/Google
Nav/maps/calendar/etc weren't preinstalled.
~~~
malandrew
What would be nice is if part of the setup process asked you to choose the
default OS app or an app from a third party. It would be mandatory that both
the OS default and the third-party apps have average user reviews for the
current major version number.
------
klewelling
We are working on 4) Programmatic app submission and developer APIs and 5)
Load a native app immediately by hitting a website/URL for Android.
We call it In App App Distribution. It enables any Android app to distribute
other Android apps without Side Loading.
This technology can be used to create a browser that does exactly what Vibhu
suggests. Some other ideas are an A/B Testing service, subscription service,
house ads service, In App App Store or a bug fixing service. We are putting
the beta together now. If you are interested please sign up:
www.inAppSquared.com
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Getting Your Video in Google News - wisdomtalks
http://wisnetsol.com/blog/getting-your-video-in-google-news/
======
wisdomtalks
Videos are one of most important tool of SEO
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
An open letter to Techcrunch editors - agentbleu
http://startupcrunch.org/an_open_letter_to_the_techcrunch_editors_0
This is an open letter to Techcrunch in a last-ditch attempt to bring some sanity back to the main blog in the startup sector!
======
imsteve
Really great advice.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Should I charge for my product (20k Users) - sabbakeynejad
Hi HN,<p>I am looking for some advice, I am the founder of http://veed.io/ an online video editing platform. We have around 20K Monthly users and we have doubled that month over month for the last 3 with no marketing.<p>The site has been free to use while in beta and i believe we will be in beta for 2 more months or so. I want to start thinking about charging for the product in some way and this is where I need your help!<p>Our main competition adds a watermark to every video, you pay a subscription of $20 to have them removed. Simple. They are doing well and growing fast.<p>I don't want to add watermarks because I think they are ugly and ruins the user's video. I also believe it will give us a competitive advantage if we don't.<p>I thought about offering a PRO tools package to our users, but most of our users are entry level if they want more powerful editing tools they will go to some other product.<p>The other idea is to charge for cloud storage? But our users are not making complex videos. they are just cropping the video and adding text. Once they have posted the video on social, they are done.<p>I would really appreciate your thoughts and advice on this.<p>Thanks
Sabba - @sab8a
======
cimmanom
Can you allow free editing for videos under a certain length, and charge for
longer ones? Or allow access to basic tools for free but charge for access to
the more advanced ones?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Show HN: Branded QR Code Generator - irunbackwards
http://qr.thinglet.com
Release Post - http://thinglet.com/releases/branded-qr-code-generator<p>It's in extreme alpha form, showing off and taking feedback on utilitarian usage right now. Hope you guys enjoy and find some use out of it. Design coming soon, I promise!
======
irunbackwards
Release Post - <http://thinglet.com/releases/branded-qr-code-generator>
It's in extreme alpha form, showing off and taking feedback on utilitarian
usage right now. Hope you guys enjoy and find some use out of it. Design
coming soon, I promise!
------
irunbackwards
It's back up - sorry about that! Had some technical difficulties earlier.
------
icebraining
Connection refused.
------
Geee
It's down.
~~~
irunbackwards
Just got home from the office -- looking into it now. We appreciate the
patience as we trip on our own shoelaces. :)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
FDA releases 20+ years of medical device data - drewvolpe
https://open.fda.gov/device/event/
======
minimaxir
Under the Devices headings, most of the sample queries have "null/no value" as
the most frequent type of device in adverse events reports, which isn't a
positive sign for the data integrity.
------
dang
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7833439](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7833439)
~~~
drewvolpe
The title got changed. OpenFDA just added data on devices going back to 1991.
~~~
dang
We'll put the title back in that case. But this is still arguably a repost. It
would be better if the linked page were dedicated to the new data, or at least
made clear what it is.
~~~
drewvolpe
Sorry about that. I thought it was better to link right to the data explorer
for the new data, rather than the press release about.
~~~
dang
No worries—these borderline cases are often tricky. Maybe you should just post
the press release? I think that's how the original submission did it.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Why can't coders code? - exBarrelSpoiler
Jeff Atwood has been sounding the alarm about interview candidates who can't Fizzbuzz since nearly a decade ago (https://blog.codinghorror.com/why-cant-programmers-program/)<p>In today's discussion about the usefulness of HackerRank, and coding challenges in general, as a way to evaluate prospective hires, I suggest that the state of affairs with mediocre, or at least less-than-rockstellar, engineers is caused by the possibility that for "most" coding jobs, you don't actually need to know CS fundamentals every single day. We're at a point where for many types of development, those who use APIs, libraries, and code from Google are able to muddle through, ship products, and linger in companies for years - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12826364<p>Is there any merit to this theory? Because if not, then <i>why</i> are there non-ninja, 1X or less engineers out there with years of experience? Some of whom who are apparently quite ignorant about the very languages/platforms/etc. that they code on day to day? Surely not all of them inflate their experience on their resumes. Evidently companies did employ them at some point, and have them code. So how can they code without knowing how to code?<p>And if this theory is accurate, and many coding positions now no longer require 10x types, or even people who are all that knowledgeable at all, doesn't that reveal an unpleasant truth about the state of the industry? That the quality or ability of an engineer does not have to have a strong correlation to the quality of the product? If large corporations are full of these folks, yet remain profitable, what does that say about the tech industry? And if smart nimble startups hire 10x engineers and throw them through intense gauntlets, yet still fail, does that then shift the responsibility of failure from engineers- regardless of their quality or ability- to management themselves?
======
rabbitz
Development usually involves tasks that range from the easy and mundane to the
difficult and arcane. And those tasks are usually not simply assigned to a
single engineer to either succeed or fail - usually the hard stuff is given to
the more advanced coders and the easy stuff is reassigned to whoever can
handle it. I can imagine a single coder on a 10 person team who can spend 10
years on a code base doing all the 'easy' parts. There are always tons of
maintenance tasks (or 'bookkeeping' bits of work as I like to call it) that
are simple, boring, and ever-present up for grabs.
Coding is just like anything else - some people only do the minimum in order
to get a "passing grade" and so they never really get past the basics. It
isn't so much that they code without knowing how to code, but that whoever is
in charge of managing them isn't necessarily an expert on coding and often
times people find it easier to improve their ability to trick their manager
rather than the difficult task of learning new or more advanced things.
------
ankurdhama
It's all about Engineer vs Mechanic. There are many many tasks of low stakes
that require a mechanic and there are very few high stakes tasks that require
an Engineer. A mechanic is very good with the tools where as Engineer is very
good at the underlying concepts. Unfortunately in IT we call them both
Software Engineer :(
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Do you hate JavaScript? - rbanffy
https://dev.to/reverentgeek/do-you-hate-javascript
======
megamindbrian2
I love javascript.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Web Design is 95% Typography (2006) - volument
https://ia.net/topics/the-web-is-all-about-typography-period
======
HocusLocus
Choose the right typeface, then
\- put too many columns on the screen so that content scrolls down for a mile
and the right side is always clipped
\- after 'mobile' users complain, replace that with a single column with snap-
into-view flibbery-gibbits that do not resemble any previous design
\- implement CSS rules that make menu items or content just disappear if they
do not fit on the screen
\- remove any pseudo-static navigation or structure, all pages are now
?queries. Hopefully the search engines will abandon you and the drop in
traffic will put you out of your misery.
\- suck the entire site into SQL and vomit everything from script parsed JSON.
\- the site is now completely blank to visitors with whitelist-js
\- I have a special folder with bookmarks to 'blank' sites. I revisit them now
and then to see if they have gone bankrupt or -- possibly -- hired some old
geezer that put up static pages again.
------
volument
> Web designers now do the job that typographers did 30 years ago
Easy to agree.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Flynn 101% Funded - danielsiders
https://flynn.io/?funded=
======
jaytaylor
Shameless plug:
In search of folks who'd like early access to my open-source Heroku-esque
PaaS: ShipBuilder
ShipBuilder is a freely available open-source project which aims to make it
fast and easy to deploy arbitrary web-applications. Get total control over all
aspects of your staging and production environments.
More info: [http://shipbuilder.io/](http://shipbuilder.io/)
It uses Go, Git, LXC, and HAProxy.
Just reply below with your github username, or shoot an email to
[email protected] if you are interested in early access.
~~~
argonaut
Have you considered merging efforts with Flynn?
~~~
jaytaylor
I'm certainly open to the possibility, I want to end up with the best possible
open-source PaaS system.
~~~
argonaut
Me too (not affiliated with Flynn). One of the reasons Rails gained so much
mind share (IMO) over the Python ecosystem was fragmentation in Python's
ecosystem.
~~~
shykes
In this case, the way to avoid fragmentation is not to merge but to
standardize on the Docker APIs, just like Flynn does.
Docker's job is to guarantee interop between PaaS-like components, so that you
don't need to lock yourself into a single monolithic PaaS. Everything you
build on Docker will benefit Flynn - and Deis, and Dokku, and Maestro, and
dockermix, and custom platforms at Ebay, Uber, Cloudflare, Mailgun etc.
------
danielsiders
Thanks to the folks at AppFog/CenturyLink for putting us over the top!
~~~
girvo
Those guys are awesome. Much better than Heroku IMO.
~~~
mintplant
I've had all sorts of issues with them, though. Two times apps have out-and-
out disappeared from my control panel and from the web, only to mysteriously
return later. Both times the apps involved were hosted on their HP
infrastructure, so that might be the source of the problem--apps in the AWS
infrastructure didn't go through the same issue.
Their logging could also use some work. Since setting up some monitoring I've
discovered that a few of my apps hosted there will sometimes die and/or
restart after running for a while. Unfortunately, the "crash log" feature
doesn't seem to work properly--the logs are always blanked out--and as such
I'm unable to get to the root of the issue. Availability can be dodgy; right
now I have a watcher process that monitors for app failures and restarts any
it sees down.
Their free plan is unbeatable, though. Up to 2GB RAM with 10 bound services
(redis, MongoDB, PostgreSQL, etc). So, my experience has been mixed. I really,
really want to love them, but unfortunately I keep running into problems.
------
rmanalan
What's happening with Dokku since Flynn is also going to be open source? My
understanding is Flynn is based on Dokku... since Jeff Lindsay is involved.
~~~
progrium
[https://github.com/progrium/dokku/issues/129](https://github.com/progrium/dokku/issues/129)
------
mixmastamyk
Flynn lives! (A Tron reference).
~~~
john_i
Please don't. It hurts too much to be reminded that the show has ended :(
------
zek
I think this a very interesting way of funding an open-source project, and I'm
glad it worked out. Excited to see how Flynn turns out!
~~~
ihsw
Ubuntu Edge is also getting on the corporate sponsor train, but unfortunately
I think they set the bar a bit too high.
[http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/ubuntu-
edge](http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/ubuntu-edge)
$80K enterprise bundle. It's a bit pricey (even though you get 100 devices),
and I'm sure if they offered an $8K option for 10 devices then they'd get a
lot more interest than none at all.
The $8K price point is almost in splurge territory, and the benefit of having
access to workshops and online support would certainly put it over the top.
------
conroy
How is Flynn planning to handle longer lived services such as databases? Do I
run the database separate and just use Flynn for app servers?
~~~
Titanous
Flynn is intended to manage and containerize backing services as well. We'll
have a system for specifying hosts and volumes that can be used for persistent
storage. In the future we also want to add hooks for provisioning, high
availability, and more.
~~~
1qaz2wsx3edc
How is orchestration handled?
~~~
Titanous
Orchestration of containers is the purpose of Flynn. We'll create detailed
architectural documents in the coming weeks.
------
victorhooi
Whew, that's awesome =).
I was watching it lately - and it seemed to be hovering around 91% for some
time...
Looking forward to seeing great things from the project.
------
macarthy12
Good news guys. I posted links to the pledge drive from a few places (HN
included), hope it helped. Looking forward to the code!
------
julien421
gg!
~~~
HeyItsJames
wp.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
IndieWeb - pandatigox
http://indiewebify.me/
======
mawburn
> _What is the IndieWeb?_
> _We should all own the content we 're creating, rather than just posting to
> third-party content silos. Publish on your own domain, and syndicate out to
> silos. This is the basis of the "Indie Web" movement. ~IndieWebCamp_
So... what is "the IndieWeb"? This didn't answer the question.
~~~
benwerd
The indieweb is a social web where everyone runs their own profile, on their
own (sub)domain, potentially on their own servers - while being able to talk
to their friends as easily as they could on Facebook or Twitter.
All based on open technologies, rough consensus, user-centered design and
running code, rather than endless mailing lists and technical debate.
~~~
pXMzR2A
That sounds like (GNU Social) + (Diaspora) - (Distributed Content)
Sounds great until your (sub)domain(s) gets censored or targeted.
~~~
benwerd
If a profile gets censored / targeted, it's one profile, vs an entire social
network. But, eg, content being replied to is typically duplicated across
profiles, so there actually is distribution of content.
------
Xeoncross
Seems like blog + XFN + pingbacks with a new name..? I would love it if
everyone could have their own domain name + server - but this isn't practical
at this point in time.
Why not work on making running a server + website easier?
\-
[https://github.com/Xeoncross/lowendscript](https://github.com/Xeoncross/lowendscript)
\-
[https://gist.github.com/Xeoncross/3b8ed1d094707bc0dff8](https://gist.github.com/Xeoncross/3b8ed1d094707bc0dff8)
\-
[https://github.com/Xeoncross/simpleserversetup](https://github.com/Xeoncross/simpleserversetup)
~~~
groks
> I would love it if everyone could have their own domain name + server - but
> this isn't practical at this point in time.
You don't need to run your own server. Point the domain name you own at
Squarespace (or Wordpress.org, or hosted Wordpress, or any service you
like...) for a low-tech, free or low-cost website where you decide what
happens.
Move when you change your mind.
------
chrisatthestudy
Am I completely misunderstanding what this is supposed to be, or am I really
so old that I remember what everyone else has forgotten? What you're calling
the 'IndieWeb', where everyone has their own website and domain, and hosts
their own content on it, we had a name for that.
We called it the World Wide Web.
~~~
humanrebar
Yeah, it's an attempt to revive the federated model of the WWW.
------
meira
The main point about IndieWeb is to create authorship over published content.
Silos (other social networks and startups) are only tools to syndicate it.
IndieWebCamp is a bunch of people developing tools to support this endeavour.
There is an IRC channel in freenode: #IndieWebCamp & #IndieChat
------
humanrebar
I like the idea of the IndieWeb, but I'm also a big believer in discretion-
oriented sharing. People don't just walk out on the street and start yelling
facts and opinions at each other. They target their message for the audience.
And if the audience is everyone, then the message tends to suffer.
I guess what I'm saying is that I don't really see myself participating much
until I can control who sees what information. I'd like sharing photos of my
family with family and friends. I don't care to post them publicly. I like
discussing politics... with people who can handle a political discussion
without hurt feelings or pointless bickering.
The IndieWeb makes a lot of sense for public conversation, though. If I were
into blogging, writing, or otherwise producing content as a job or serious
hobby, I'd be all over it.
~~~
benwerd
We're working on that. :)
------
lowglow
Here is something that helps explain the who, what, why a bit more.
[https://indiewebcamp.com/](https://indiewebcamp.com/)
------
mrspeaker
Arrgh! I'm very intrigued, but have read that page 3 times and have no idea
what it's about - is it just "add microformats to your website and presto: the
internet was the indieweb all along!" or am I missing something?!
~~~
pmlnr
It's a little deeper than that. For short the end goal would be for everyone
to have their own domain - a website - and that domain should be the centrum &
origin of their activity on the intenet.
This means that the website would be the tool to send and receive
interactions; it would be the storage for all one's content.
This is to avoid those situations when content is removed, censored, etc. on a
silo/social network; to have control over your own data and to have a mesh-
network-like layout of individual sites that are more not single point of
failures in opposition of gigantic monoculture that currently rule the
internet.
The reference for the 'like it was all along' is a reminder that a very long
time ago the internet was a network of individual websites and you were not
bound to use centralized services from corporations.
~~~
BillinghamJ
How does this differ from how Diaspora works?
~~~
pmlnr
diaspora is an open source social network. It's not a site for an individual,
unlike, for example, [http://withknown.com/](http://withknown.com/),
WordPress, and the rest.
My personal opinion behind the indieweb is here, in case it makes more sense
like this: [https://petermolnar.eu/journal/indieweb-decentralize-web-
cen...](https://petermolnar.eu/journal/indieweb-decentralize-web-centralizing-
ourselves/)
------
z3t4
I think more people should be self-hosting. You are probably already paying
for a 24/7 Internet access. And your router is probably more then capable of
hosting a web server.
~~~
shortstuffsushi
Many ISPs (at least in the US, or Wisconsin) don't allow you to do this, and
block incoming HTTP/HTTPS traffic.
~~~
relaxitup
I imagine there is some Cloudflare magic that could take care of this problem
(whilst your home webserver running on an alternate port) ?
~~~
shortstuffsushi
Yes, using alternative ports does sometimes work. In the past, I had used NoIP
or whatever the name was at that point to route incoming from 80 to a non-
standard port. CloudFlare could probably do the same, but then have you
defeated the goal of self hosting, since you have a provider in front of your
site?
------
aklemm
Looking forward to implementing these on my personal domain. The dream is
alive! These are great steps in the right direction, but the major draw that
will take IndieWeb concepts mainstream still seems elusive.
------
ac360
I love the IndieWeb movement. I don’t know if you guys have meet-ups, but if
you’re in SF, I’d love to meet you.
I’m one of the founders of Servant –
[https://www.servant.co](https://www.servant.co) – It’s a personal database
which you can give apps permission to read and write to. The goal is to allow
people to bring their own database to the apps they use and disconnect it
whenever they’re done with an app.
We’re in the centralization camp, but we share many goal/themes with the
IndieWeb movement.
\- Austen austen [at] servant.co
~~~
willnorris
There are the actual Indie Web Camps that occur several times throughout the
year. And each month there is the Homebrew Website Club Meetup
([http://indiewebcamp.com/next-hwc](http://indiewebcamp.com/next-hwc), named
after the Homebrew Computer Club).
------
ChrisArchitect
I get this, it just seems like a battle sometimes. If you're just looking for
somewhere to post some content/share an article/thought..... Also, and this is
particularly relevant here on HN - what if you want to post some content that
might be of interest on HN but you don't want to overload your personal site
with traffic? Let one of the so called 'content silos' worry about the uptime.
Also, why not just come out and say who this is about - the
facebooks/mediums/tumblrs etc
~~~
benwerd
If you're just looking for somewhere to post some content, we run an indieweb-
compatible service: [https://withknown.com](https://withknown.com) ;)
It's about not having control over your representation online. For me, it's
also about freedom of identity, and freedom to dictate your own content
standards.
------
fredfoobar42
Do I need to have this WebReply crap? I have my own domain, and I don't have
comments, because I want to own every pixel of the thing.
------
ugexe
"We should all own the content we're creating, rather than just posting to
third-party content silos."
Isn't this just centralizing and stream-lining the same process they claim you
should be avoiding?
~~~
kyle_wm
What makes you say that? It's about posting your own content on your own
domain, very much not about centralizing nor streamlining.
~~~
tombrossman
It is definitely about centralizing, on your own domain. Nothing wrong with
that but the distinction is to have total control and not rely on a third-
party silo. This takes some extra effort but is totally worth it.
~~~
joshbuddy
I think that value proposition is very different for different people. For
technical people, maybe it's a good idea. For non-technical people, I fear the
indie web is very much out of reach.
------
pc2g4d
This seems like a great platform for spam, so if it's to succeed long-term
there will need to be good antispam tools. Seems like a cool development,
though, and I hope it works out.
~~~
benwerd
There are some pretty good proposals about spam. So far it hasn't been a
problem, but it's good to have tools in place.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ecuador Spikes Halts Snowden's Asylum Because Julian Assange Is a Fame Hog - cobrausn
http://www.theatlanticwire.com/politics/2013/06/ecuador-snowden-asylum-julian-assange/66704/
======
gee_totes
I hope this spurs Snowden to take a step back from having Assange and
WikiLeaks do his PR. I always thought this was a terrible idea.
PR efforts from Assange/WikiLeaks need to be 100% focused on Bradley Manning.
They owe it to him to give him their undivided attention.
However, if Snowden wants to continue giving interviews and have media reps,
he's in a tough spot. His other main media contact, Glen Greenwald, struggles
with being perceived as a journalist because of his past history as an
activist. Greenwald wouldn't want to jeopardize his recently gained
journalistic integrity by doing something 'activist-y' like team up with
Snowden to plan media strategy (which is what Snowden really needs).
I think the best outcome in this scenario would be for a media-savvy activist
internet lawyer come out of an organization like EFF of Harvard and rep
Snowden.
------
ScottWhigham
For those who can't decipher the (awful) title:
"Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa has declared Edward Snowden's special
travel document to be invalid because he doesn't want WikiLeaks founder Julian
Assange to look like he's "running the show."
------
aclevernickname
So, Snowden is disappeared in Russia, and Ecuador halts Snowden's asylum
request. We've had no update on Snowden's whereabouts since his (missed)
flight to Havana, and don't even know if he's actually in the airport he's
reported to be stuck inside.
But let's blame this on Assange. We can spin this to make him look weaker for
trying to help. That will help to minimize the effect both of their efforts
have on the world. The "good guys" keep winning, and the "bad guys" keep
losing.
God Bless America.
------
bdfh42
I suspect that Assange would love another martyr - just as long as it is not
him.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Amber Smalltalk 0.10 released - bromagosa
http://amber-lang.net/
======
klibertp
Totally awesome!
Some time ago there was a Smalltalk for Java announced - I wasn't particularly
thrilled, because I have nothing to do with Java. This time, however, I'm more
than excited - I'm starting to play with Amber right now!
EDIT: this is getting better with every page I read. It's compiled to JS, so I
expect it to be fast. It supports seamless integration with JS libraries -
it's IDE is written in Amber but with jQuery. It's class library is
simplified, but based on Pharo. It has a Canvas implementation - and I don't
mean <canvas>, but a HTMLCanvas known from Seaside. It's a live, interactive,
clean Smalltalk environment in a browser.
My life just got a bit better and more enjoyable :)
~~~
mprovost
A sentence I never though I'd see 10 (or even 5) years ago: "It's compiled to
JS, so I expect it to be fast."
~~~
klibertp
Haha :) I was thinking "fast in comparison with a Smalltalk virtual machine
implemented in JS" - but you're right in that JS got ridiculously fast
compared to how it was a few years back.
------
protomyth
Some example code snippets on the front page couldn't hurt, and please, please
have a downloadable ebook or pdf of your documentation, so I can sit back with
my tablet / e-reader in non-connected situations. Doing a little bit of
targeting to iOS developers given Objective-C's ancestry couldn't hurt.
[edit: Objective-C is a decedent of Smalltalk - I was emphasizing the
connection to be able to draw Objective-C programmers to its roots]
~~~
klibertp
> given Objective-C's ancestry
Wait, what? You mean that Smalltalk is a descendant of Obj-C? That's...
interesting... [EDIT: ok, I misread the parent statement, my bad.]
> Some example code snippets on the front page couldn't hurt
You have a whole system source right there before your eyes. Click on "try in
browser" button, then select a package in the left-most pane, then a class
name in second pane and then method name in rightmost pane. Voila, what you're
reading now is a Smalltalk source for this method.
~~~
bromagosa
I believe, and hope, he meant the opposite :)
~~~
protomyth
Yes, I meant the opposite and looking at it am not real sure how someone would
turn that around.
------
mark_l_watson
That is very cool. I played with Amber a few years ago and it seems like the
in-browser experience is better.
Off topic, but I just had some pain moving a small example Ember.js app to the
most recent 1.0rc1, with lots of pain. I have to at least consider that Amber
might be good for writing a fat browser client.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Favoriting A Tweet Can Say So Much - mrtnkl
http://martinkool.com/post/51497453404/favoriting-a-tweet-can-say-so-much
======
mkandler
I always wonder how changing "Favorite" to "Like" would affect the frequency
of the action on Twitter. To say something is your favorite is kind of
extreme, right? - you can like lots of things but you only have one favorite.
Interesting point you make though, because in an argument you'd be more likely
to use a "favorite" to select the better stance.
Disclaimer: I'm a terrible Twitter user, and still trying to figure out what
I'm doing.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Using ES6 with D3.js - philipcdavis
https://learningd3.com/blog/using-es6-with-d3/
======
josiahjd
Concise and to the point. Well done!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Scary: Plane Crash Caught on Dash Cam - nashequilibrium
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=icfVsql38oc&feature=youtu.be
======
nashequilibrium
This just shows that you have no chance of survival in this situation! It
happens so quick.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Parsing continued-multiline data in Python - flittr
http://iswwwup.com/t/d1934baf95dc/parsing-continued-multiline-data-in-python.html
======
dalke
This links to a StackOverflow mirror. The original is at
[http://stackoverflow.com/questions/29337063/parsing-
continue...](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/29337063/parsing-continued-
multiline-data-in-python) .
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ubuntu 10.04 LTS (Lucid Lynx) available on Linode - uggedal
http://blog.linode.com/2010/04/29/ubuntu-10-04-lts-lucid-lynx/
======
megalogeek
For anyone pondering upgrading their existing Linode to Lucid, we published an
article in the Linode Library that explains a couple of thing you need to do
for it to work.
[http://library.linode.com/troubleshooting/upgrade-
ubuntu-10....](http://library.linode.com/troubleshooting/upgrade-ubuntu-10.04)
------
timmorgan
Slicehost now has 10.04 available as well:
[http://www.slicehost.com/articles/2010/4/30/ubuntu-10-04-lts...](http://www.slicehost.com/articles/2010/4/30/ubuntu-10-04-lts-
lucid-lynx-32-bit-and-64-bit-images-available)
------
uggedal
As of this writing neither Slicehost nor RackspaceCloud offers Lucid Lynx
images.
~~~
timmorgan
Good for Linode, but I can't say I expect any VPS hosting company to have
Lucid (or any other brand new release) day one anyway. I'll give them a week
or so before I start to wonder.
~~~
rythie
Slicehost have got it now:
[http://www.slicehost.com/articles/2010/4/30/ubuntu-10-04-lts...](http://www.slicehost.com/articles/2010/4/30/ubuntu-10-04-lts-
lucid-lynx-32-bit-and-64-bit-images-available)
------
pstevensza
Even though I don't use it as much as I should, I enjoy having a small box
with Linode. Great VPS provider. Looks like the weekend is upgrade time.
~~~
koanarc
I signed up for a Linode this month just in case I ever need use of a mail
server/web hosting+root access/whatever on a whim, and was absolutely blown
away with how quick it was to set up. Hands-down THE most intuitive and well-
documented service I've ever used on the internet, _for anything_. No more
NetworkSolutions-related aneurysms!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Smalltalk in small talks: The Setup - Autre
http://blog.redline.st/2010/12/15/smalltalk-in-small-talks-the-setup/
======
joev
I have high hopes for this series; I really enjoyed Peter Michaux's "Scheme
from Scratch" series, from which the author says gained inspiration for his
series:
[http://peter.michaux.ca/articles/scheme-from-scratch-
introdu...](http://peter.michaux.ca/articles/scheme-from-scratch-introduction)
------
rincewind
How does this compare to JSqueak? Does it run Morphic?
It seems to integrate better with the host JVM (like GST integrates with
unix).
~~~
Autre
It's my understanding that JSqueak was (is?) just a toy. OTOH, redline aims to
be a full blown implementation of smalltalk that integrates with the jvm like
jruby, scala, clojure, etc do. As you can see from the github repo, it's still
pretty much a work in progress (plus a learning tutorial for
interpreters/compilers).
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
SIRC Guide to Flirting - nostrademons
http://www.sirc.org/publik/flirt.html
======
pkaler
I'm not the greatest looking guy around, but I've dated some very hot women by
breaking most of these "rules".
When you can sit down at a table of 4 gorgeous women without being invited
you've hit gold. I'm ballsy, bordering on arrogant and women always know where
I stand. Women respect that.
If you see a woman and you want to ask her out, do what it takes to make that
happen. Women respect that.
You won't learn that in an 18 page PDF.
Guys focus way too much on the mechanics of flirting when they should really
be developing their inner confidence, self-worth, and certainty.
~~~
ilaksh
Your main points are worth emphasizing but they _were_ reflected in the
article and we should appreciate what a fascinatingly detailed study of human
behavior this is.
I would hazard a guess that in fact you have mastered the nuances of flirting
and just aren't conscious of the degree to which your successful behaviors are
reflected in the guide or when your rule breaking is not beneficial.
------
divia
I thought most of the article was pretty standard stuff, but I was interested
in this part:
_Researchers have found that nodding can be used to 'regulate' conversations.
If you make single, brief nods while your partner is speaking, these act as
simple signs of attentiveness, which will maintain the flow of communication
from the speaker. Double nods will change the rate at which the other person
speaks, usually speeding up the flow, while triple nods or single, slow nods
often interrupt the flow altogether, confusing speakers so much that they stop
in their tracks. So, if you want to express interest and keep your partner
chatting with you, stick to brief single nods._
~~~
wallflower
One of the best ways to get out of a conversation involves breaking the other
person's momentum - as soon as you can, ask three close ended questions. For
example, if the person is talking about their favorite dog. Ask 'How old is
the dog?', 'Do they like cats?', 'Is it 730 already?' - then excuse yourself
politely. It's not the most tactful way to extricate oneself from a running-
over conversational hog but it works effectively.
------
biohacker42
You know how you tie your shoes every day, but then one day you stop to think
of how to tie your shoes and you find that you don't know how! And the only
way to tie your shoes is to stop thinking about it and let your muscle memory
take over.
That's how reading that article made me feel about social interaction.
~~~
andreyf
This is a terrible guide for analytical people who over-think things to begin
with.
_When you first approach an attractive stranger, having established at least
an indication of mutual interest through eye contact, try to make eye contact
again at about 4ft away, before moving any closer. At 4 ft (about two small
steps away), you are on the borderline between what are known as the 'social
zone' (4 to 12 ft) and the 'personal zone' (18in to 4ft)._
If you're having problems socializing with people, drawing 'zones' around them
and following strict rules of interaction isn't going to help.
~~~
dkarl
People who over-think things are paralyzed by uncertainty when it comes to
social interaction because it seems so intellectually intractible. The rules
and guidelines aren't meant to encourage their compulsive ratiocination;
they're meant to serve as a security blanket, to give people enough courage to
actually start interacting. Simply by being short and comprehensible, they
provide authoritative reassurance that flirting doesn't require a highly
sophisticated understanding. Once a person is reassured enough to get started,
the rest will come with experience.
~~~
carterschonwald
Actually computing equilibria in even toy mathematical models of social
collaboration is horribly intractible even at a single time step. So what you
wind up being best off doing is randomly choose your initial location and just
follow the local gradient of fun, then iterating this a few times and choosing
the best one.
~~~
jey
Nobody is suggesting doing game-theoretic analyses before engaging in social
interaction. Obviously someone who thinks that they can completely derive
their actions from formal rules of behavior is doomed to fail, but it's not
like the only two possible choices are "behave completely randomly" and
"perform a game-theoretic analysis of the situation based on formal rules".
Guides like this provide a good set of heuristics and help the socially
unskilled people understand the general ideas and general concepts which
socially skilled people seem to just pick up from their environment. This is
important so you can pick a reasonable starting location before doing your
hill climbing algorithm -- if you just choose a completely random starting
point, everything is just extremely discouraging, there's no useful feedback
from the environment (other than "YOU FAIL"), and there's absolutely no fun
gradient to maximize. (Or at least, the fun gradient is so negative in all
directions that it's difficult to figure out which way is up.)
It always amazes me how socially skilled people apparently can't even
understand what it means to be socially unskilled. It would be as if everyone
who learned to ride a bicycle later completely forgot that they had to _learn_
this skill, then just went around telling everyone who didn't know how to ride
a bicycle, "you just get on and pedal, it's so easy, I don't see why you keep
falling, you must not be trying".
~~~
carterschonwald
regarding the first part, you're absolutely right, but understanding the worst
case computational complexity of a problem does lend a certain appreciation to
the average case complexity that happens when people implicitly approximately
solve those problems.
Admission: My current research project involves studying the computational
complexity of socially inspired optimization problems. Turns out that even the
simplest nontrivial ones are PPAD Hard or #P hard. (so special cases or
approximations become key very quickly)
This is why its useful to put social problems into at least semi-mathematical
language to make it easier to spell things out to the socially oblivious (but
still logically endowed, which sadly isn't always the case) or to make it
easier to discuss a complex social issue with a friend
~~~
dkarl
This reminds me of an article I read years ago about cognitive psychologists
trying to model how outfielders catch fly balls. Evidently, even given the
massively parallel nature of the brain, it was very hard to come up with a
model that was effective enough to explain the performance of real outfielders
(Little League to Major League) but was simple enough to be neurologically
plausible. Just like the social models you describe, none of the
mathematically straightforward ways of modeling the fly ball problem were
cognitively feasible. Yet, if you were teaching an engineering student to
catch a fly ball, they would probably be helpful, even though the final goal
would be to induce an entirely unrelated cognitive structure in the engineer's
mind.
------
delano
"Guides" on social behavior are by definition an awkward mix of over-
generalized observations and overly-specific deductions. This one is no
exception:
_In pubs, for example, the area around the bar counter is universally
understood to be the 'public zone', where initiating conversation with a
stranger is acceptable, whereas sitting at a table usually indicates a greater
desire for privacy. Tables furthest from the bar counter are the most
'private' zones._
_When you first meet new people, their initial impression of you will be
based 55% on your appearance and body-language, 38% on your style of speaking
and only 7% on what you actually say._
That isn't to say they have no value. It's helpful to be aware of the various
aspects of social interaction, like how eye contact and the distance you keep
affects a conversation. The danger is that the ideas are presented as
definitive facts, as though all you need to do is follow their prescription to
success:
_When you first approach an attractive stranger, having established at least
an indication of mutual interest through eye contact, try to make eye contact
again at about 4ft away, before moving any closer. At 4 ft (about two small
steps away), you are on the borderline between what are known as the 'social
zone' (4 to 12 ft) and the 'personal zone' (18in to 4ft)._
The truth is, there is no prescription. At least, not a universal one. If you
need a place to start, try simply to enjoy yourself when you're out. Being
social comes more naturally when you're having a good time.
~~~
dkarl
Pop culture is the best and only guide we have. Dave Hickey said the cultures
that write love songs are the ones that don't have rigid scripts for love and
courtship. We listen to love songs because we accept few limitations and
instead use a shared collection of stories to orient ourselves in the vast
space of possibilities.
So, what part of pop culture tells us how to flirt? (If you say reality
television, I will climb out of your monitor and stab you in the face.)
~~~
delano
Our own experiences are the best guide we have.
Although I can't say I didn't learn anything from Fifth Wheel.
------
nostrademons
May be off-topic, but I found it very interesting and not at all obvious. The
stereotype of a hacker tends to be very socially oblivious, so this is perhaps
relevant. Read before you kill.
~~~
cake
This article is what I love about HN, geeky yet giving you an informative
approach about certain aspects of life.
I guess that it's the whole point of the "hacker" thinking, having the
knowledge of what's happening behind the scenes.
------
kqr2
Link to pdfs:
<http://www.sirc.org/publik/flirt.pdf>
Also, their _advanced_ guide to flirting:
<http://www.sirc.org/publik/flirt2.pdf>
~~~
divia
From the advanced guide:
_27 percent of those in social class AB found this unacceptable, increasing
to 35 percent of the C2s and Ds, and 45 percent of those in social class E._
I'm sure whoever wrote this was just trying to refer to the different groups
in a succinct way, but to me this classification system is amusingly
reminiscent of a Brave New World's.
~~~
andyking
These are pretty standard demographic classifications in Britain, used in
marketing and such-like:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NRS_social_grade>
In, for example, the media you'll quite regularly come across such things as
"Over 50% of our audience are ABC1s".
------
hrabago
While some may find this guide a bit obvious, I find it an interesting read,
and somewhat fitting here in HN. I say this because when I think "hacker", I
think of someone who knows more than just the correct API call to make, but
the reason why. Well, this guide goes beyond stating what or how, but goes
into why as well, in a way that reminds me of technical articles written for
those who are past "Hello World".
------
dkarl
"Almost any participant sport or hobby can involve flirting. The level of
flirtatious behaviour, however, often tends to be inversely related to the
standards achieved by participants and their enthusiasm for the activity."
Damn, so much for meeting someone while doing something I actually _like_. The
good news is I've always wanted to join a book club but never have because I
don't like the books they read. I didn't realize my distaste for chick lit
would actually work to my advantage.
------
sown
I stopped trying when I realized I needed a guide like this.
~~~
dkarl
Don't stop trying. Remember the world is full of girls who are a bit more
awkward than their peers, not to mention girls who had socially awkward
fathers. As long as you're making a sincere effort to interact pleasantly with
people, without pretending that you don't have a problem, you will find girls
who are willing to overlook your awkwardness. It's just another unattractive
characteristic that some people mind and other people don't, like being
chubby, short, boring, badly dressed, poor, always late, glib, irresponsible,
whatever. People can even find it endearing.
Good intentions + sincere effort + honesty about who you are = nothing to be
ashamed of.
~~~
sharkbrainguy
chubby, short, boring, badly dressed, poor, always late, glib, irresponsible
Please... just stop describing me
~~~
kirubakaran
Ah, so you are the chubby, short, boring, badly dressed, poor, always late,
glib, irresponsible guy who gets all the women with his sense of humor!
------
sanj
I never thought that HN would be a place to discuss my Grand Unified Theory of
Flirting!
It is based in negotiation theory, which always struck me as a good starting
point.
~~~
Raphael
It would be awesome to finally reconcile Quantum Love-chanics and Feynman's
Theory of Flirtativity.
~~~
eru
Feynman was definitely an expert on this.
[Insert xkcd-comic link here.]
------
c00p3r
After you're finished that cosmo-style psyhology text, take a look at our
favion.ico. =)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Show HN: Plainflow, behavior-based customer journeys for your SaaS - anacleto
https://www.plainflow.com/
======
anacleto
HN, this is a simple way for SaaS companies to integrate SaaS services and
create behavioral based customer journeys.
Some examples:
\- Send onboarding emails when you have new signups
\- Send a Slack alert to your #customer-success team when there is a new
churn-risk customer
\- Send a Slack message to your #sales team when there's a new demo request
event
Here's interactive workflow example (no need for signup)
[https://www.plainflow.com/recipe/slack-notification-for-
chur...](https://www.plainflow.com/recipe/slack-notification-for-churn-risk-
customers)
Thoughts?
------
richardfeynman
This is going to be big. I hope that one day HN will look back at the lack of
upvotes on this post in the same way they look at the Dropbox announcement on
HN.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Tea or Coffee? - lewisflude
I'm a coffee man myself!
======
loungin
Tea... the taste/smell of coffee is so disgusting to me that it makes me
nautious for as long as I can remember. Even as an ingredient in food, there
is something about coffee that is completely repulsive.
------
victorhn
Used to be coffee, but now i am experimenting with green tea, i have found
that it provides a milder effect but more lasting and it doesn't have the
crash associated with coffee.
------
simon
Both ... just not at the same time. That would be like crossing the streams!
------
praptak
I switch between coffee, tea and yerba mate.
------
jstanley
Yeah... it's tea for me.
"MISS TEEEEA!"
------
saurabh
Chai or better yet, cutting.
------
willieavendano
Coffee and Yerba mate
------
iends
Just water.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Show HN: Spy on Optimizely customers' experiments - zjgreen
Here is a bookmarklet you can use you browse or spy on an Optimizely customer's experiments!<p>javascript:window.jQuery && jQuery.getScript("//gist.github.com/optimizelyspytool/7a7f573ec1657fb7db97/raw");<p>(highlight and drag this to your bookmark bar on your browser)<p>Since all of their experiment code is made publicly available in the javascript library, rather than server-side decisioning, it's all waiting to be browsed!<p>I saw a site made by the guys over at http://nerdydata.com but has since been removed.<p>Post any interesting finds using the tool!
======
latteatwork
I can think of times where I can use this to see experiments my competitors
are running!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
CSS Triggers - callum85
http://csstriggers.com/
======
onion2k
What the site fails to explain is _why_ these things are important. Changing a
property that effects a layout change means the browser will need to redraw
that element and anything that the geometry has pushed around. A full repaint
is _slow_ so if you're doing it often the user's experience will be very
negatively impacted. A composite event should be pretty fast as it happens
largely on the GPU hardware.
For this reason, for example, animating things with a CSS transform is
considerably better for the user than animating a property like left or
margin-left. Animating with CSS can be _much_ better than something like
jQuery's animate().
If you want to know more, google 'layout thrashing'.
~~~
callum85
"fails to explain" is a bit harsh. It's a cheat sheet for people who already
know about layout thrashing.
------
mcmillion
Great list. Very useful.
The info box renders halfway off the screen in Safari 7.0.5
------
StephenGL
Fairly useful reference. Nees a key for the colors. I had no idea what the
dots meant.
~~~
gotofritz
There is a key... although they should use tooltips so that when you scroll
the key out of view you can still tell which dot is which but rolling over
them
~~~
StephenGL
Or just scroll the key with the giant "Select a property" thing.
------
robin_reala
Worth pointing out that this is only tested in Chrome for the time being.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ceefax Final Broadcast: 'Goodbye, cruel world.' - laumars
http://h4ck.in/g/a/14/Ceefax-Final-Broadcast%3A-%27Goodbye%2C-cruel-world.%27#.UIcBm60drmg.hackernews
======
ashleyblackmore
This is what I would play around with before I had a computer. You could only
use it with a certain remote (with coloured buttons) and my folks didn't have
one so I couldn't use it at home. It infuriated me knowing it was nevertheless
coming across the air. I could only use it at my grandparents' place. I think
they were pretty baffled that I wanted to spend so much time clicking around
on a gaudy screen, but there were games and live news streams. Also kids shows
would announce Ceefax pages at the end of shows so you could get more
information. So much like the internet but years before I would have access.
QQ.
So long, Ceefax
~~~
scrumper
All you really needed was a "Text" button on your remote. The coloured buttons
were for Fastext, a later innovation found on more expensive tellies. You posh
nob with your posh grandparents. :)
I'm sad it's going, but I don't think I've looked at it in over twenty years.
Do you remember BBC2 announcing "And now, some pages from Ceefax," in the
afternoon? My cue to go outside and play...
Oh, and you talk about frustration: our first TV was a giant old brown-cased
Grundig. No text, but the remote that came with it had all the buttons! Now
that was a slap in the face.
~~~
ashleyblackmore
No text button! :,( But yeah my posh grandparents had a pretty posh telly!
>> "And now, some pages from Ceefax," in the afternoon? My cue to go outside
and play...
Kinda reminds me of this: <http://imgur.com/AlzRd>
Weather on Ceefax: [http://i.telegraph.co.uk/multimedia/archive/02196/map-
ceefax...](http://i.telegraph.co.uk/multimedia/archive/02196/map-
ceefax_2196470b.jpg)
Turner the Worm: <http://www.yoursinclair.co.uk/pics/anims/dinosaurplanet.gif>
~~~
scrumper
Hah! Fantastic stuff! And of course Your Sinclair is a prime nostalgia trigger
all of its own. Do you remember Bamboozle (I think it was on C4 rather than
Ceefax.)
What about this then? <http://www.grangehill.net/bbc1_clock_offair.jpg>
I remember being blown away when they changed to this:
<http://625.uk.com/tv_logos/logos/bbc1_85.jpg>
Funny to think about how little media we had back then, when today I can pull
a slab out of my pocket and access a significant fraction of the world's
movies, songs and books instantly. Reckon I had more fun then though, but that
might be because I didn't have a hellish job and a family to feed. Ah well.
Cheers for the memories. Better stop now or we'll end up talking about Bagpuss
and the bloody Clangers like a pair of students.
~~~
nicholassmith
My aunt and uncle used to look after me and my sister when we'd finished
school before my mum finished work, highlight was group playing Bamboozle. It
was awesome, then occasionally the signal would die and it'd ruin your game.
------
halvsjur
Still going strong on most Norwegian channels. It's very good for a fast
news/weather/stock etc. update, the interface is much faster to use compared
to what you get with the web.
Modern TVs cache all 999 possible pages, so flipping between pages is
instantaneous. With old sets you could end up waiting for about a minute in
the worst case.
NRK (the Norwegian equivalent to the BBC) have a web based interface:
<http://nrk.no/tekst-tv/190/>
~~~
mongol
It's the same in Sweden (at least for public service broadcasting SVT). There
is an Android app that I use regularly that gives the same user interface as
the television screen. Text-TV as it is called here is still very fast in
breaking news, as well for relevant though brief news headlines. It is one of
the best medium for news still.
For example, the news that Sweden was on its way to turn around from 0-4 to
4-4 against Germany in WC qualifiers reached me by the means of Text-TV (the
start page said so at 3-4), so I could tune it in and see the 4-4 goal.
<http://www.svt.se/svttext/web/pages/100.html>
------
josephlord
It's quite possible to broadcast teletext on digital services and that is done
widely at least through Europe. The UK went for MHEG as a replacement. I found
teletext faster and often fuller in detail than the equivalent digital
services although the pictures are better on MHEG and it has the ability to
embed broadcast streams (sometimes loops and sometimes live).
At least the TVs I worked on received MHEG if they were set to UK and teletext
in other settings.
~~~
TazeTSchnitzel
Huh. I thought we used one of the HTML subsets for our interactive services.
Guess not.
~~~
pa676767
That's coming. MHEG is going be replaced with hbbtv (a html sub-set). MHEG is
too difficult to write and has a small number of people who understand the
weird syntax.
~~~
TazeTSchnitzel
Ah, that's good to hear :)
------
venti
The German system, called "Teletext" is still alive and kicking. See for
example <http://ardtext.de/> and <http://zdftext.de/> of the first and second
TV channel in Germany. Even in times of the Web it's often faster to get the
latest sports results through teletext (if you just want the results and no
clutter).
~~~
waqf
Small point: Teletext is not the "German" system, it's the generic name for
the service. The UK had several Teletext services, such as Ceefax (BBC
channels) and Oracle (independent channel). Similarly ARDText and ZDFtext are
German Teletext services.
~~~
kleiba
The German name for the service is "Videotext", although this might just be
colloquial.
------
Tycho
The travesty is, it's still better than the Red Button service you get with
brand new digital TVs (as far as reading text goes, anyway).
------
wronskian
Just to be clear, the 'final screen' shown in that article is a mock-up that's
been doing the rounds; it wasn't shown on the actual BBC Ceefax service.
~~~
makomk
Yeah, the BBC News article at <http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-20032882> has what
were apparently the actual final moments of Ceefax (top video on the page) -
they're a lot more impresssive.
------
aj700
To ease the pain, hasn't somebody made a user style sheet that makes BBC News
web pages look like Ceefax? White on black. Fixedsys?
------
gnu8
"BBC ageism"? How dramatic can we get? I'm sure there are more efficient and
effective ways of providing people with information today. Memories are
wonderful but let's not let our sentiment turn into outrage over turning off
an outdated service that is no longer needed.
~~~
iamjustlooking
It's a tongue in cheek joke based on a number of BBC ageism scandals that have
erupted over the past couple of years.
<https://www.google.com/search?q=bbc+ageism+tribunal>
~~~
gnu8
Thanks, that puts it into perspective for me.
~~~
corin_
I think even without that context it ought to have been clear that the entire
message is written to be humourous - not having a dig at you, maybe English
isn't your first language or maybe you just have a different sense of humour
to me, just saying that this was designed to be funny to all, not to those who
spot the in-joke.
------
k-mcgrady
This was how I got 'niche' news before we had the internet. Every morning
before school I would hit text, type in the page number and get the latest F1
news. If I remember correctly when there were multiple pages it would cycle
through them automatically which meant that if you didn't read quick enough
you had to wait for it to cycle back around so you could finish the page. It
used to stay on each page for about 30 seconds so this was a real pain on 4/5
page stories.
And, similar to browsing multiple websites to read different sources, I would
use the BBC's Ceefax and then switch to ITV to read their teletext service.
~~~
jameshart
I guess it's a little late to let you into the secret now, but: that was what
the 'hold' button on the remote was for - it would prevent the page reloading
the next time the page number was transmitted. Of course, when you finish
reading page 1, and 'unhold' it, the next version of the page to load might
not be page 2, perhaps, but say, page 8. So you have to wait for 2 to come
round again....
------
TomGullen
RIP Ceefax "Now and Next"! The most useful page on it!
I will always remember the way that if you are on page 643 and you type 641 it
will go 644, 645, 646.. and other times randomly just straight to it.
~~~
anigbrowl
That brings back memories - I had so many three-digit numbers into muscle
memory for checking news, TV listings and so on, and used to be able to flip
around really fast because I had a feel for the page timing. I guess Ceefax
was long past its use-by date, but I'm sad to see it go. every time I use the
Cable TV guide here in the US I wish I could call up Ceefax instead.
------
zizee
This story reminds me of the story of the recent closure of the venerable
Minitel network in France.
<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2733106>
<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4170531>
<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4175141>
------
handelaar
Ireland's (<http://rte.ie/aertel>) goes off air in 6 hours.
------
gadders
Uh oh. Where is my Dad going to get his horse racing results now? NB: He
doesn't have a computer.
~~~
user24
Where I work, <http://gg.com>, we offer text message based alerts for running
horses.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Where Are the Hardest Places to Live in the U.S.? - pzaich
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/26/upshot/where-are-the-hardest-places-to-live-in-the-us.html
======
valar_m
I am from Bell County, Kentucky, ranked 3110 out of 3135 counties. I no longer
live there, but my parents do. I was there just yesterday for Thanksgiving.
It may be tempting to dismiss the problems plaguing this region as being self-
inflicted, a mere product of backward ways and a collective refusal to catch
up. These problems, however, are infinitely more complex than that. Countless
politicians at every level of government have tried to find a solution.[0] In
the end, they all failed.
It occurs to me as I type this that I don't have a precise thesis for my
comment, other than to say this: It is not easy. If it were easy to fix, we
would have.
[0]
[http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=9518](http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=9518)
~~~
lisper
> Countless politicians at every level of government have tried to find a
> solution.[0] In the end, they all failed.
You can lead a horse to water...
As long as people insist on believing that the earth is 6000 years old, that
lowering taxes on rich people is going to make their own lives better, and
that the best way to preserve freedom and peace is unfettered access to
firearms, there is only so much you can do for them. At the end of the day you
simply can't help someone who steadfastly refuses to help themselves.
~~~
refurb
What a ridiculous comment. So if they don't subscribe to liberal values they
deserve their fate? You sounds like lke the rednecks i've met. "Those dumb
city folks just don't know any better!"
~~~
lisper
Science is not a liberal value.
~~~
refurb
Looking down on folks who don't think like you apparently is.
~~~
toomuchtodo
Facts are non-negotiable.
~~~
refurb
Treating people with respect should also be non-negotiable.
I'm always amazed at the folks who are "open-minded" and at the same time feel
a need to "correct" anyone who doesn't think the same way they do.
What is the harm if folks have different beliefs than you?
~~~
lisper
The problem is not that their beliefs are different. The problem is that in
places like rural Kentucky, doggedly clinging to beliefs even in the face of
overwhelming evidence to the contrary is widely considered to be a virtue.
That is not an attitude that is conducive to problem-solving, and so,
unsurprisingly, problems tend to go unsolved.
I don't think that pointing this out is in any way disrespectful.
------
fivedogit
I'm from Lexington, KY, the blue dot in a sea of orange on the map. You hear a
lot about Appalachia's woes (the stories on the local news from Bell County,
Bath County, etc are depressing beyond words), but it's been hard for me to
understand _why_ Appalachia is the way it is: chronically, horribly and
uniformly poverty stricken.
So I just read this PBS author interview which tries to put some reasons to
it:
[http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/countryboys/readings...](http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/countryboys/readings/duncan.html)
The main takeaway, as I read it, is that in cities and other rural areas there
is a middle class and even some upper class folks around and the resources
they bring along (and maybe even the example they set... sorry if that's
offensive) is a positive influence on the extremely poor. In cities, obviously
you have better municipal services and programs and a professional class of
doctors, lawyers, etc. In rural farmland many families own their land which
has some value and there are some wealthy landowners with large tracts
sprinkled in.
In Appalachia, there's none of that. The land isn't worth anything and it's
just poor poor poor as far as the eye can see (which is large, geographically,
unlike inner cities).
Except for coal mine owners and operators. That, I can't explain. Do they live
in the area? Do they not contribute to the communities? The PBS article goes
as far as to say they actively held the poor down to keep them working in the
mines, but I'd have to see more evidence to believe that wholesale.
In any case, it strikes me that this wasteland of poverty with very few middle
class or wealthy folks is the opposite effect of tech hubs. Brad Feld and
others have written about how the density of entrepreneurs and angel investors
with deep pockets is what makes a tech hub viable (very liberally
paraphrased). From a general perspective, it seems like a normal curve where
the outliers at the top are places most uniformly non-poor and populated
densely and the outliers at the bottom are uniformly poor and populated
sparsely.
~~~
bane
It's a bad cycle. Imagine you're the "wealthy" person in a town of poor,
jobless people. What local businesses do you spend you time and money in?
Groceries and gas? Both are probably not locally owned, so most of what you
spend leaves the area. You drive 2 hours on weekends to get to the nearest
Walmart to buy clothes, so again most of your money leaves the area: and none
of the places you're spending at employee lots of people and/or pay them lots
of money. Most of the jobs servicing those industries will be part-time
anyways.
For the people who work in the mines, they make more money, but they honestly
don't really know what to do with it...and there's nothing in particular to
spend it on locally anyway.
Even worse, arable land is a rarity, it is a mountain area! So it's hard to
even build a local agricultural economy. It's isolated from transport links,
landlocked and hard to navigate. If you pick a route from anywhere East of
Appalachia, and take it to San Francisco or L.A., you'll be routed entirely
around the area in favor of a Northern or Southern route.
I didn't grow up in Appalachia, but I grew up in an area not too different
from it. Honestly, if we hadn't been within commuting distance of a major
city, my career options would have been farm work or gas station attendant.
There wasn't even enough of a commercial sector for "retail clerk" to make the
list.
It's a useful thing to drive through that area: it's stunningly beautiful, but
you start to get a feel for why there's so little going on there.
~~~
seanmcdirmid
Tourism might work, the area is plenty beautiful. Of course, those jobs aren't
really that great. Most cities in mountainous regions are built in valleys for
that reason.
But really, mountainous areas just can't support that many people, so they
shouldn't be that populated anyways.
> Even worse, arable land is a rarity, it is a mountain area!
In Asia they terrace a lot. Not sure if that is a good idea though, and
definitely not necessary in the states where there is plenty of good
agriculture land (much of China is mountainous, so it is necessary).
~~~
bane
There is, lots of ski resorts, hiking, that sort of thing. The kicker is that
those same places will actually hire in lots of Europeans to work the
facilities, so not only are the employees not local, they aren't even from the
same country!
It's a shame, there's a kernel of some great culture there, a unique dialect,
great music, entertaining local history and color, some beautiful folk art.
Local dialect
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=03iwAY4KlIU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=03iwAY4KlIU)
The traditional music is a descendant of Celtic folk music, but unique enough
to be interesting.
Here's a fantastic documentary on the music
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MXh8SDp0H-E](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MXh8SDp0H-E)
All it would really take would be for some kind of Appalachian Music to become
wildly popular and I could see the region getting popular music centers people
would come to visit. Their main possible export market is all cultural.
------
clairity
i was in arkansas last week for my father's passing. i've been writing about
his life as a way to cope, and my trip was a stark reminder of the marginal
lives of the working poor in this country. mind you, these are not people
asking for a handout or who see themselves as poor. but their 40 hours of work
(if they can get it) certainly provides much less for their families. they
have jobs implicated in all sorts of health problems that are barely being
managed by a mediocre health system. they worry about foreclosure and
repossession and deal with payday lenders and pawn shops. phones and other
utilities get cut off for non-payment and they're charged fees they can't
afford to reinstate service. they're not unhappy so much as they have much
harder lives than those of us in the professional ranks. it's simply not fair.
------
weeksie
Urbanization. The trend is continuing and is going to continue and as it does
the rural areas of the country are going to see more and more resources drain
to urban centers. Eventually the rural population will be entirely composed of
maniac bandits driving burnt out plymouth dusters with mounted machine gun
turrets and terrified hill people raising rabbits for food in their back
yards.
But for serious, as we see urbanization pick up, the rural areas are going to
continue their downward slide. And as the trend toward suburbanization has
reversed we're going to see the suburbs become the new "burnt out inner
city"—because inner city is no longer synonymous with poverty and crime.
~~~
thrownaway2424
I'm not sure this forecast is based on the data in this article. Rural land is
actually ridiculously valuable and increasing in value rapidly. I passed up an
opportunity to buy some prime farmland in 2008 at what I considered an
exorbitant price. The same land today is worth triple. Anyway there's a bunch
of very empty, very rural counties in the top decile of this analysis. Just
look at Iowa where there are lots of top counties including Story County. Then
look at Wyoming which looks really good in this analysis.
To some extent I think this analysis is plagued by law of small numbers. It
seems like the ranking is highly influenced by the fraction of disabled people
but there's a lot of quantization noise in that figure, especially when a
county like Teton County, Wyoming contains only 22000 people. I think the same
thing is probably happening in rural eastern California, for instance in Mono
County (pop 14000).
~~~
ap22213
Define valuable. I live in Northern Virginia, where a good acre of land can
cost a million dollars. Yet, I can drive 3.5 hours and get to land that's
worth under $1,000 an acre.
~~~
thrownaway2424
Prime farmland (USDA class 1 soil capability) in Iowa costs 10-12 thousand
dollars per acre. In 2006 such land cost 3-4 thousand. Ref:
[http://www.extension.iastate.edu/agdm/wholefarm/html/c2-75.h...](http://www.extension.iastate.edu/agdm/wholefarm/html/c2-75.html)
~~~
toomuchtodo
Which is currently driven up in price by cheap money that has nowhere else to
go for safe yields (after the stock collapse in '00 and the real estate
collapse of '08).
[http://giannini.ucop.edu/media/are-
update/files/articles/V15...](http://giannini.ucop.edu/media/are-
update/files/articles/V15N1_3.pdf)
------
cellis
Why is Loudoun County, Virginia so prosperous? It has a median household
income of $122,000, but I don't see any meaningful employers in the area, and
it's a large population of around 350,000 people.
~~~
colinbartlett
That's Northern VA where tons of tech companies are and was the veritable
center of the internet before Silicon Valley. (AOL is or was headquartered in
Dulles which is in Loudoun County). It still houses a massive amount of
technology companies, data centers, etc.
------
davidw
What's up with Wyoming? Some of those counties have median incomes above 70K.
~~~
rdl
0% state income tax, so if you are rich and have 5 homes, the Wyoming one is a
good primary residence.
Also, lots of ranches. These are usually run off someone's personal taxes, so
high income and high deductions/expenses. $500k/yr income isn't that great
when you need to spend millions every decade and high annual operating
expenses too. A lot of ranching or timber is about early capex leading to
income down the line.
Ski stuff.
~~~
toomuchtodo
> the Wyoming one is a good primary residence.
Something to note: Wyoming doesn't shield either traditional or Roth IRAs
(although ERISA-protected assets like 401ks are) from creditors, unlike other
no-income tax states such as Texas and Florida.
~~~
rdl
Interesting, although probably largely irrelevant for the mega-rich. IIRC
Wyoming _does_ have a homestead exemption, so your house can't be taken.
------
xmstr
The bible belt continues to have some of the worst (or hardest) places to live
in US. If find this very interesting, as many in this area continue to shun
higher education in favor of strict adherence to the bible.
~~~
bdunbar
> shun higher education in favor of strict adherence to the bible.
Which passage in the Bible tells Christians to shun higher education?
~~~
jchrome
> Which passage in the Bible tells Christians to shun higher education?
\- He/She never said that any biblical passage tells Christians to shun higher
education. Nice straw man.
He/She said "many in this area continue to shun higher education in favor of
strict adherence to the bible." But, since you are asking the question, lets
look at an answer:
\- How about all of the passages justifying rape/slavery/violence in the Old
Testament? All of these, while not outright shunning higher education, do so
implicitly. Just one example among many:
"However, you may purchase male or female slaves from among the foreigners who
live among you. You may also purchase the children of such resident
foreigners, including those who have been born in your land. You may treat
them as your property, passing them on to your children as a permanent
inheritance. You may treat your slaves like this, but the people of Israel,
your relatives, must never be treated this way." (Leviticus 25:44-46 NLT)
Something else to look at - "Anti-intellectualism in American Life" (Richard
Hofstadter). A great book. His tale begins with itinerant Baptist ministers
traveling through the bible belt, denouncing those "New England
intellectuals". Anti-Intellectualism and organized American religion in the
South are very good and old friends.
------
lisper
These results need to be taken with a big ol' hunk o' salt. The outliers are
all teeny tiny counties. #1 ranked Los Alamos county has only 17,000
residents, and last-place Clay county has 21,000. The bigger the county, the
more likely it is to simply regress to the mean.
Actually, the most interesting result is that Los Angeles county, which with
~10M people is the most populous in the U.S., is not closer to the middle than
it is.
~~~
TheCoelacanth
That doesn't appear to be accurate. #3 Fairfax County, VA and #9 Montgomery
County, MD both have over a million people which puts them in the top 50
counties in the US by population. The others are smaller, but many are still
much larger than Los Alamos. #4 Loudoun County, VA has 350,000, #6 Howard
County, MD has 290,000, #2 Arlington County, VA has 227,000 and #7 Alexandria
City, VA has 140,000.
It's also worth mentioning that those six counties are all contiguous with
each other. That's a combined total of over 3 million people. That's far too
many to dismiss as simply a statistical outlier.
~~~
lisper
I'm not saying that these results are completely invalid, just that they can't
simply be taken at face value. You have to take things like population into
account when interpreting the data.
------
ams6110
I guess "hard" is subjective. I was guessing the hardest place might be rural
Alaska where you have no electric power or water unless you provide it
yourself, and you have to spend most of the short summer cutting firewood so
you don't freeze to death over the winter, and growing vegetables, fishing,
and hunting so you don't starve.
------
burger_moon
When you compare it to this dot map which shows population density you can see
a relation to high density in rural areas to the worse areas on the other map.
[http://demographics.coopercenter.org/DotMap/](http://demographics.coopercenter.org/DotMap/)
------
Zaheer
Very interesting data, also compare it to the Racial Dot Map:
[http://demographics.coopercenter.org/DotMap/](http://demographics.coopercenter.org/DotMap/)
------
EliRivers
Inside some of those prisons looks extraordinarily harsh. The ones where there
is no law and brutal crimes go unpunished every day.
------
DLWormwood
Where’s cost of living in the metrics? Without that, unemployment and median
income paint a very incomplete picture.
~~~
crabasa
Agreed in regards to median income, but COL wouldn't impact life expectancy,
obesity, unemployment or education.
------
Dewie
There seems to be some stark contrasts in South Dakota.
~~~
nostrademons
Also in New York City. While Manhattan is ranked #365 out of 3135, the Bronx
is ranked 2324, Brooklyn is 1306, Staten Island is 601, Queens is 390,
Westchester is 98, and Nassau county is 66. One city (and suburbs) runs the
gamut from poverty to extreme wealth.
~~~
partisan
Having grown up in the Bronx, I am actually really grateful. I can tell you
some horror stories, but the best part of it was that there was still access
to opportunity just an affordable train ride away in Manhattan.
Further up in Westchester and Rockland you find areas that are really deep in
poverty but don't have easy access to reliable public transportation to places
where jobs are more easily found.
------
socialist_coder
Kentucky truly is the worst state in the US.
~~~
briandear
California has the highest cost of living adjusted poverty rate in the United
States.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Show HN: Tcpkit – A tool to analyze TCP/UDP packets with Lua - git-hulk
https://github.com/git-hulk/tcpkit
======
benkillin
How does this differ from scapy other than lua vs python?
~~~
git-hulk
tcpkit offer embedded Redis/Memcached/DNS latency monitor, and export
latency's data to the user, you can store it to influxdb and show latency
buckets with grafana. we now use tcpkit to offer redis/memcached latency
monitor.
------
zamadatix
Any reason to use this over Wireshark/tshark + Lua?
~~~
as-j
I have an embedded system, I have C and Lua and size is a major issue. This
really looks interesting to me, maybe I can fit it, and then run have custom
Lua parsers for different protocols.
Libpcap is probably the biggest issue, it’s pretty large in our world.
I had a quick look through tcpkit, it seems to make some odd decisions. For
example latency stats is done in C. Why isn’t this a generic Lua plugin? I
want latency, but the buckets are all wrong in my world, my latency starts at
300ms, and increases. Why isn’t this in Lua and easily tweakable.
Plus, is I can do latency stats then I can start doing some really interesting
things I care about. For example bandwidth use, average packet size, etc etc.
(Oh, and why Lua 5.2? 5.3 has ints, which is nice when dealing with numbers)
~~~
git-hulk
tcpkit allow the user to run have custom Lua parsers for different protocols.
and the latency only works in redis/memcached mode, use `-m` to specify the
mode, the default is raw, and the packet would pass to Lua VM. See the example
in scripts dir. I would update the Lua to 5.3 later, or pr is welcome.
~~~
as-j
I'm actually pretty excited by this. I hope you didn't take my comment
negatively, this is something that I might really be able to use.
~~~
git-hulk
aha, I very appreciate your comment, also the suggestions were great.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Cheap Arduino Wireless Communications - profquail
http://www.glacialwanderer.com/hobbyrobotics/?p=291
======
proee
The wireless modules in this article are pretty weak sauce (In fact they make
me cringe)
If you're going to do anything that requires reliable data transfer or data
rates higher than a few k, consider the following:
[http://www.microchip.com/wwwproducts/Devices.aspx?dDocName=e...](http://www.microchip.com/wwwproducts/Devices.aspx?dDocName=en535967)
These only cost 10 bucks in single quantities and include a tuned pcb antenna.
These modules are MUCH, MUCH, MUCH better...
~~~
joshu
that looks awesome.
but if i go to $20, i can get xbee parts. any suggestions regarding
differences?
~~~
proee
These modules are basically equivalent to the xbee parts. You'd have to pull
out the spec sheets to see the differences, which may come down to the MAC
layer or software protocals.
------
urfe42
I just finished a project using these exact same parts! After looking at the
high prices on the XBee chips I got a few of these same transmitters and
receivers from Sparkfun to build a remote control for one of my robots. The
chips have a lot of quirks but are not very hard to figure out despite some
comments to the contrary on Sparkfun. If you are interested in Arduino I would
_highly_ recommend Tom Igoe's book Making Things Talk. The book is filled with
a ton of wireless projects and walks you through the Arduino basics. If you
are in L.A. and interested in Arduino I recommend checking out the occasional
Arduino classes offered at Machine Project (www.machineproject.com).
------
skolor
While not entirely related to the article, I've been wanting to start playing
with an Arduino for a while now. I have a little bit of experience with
circuits, but not really anything that goes beyond soldering a longer wire
onto something.
Does anyone have a suggestion about where to start with Arduinos?
Specifically, a kit which would be complete enough to play with and make a few
things.
~~~
blhack
I recently bought and arduino and have been having a _LOT_ of fun with it...
Last night, actually, I was the most giddy I think I have been in YEARS...
I stole two servos out of a remote control plane from my childhood, and
connected them to one another so that I could point a stick at almost any
point...(think like what an observatory does...the end of my servo was the
telescope)...
Anyhow (this is going to be a birthday present for my friend that introduced
me to this)...I connected an LED to the end of a stick that was connected to
one of the servos, then wrote some code to spell out words with it in the
air...
Set a camera in front of it, turn the lights out, expose for about 30 seconds
(or however long the drawing takes) and get a word...totally stupid, totally
pointless and TOTALLY fun...
For this project I needed:
2 servos (any servos will pretty much work...you can buy them at your local
hobby shop)
1 LED
some wire.
Some Spaghetti sticks (I used these to make an "arm" for the LED).
The birthday present is going to be a program that spells out "Happy Birthday"
in the air, as well as the source code for it :).
Honestly, after the servo went back to its "home" position, and shut off the
LED, it took about 10 seconds for the photo to process. Seeing the photo come
onto the screen with my message in it was _AMAZING_.
Seriously, if you're even thinking about buying one of these, JUST DO IT!
Playing with this thing feels like when I first started to code way back
when...
~~~
lsb
That sounds really cool, you should write it up and submit it.
------
kiba
My ideas for a wireless arduino project/startup:
1\. Build a wirless mesh tower that send a stronger signal than of your
typical internet router.
2\. Connect a server to it.
3\. Write docs and plans so others can build it too. Sell arduino kit for lazy
people.
4\. Build a UAV that retransmit wireless signal to other mesh tower.
5\. Again, write docs and plans so other can build transmitter UAV too. Don't
forget selling the kits.
6\. Use profits to build next generation of wireless mesh towers(solar
powered? long lasting?) and transmitter UAV(higher up? Bigger payload? Stay in
the air longer? More pointers?)
7\. Repeat the cycle of improvement, selling, and education.
As a bonus, you get FREE internet.
~~~
joshu
sounds pretty great, except for all the hard parts.
~~~
evgen
yeah, I also missed that step about explaining to the FCC why this unapproved
device should be allowed to "send a stronger signal than of your typical
internet router." As a bonus you do get a FREE visit from some government
bureaucrats though :)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
C Language Resources - RBerenguel
http://www.mycplus.com/featured-articles/top-ten-c-language-resources/
======
svag
Today I was trying to find some resources(sites, books, etc) in order to keep
up to date with some programming languages. One of them was C and I found the
following site:
<http://www.di-mgt.com.au/cprog.html>
Just to mention that the last update of this page was on 1 January 2010.
------
sfphotoarts
It's fascinating watching the HN community ebb and flow around topics, there's
this collective conscious that discusses programming languages (mostly) and
some days the tide takes us to a heavily Pythonic view of the world, and this
week we're having a c revivalist movement.
I thinking writing a system to identify topics on HN day after day and try to
correlate this with other events might be interesting, is it for example all
reactionary, is it some form of herding, does it follow topics on other
similar forums, or just pseudo-random.
Back to the topic. There is one definitive C resource, K&R.
~~~
mmastrac
K&R doesn't cover c99, which makes C far less annoying to write in, IMHO.
Unfortunately I don't have a good, comprehensive reference for c99 to offer up
myself.
~~~
nitrogen
The C99 standard itself and corresponding Wikipedia pages are quite useful.
The gcc manual is also a handy reference for determining whether a particular
gcc feature is standard compliant.
[http://www.google.com/search?&q=filetype%3Apdf+iso+9899](http://www.google.com/search?&q=filetype%3Apdf+iso+9899)
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C99>
~~~
reirob
Funny that only 2 commercial compilers are fully supporting C99 standard: IBM
Rational logiscope >= 6.4 and Sun Studio.
------
mrerrormessage
What about "The C Programming Language"? Didn't that make a lot of us better
programmers by teaching us how to use C?
~~~
agentultra
It's a classic and certainly taught me a lot.
It's also one of the more slim programming books on my shelf. I've considered
handing to to friends interested in programming. Simply because I hand them a
Python book with thousands of pages and I can see them visibly cringe.
I also find the K&R style quite readable. :)
~~~
RBerenguel
I also love K&R's style, it is one of my favourite books about programming
------
spacemanaki
This looks like it's only online resources, but I'm reading C Interfaces and
Implementations, and it's great. I wish I had read it earlier. Even though I
don't use C much at work, it's quite an interesting step from K&R.
------
nitrogen
I would recommend adding the Linux Kernel Coding Style guide to the list of
recommended reading for C programmers. You don't have to follow its advice,
but seeing some of the reasoning behind the policies therein can improve your
appreciation of the language details.
Original version (text): <http://www.kernel.org/doc/Documentation/CodingStyle>
Formatted version (HTML):
[http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/alfs/view/hacker/part2/hacke...](http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/alfs/view/hacker/part2/hacker/coding-
style.html)
------
saqi
This list is full of valuable links. Thank you all!
------
nonUser
Website is down :(
~~~
dwc
HN + Reddit, apparently too much for the server. Maybe it'll respond properly
later.
EDIT: I just refreshed and it worked.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
We Mailed 100K Stickers Around the World, Made a Million Mistakes Along the Way - rbanffy
https://dev.to/thepracticaldev/sending-100-thousand-stickers
======
F_r_k
I still don't know why companies insist on only accepting a specific address
format. As they said, every country has its own format: some with the house
number in front of the street, other afterwards; some with a province, others
not; etc.
A simple text box is so much simpler (enforce things like max width, max
lines) and relies on the customer inputting their info corresponding to their
local postal delivery. In an international context this is the right way.
Edit: the only thing that must be localized in the sender's locale is the
recipient's country (Spain instead of España when sending from an English
speaking country). Every thing else must be in the recipient's locale.
~~~
zachlatta
At [https://hackclub.com](https://hackclub.com) we send stickers to tons of
students all around the world to help them promote their clubs.
One of the big problems we run into is that people often don't know how to
properly write their address. They'll forget to give us their zip code. Or
their state. Sometimes even their city. Does the state go before or after the
zip code? How do you write the apartment number? It only gets more complex
when they're in another country and we're sending from the US.
We probably run into these issues more often than most because we work with
high schoolers that usually aren't regular users of physical mail, but we also
run into these same problems more often than you'd expect when sending
stickers to adults that donate.
Having form fields to prompt for everything needed fixes this problem.
~~~
BrandoElFollito
_One of the big problems we run into is that people often don 't know how to
properly write their address_
OK, I think there is a limit to babysitting. If someone is a developer /runs a
coding club and __does not know how to write his address __we run into basic
darwinian natural selection.
~~~
zachlatta
How often did you send letters in high school?
I know that I thought zip code came before state until I started sending lots
of mail.
~~~
BrandoElFollito
Everyone knew his address when 10 yo. Not only you have to write it down a few
times a year but it may have even been taught at school (France).
One of the reasons may be that we use addresses a lot, in other countries it
may be that they are used only with actual shipping (?).
~~~
zachlatta
Everyone knows their street address, just not how to write their full address
on an envelope for postal service.
~~~
BrandoElFollito
I meant the full address, the way it should be written on a letter.
------
otto_ortega
"Initially we assumed this endeavor could be housed by a single Excel
file...."
What?! Are you sure dev.to is a community of developers?
I can understand the part about character encoding (it has happen to all of
us...) but seems like a lot of the issues they had could have been avoided by
applying some software development skills...
Still, it is very nice that you decided to give away stickers for free, being
on the recipient side is a nice feeling, I remember from the time Canonical
shipped free Ubuntu disks!
~~~
bhalp1
Founder here. Here are a couple comics that describe why it might have been
the right choice to not try and software develop our way out of this one in
the first place. [https://xkcd.com/974/](https://xkcd.com/974/)
[https://xkcd.com/1319/](https://xkcd.com/1319/)
------
majormjr
I still don't know what dev.to does, only that they fail at sending out free
stickers.
~~~
bhalp1
Founder here. [https://dev.to](https://dev.to) a platform for the software dev
community to talk about what they're hacking on and teach one another. It's a
lot clearer on the home page. This post is just a story about stickers. :)
~~~
Danihan
Not to say that every blog post needs to make you look great, but there were a
LOT of code issues with this process. You should invest in a grumpy QA team.
~~~
bhalp1
Duly noted. I'm pretty proud of our team in general though. At the time there
were two devs working on the whole app and I think we got a lot of good work
done.
------
darshandsoni
Some of those mistakes really shouldn't have happened, particularly because it
was a community of developers and not just some big, old-school corporation.
It's nice to see 95% of people eventually received their items but that
could've been achieved with a lot less hassle!
On a side note, I hope the addressing experience was insightful and will be
thought of better in future applications. It irks me to see so many web forms
with the very American form of "City, State, ZIP" that are not designed to
handle any exceptions to that rule, not because the company policy doesn't
cater to an international audience, but because the developers didn't realise
that addressing is very different across the world - and those people all get
their mail just fine.
~~~
jads
In a very small way, it always bothers me as a Brit (now living in the US) to
see address information ask for (and even require) a ZIP code for int'l
customers for two reasons:
1\. ZIP is a US-only term. Sure, it's easy to figure out, but it's postal code
everywhere else in the world. If an address form has a country field, the form
should at least change the label accordingly. If not, even just writing
"ZIP/postal code" makes at least some attempt to avoid US-centric terminology.
2\. Some countries don't use a postal code system at all. I've seen services
make this a required field, regardless of country.
~~~
bhalp1
Our form said Zip Number/Postal Code and State/Province and neither were
required fields.
~~~
jads
Sorry, this was not aimed at/related to dev.to - just an observation of
address fields in general. Glad you were displaying geographically appropriate
address info :)
------
logfromblammo
I read the article, and discovered that they did not literally make 10
mistakes per sticker.
More like about 10 mistakes overall that resulted in a 5% failure rate for
sticker delivery.
------
cdpolyme
> So when we got inputs like Después de hogares crea, segunda entrada mano
> derecha, última casa verde (something about the last green house on the
> right according to Google Translate), we figured we had to validate these
> addresses.
Weird as it might seem, that's how addresses work in some places, if you make
it invalid, you are excluding those users.
------
lowbloodsugar
Thank you for sharing this. I think a lot of people here forget that there is
no such thing as common sense, only hard earned experience. I thought you
acted in true start-up fashion, learned a lot, and made your customers happy.
------
Ryel
Not sure why you're getting so many negative comments in this thread but the
Dev.to team is AMAZING.
Thank you for the stickers!
I took some for myself and gave a few to some friends in my coworking space at
Galvanize and Green Desk in NYC.
------
celim307
Some of those things I don't understand how you can make when there are so
many libraries out there, and are common things to look out for.
Other than that, cool idea and cool project
~~~
bitJericho
Because 20-something devs actually do suck at their jobs, and experience
matters!
------
sebst
Slightly OT, but has anybody a recommendation on supplier of such printed
stickers? I was thinking about sending some to my customers as well. Either US
or Europe.
~~~
heartbreak
The supplier that dev.to used according to the OP is Sticker Mule.
[https://www.stickermule.com/](https://www.stickermule.com/)
------
strgrd
I was really hoping they were going to mention kerning, because despite the
letters appearing perfectly spaced, all I see is "DE V."
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Welcome to the New Techno Feudalism - deevolution
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/apr/24/the-new-feudalism-silicon-valley-overlords-advertising-necessary-evil
======
jrepinc
Also
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n-2TEwdRnX0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n-2TEwdRnX0)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
In California, It’s U.S. vs. State Over Marijuana - ghshephard
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/14/us/14pot.html?hpw
======
nestlequ1k
Looking forward to another 4 more years of this "hope and change".
For the record DOJ is directly under the President's control. You can't blame
Republicans for this one. If we can't trust Obama to take rational positions
on such clear cut issues, who can we trust?
~~~
cloudwalking
While I agree that pot should be legal, I don't think this is a clear-cut
issue.
The President is head of the Executive branch. It's his duty to enforce
Congress's laws.
Pot is illegal at the federal level (aka Congressional law). It's against the
law to possess, sell, etc. So unfortunately the President is legally required
to prosecute this.
Now, given that, I am a bit disappointed this is happening. There are plenty
of other more important things to prosecute more zealously. Especially given
Obama's "bigger fish to fry" comment.
~~~
iandanforth
The President could, and should, say that the law is unconstitutionally broad.
It would be a much more conservative reading of the constitution to say that
Congress does not have the power to arbitrarily outlaw substances within any
and all states. This is why it required a constitutional amendment to outlaw
alcohol. Given a traditional legal precedent and a strict-interpretation court
the President has both the grounds to deem certain provisions of the law
unconstitutional and the belief that that would be upheld by the court. Those
are the only two tests he needs to pass to refuse to enforce a portion or all
of the law.
Responsibility to enforce the laws of congress:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_Two_of_the_United_State...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_Two_of_the_United_States_Constitution#Clause_5:_Caring_for_the_faithful_execution_of_the_law)
Right to refuse to enforce un-constitutional provisions:
<http://www.justice.gov/olc/nonexcut.htm>
History of the commerce clause (Or "FDR, how we miss your court packing"):
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause>
~~~
greenyoda
But if Obama claims the law prohibiting drugs is unconstitutionally broad and
shouldn't be enforced, he couldn't justify prosecuting the Mexican drug
cartels for selling drugs either. And I don't think he wants to go that far
toward drug legalization, given what his position has been on this subject so
far (he's waged the "war on drugs" as actively as his predecessors have).
------
blahedo
As much as I support marijuana legalisation, I'm always puzzled at the
righteous anger summoned against the federal government for prosecutions like
this---how dare they, when the states have said it's legal! The problem is,
that argument is an extremely shady one, with an extremely sketchy past. I
currently live in a state (Virginia) where, faced with the Brown v Board
ruling in the 60s, many counties just defunded their public schools entirely
and funneled the money to "private" academies for white kids, with the state's
blessing. The movement was called "Massive Resistance". Several other states
across the South had other policies that were not permitted to stand when they
conflicted with the federal government.
Don't get me wrong, I think the tide is moving in a different direction here
---marijuana legalisation, particularly medical marijuana, is a matter of
"when", not "if". But in the meantime, it really shouldn't be a matter for
surprise or outrage when the federal government prosecutes on it.
~~~
thaumaturgy
The primary error in this line of thinking is to draw parallels between a
racial issue and a drug issue. In the case of the racial issue, the federal
government was acting on the behalf of a portion of its citizenry, and against
the will of a smaller portion of citizens; in this case the federal government
would find itself on the right side of history.
In the drug case, the federal government is acting against the expressed will
of a larger portion of citizenry, to the extent that many of those citizens
have expended considerable effort to pass legislation contrary to the federal
government's enforcement; in this case, I think it is quite likely that the
federal government will find itself on the wrong side of history.
Merely drawing parallels from issues of states' rights versus federalism in
the past isn't very enlightening. You have to consider each issue on its own
merits.
That "righteous anger" isn't because this is simply a states' rights issue;
rather, it's because the federal government is acting against the wishes and
welfare of the citizens of states, and it is not doing so to protect the
interests of some demographic group of victims.
------
ghshephard
More prosecutorial shady behavior by the federal government. Here they are
prosecuting someone who did everything above-board and in accordance with
state law, after the president has made it clear that this type of prosecution
should be low priority.
------
millstone
The article refers to Davies's "seizing on what he saw as uncharted territory
with a vast potential for profits." This is damning if true: California
dispensaries are required to be non-profit.
If Davies really did seek "large profits from the cultivation and sale of
marijuana", as the prosecuting attorney alleges, then he is in violation of
both state and federal law. If he did not seek such profits, then he may
indeed be in compliance with state law.
~~~
jimktrains2
Not really. IIRC he can pay himself a nice salary, he just needs to invest the
rest of the revenue back into the business.
------
rmc
Maybe it's the EU citizen in me, but I just done understand how this is
possible? Isn't it legal in that state? So how can you face jail time?
It almost sounds like there are 2 legal systems and rules if law that operate
in one physical area! And something can be legal in one, and illegal in
another. But that can't be right, that sounds insane. What's the point of
state law then?
Can someone explain this like I'm 5?
~~~
allerratio
Federal law breaks state law. It's the same in federal countries of the EU. In
Germany for example there are several laws where federal law overrides state
law. For example the [Constitution of
Hesse](<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constitution_of_Hesse>) allows death
sentences but is overruled by the German Constitution (the "Grundgesetz")
~~~
eru
A more practical example was the court case that allowed female soldiers to
serve with weapons in Germany.
It went all the way up to European level, and there they overturned German
law.
~~~
rmc
EU is not a great example, since there are no EU laws per se, it's countries
that have to implement EU directives. additionally there is no EU jails or
criminal justice system.
~~~
bscanlan
There are EU laws per se.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regulation_(European_Union)>
------
caf
You would hope that, if it's true that this business was compliant with letter
and spirit of the State law, the California States Attorney would make a
polite request to their Federal counterpart asking that the case be dropped as
not in the public interest. If they don't, it seems like the State is hanging
him out to dry.
------
tsotha
That argument was settled pretty decisively in 1864.
------
davidw
Could we keep marijuana politics discussions elsewhere, please? This is one of
those hotbutton issues that starts to dull the focus and quality of a site
like this.
~~~
josephlord
I think there probably are issues in this case that feel quite relevant here
this week like federal prosecutorial discretion and the means by which plea
bargains are achieved.
~~~
davidw
So because something is tangentially related to something else here, it's
cool, right? Like since Aaron was Jewish, Israeli politics would fly too?
I disagree and think that "7 degrees of hacker news" is a fun game but should
not seriously be considered a serious or legitimate reason to include some or
other article.
~~~
josephlord
I didn't say it was cool but that many people may have felt it was relevant
for that reason. At times over the weekend the front page was 75% Aaron
related so there are clearly large numbers of people with very strong feelings
that his case is important. There is also a strong feeling that prosecutorial
conduct was a significant factor in his death making this story potentially
relevant. I haven't seen anyone suggesting Israeli politics was in any way
related to his death.
Personally I neither upvoted this story or downvoted your comment but the fact
that this story is on the front page and your comment has been downvoted may
indicate that others (shockingly) have different views to yourself and I
remind you of the submissions/comments guidelines:
> Please don't submit comments complaining that a submission is inappropriate
> for the site. If you think something is spam or offtopic, flag it by going
> to its page and clicking on the "flag" link. (Not all users will see this;
> there is a karma threshold.) If you flag something, please don't also
> comment that you did.
~~~
davidw
My guess is that those upvoting the article and downvoting me are people for
whom the issue is very important. Similar people might vote for articles about
gay rights, euthanasia, immigration, and so on and so forth. They're all very
important topics - probably more important than most of what we discuss here,
if you think about it. That's what makes them so good at getting 'airplay'.
Keeping them out has to be a conscious decision and effort.
There's nothing about this article that "gratifies one's intellectual
curiosity." and it might well be considered a "classic flamewar topic",
although I suspect _mostly_ a one-sided flamewar here. Still though, it's a
charged, political subject.
If no one calls out stuff that's off-topic, it's going to continue to be
propagated.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Wikipedia links to HN - lelf
https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special%3ALinkSearch&target=news.ycombinator.com
======
nonchalance
Some of these make perfect sense:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CoffeeScript](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CoffeeScript)
links to
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2037801](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2037801)
with the sentence "On December 24, 2010, Ashkenas announced the release of
stable 1.0.0 to Hacker News, the site where the project was announced for the
first time."
"80legs has been criticised by numerous site owners for its technology
effectively acting as a Distributed Denial of Service attack and not obeying
robots.txt."
[http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1056960](http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1056960)
(which makes sense because the discussion includes site owners)
Others are questionable:
"While ZumoDrive encrypts transport of all content with 256-bit SSL, and
stores that content encrypted on Amazon S3 servers, that content is still
accessible to ZumoDrive administrators" It would seem that the direct link
[http://www.daemonology.net/blog/2010-03-11-zumodrive-
rolls-a...](http://www.daemonology.net/blog/2010-03-11-zumodrive-rolls-a-hard-
six.html) is far more relevant than the comments
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1183308](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1183308)
(and many of the comments actually are opposed to the claim)
~~~
saraid216
Keep in mind that HN comments are actually a fairly decent set of secondary
sources: the discussion of expert-level commentators is _exactly_ what
Wikipedia wants to link to, rather than basing things off the first-hand
claims.
~~~
greenyoda
Except that the quality of HN comments varies widely: not all commenters on HN
are experts in the subjects they're writing about (and the people voting up a
comment aren't necessarily experts either). A general reader following a link
here from Wikipedia is not likely to be able to tell the difference between an
expert and a non-expert. Thus, HN would make a much worse secondary source
than something like an industry publication that has an editor and fact
checkers (rare as these seem to be in our field today).
~~~
tomasien
I, for example, comment regularly on HN and I know next to nothing.
~~~
tomrod
I can report the same.
------
spindritf
Among them an article on Taskwarrior[1]. We are now an officially recognized
authoritative source on procrastination. I don't think anyone could question
that.
[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taskwarrior](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taskwarrior)
~~~
rfnslyr
I've been looking for something like this for a very long time. Anyone know of
something like this with a GUI?
~~~
ronjouch
Not sure it qualifies as _" something like this"_, but for Linux/GTK, GTG [1]
comes to mind.
[http://gtgnome.net/](http://gtgnome.net/)
------
tailbalance
And there's one to news.ycombinator.net
[https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special%3ALinkSea...](https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special%3ALinkSearch&target=news.ycombinator.net)
------
GabrielF00
Hacker News would not qualify as a reliable source on Wikipedia as it is an
aggregator of user-submitted content without much oversight.
~~~
gwern
No, but many of these may be used in much the same way as why Wikipedia links
to tons of Twitter pages even though it's 'an aggregator of user-submitted
content without much oversight' \- the users themselves confer the the
reliability. I wouldn't be surprised at all to see a pg comment used as a
source in the Paul Graham article.
~~~
GabrielF00
But that's a primary source. Generally, use of primary sources on Wikipedia
should be limited because primary sources are easily subject to abuse. For
instance, even something as simple as a quote from X that "Y is great" can be
problematic. Is that what X really thinks? Is there a quote from somewhere
where X says "Y is not great?" Was X really in a position to evaluate Y?
Wikipedia articles should generally be based on reliable secondary and
tertiary sources.
[[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:PRIMARY#Primary.2C_s...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:PRIMARY#Primary.2C_secondary_and_tertiary_sources)]
~~~
beambot
From your link: "Wikipedia articles should be based on reliable, published
secondary sources and, to a lesser extent, on tertiary sources and primary
sources."
That suggests that Wikipedia treats primary sources on par with tertiary.
------
ck2
Someone should make an automated dmoz-like directory of wikipedia external
links with thumbnails.
------
igorgue
They should go to source links... Unless they're comments or text posts.
------
nvr219
Top one on that list is "toilet paper orientation archive 1" lol.
~~~
misnome
...which is a talk page, without an actual article. And it's a very long
discussion/argument.
I'm not sure a better example of wikipedia could be found.
~~~
polshaw
The 'toilet paper orientation' article is still there, with over 100
notes/references.
------
amerika_blog
Wikipedia is overrated as a resource. It is, like many crowd-sourced things, a
social determination of importance and not an actual assessment.
However, as you'd expect, it's great for pop culture.
~~~
trumbitta2
Out of curiosity: what's an actual assessment of importance, as opposed to a
social determination of importance?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ruby On Rails – Services vs Object Classes - enricribas
http://infinitemonkeys.influitive.com/services-vs-objects/
======
mercurial
When I look at the "good" enterprise codebases, I see more and more
functional-style code written in non-functional languages. Dumb entities,
service layers which would be single functions if the language allowed it, and
persistence layers which are essentially stateless apart from their
connections.
So, I'm all for a switch to services instead of fat models, which have always
made me cringe.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Pirate Bay Founder: “Future copy fights will need something better” - llambda
http://torrentfreak.com/shut-down-the-pirate-bay-founder-says-130708/?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter
======
area51org
What he actually said seems to be more along the lines of "shut it down and
replace it with something better." I took the headline to imply that he's
turned over some new leaf and is "anti-piracy" now (clearly untrue from the
article's content).
~~~
javis
'"Shut it down and replace it with something better" says Pirate Bay founder'
doesn't get the clicks TorrentFreak are desperate for.
------
Goosey
Most insightful part is the forward thinking about the new wave of enforcement
that copyright infringement of physical goods via 3D printers will bring.
Something I hadn't considered before, but a massive shift indeed.
~~~
jkn
You probably meant patent infringement rather than copyright infringement? If
not, what would be good examples of copyright infringement made possible
through 3D printing?
~~~
betterunix
[http://www.npr.org/blogs/alltechconsidered/2013/02/19/171912...](http://www.npr.org/blogs/alltechconsidered/2013/02/19/171912826/as-3-d-printing-
become-more-accessible-copyright-questions-arise)
~~~
jkn
Thanks!
These cases seem comparatively insignificant to me. I think patent
infringement will be the real "intellectual property" issue with 3D printing.
I'm looking forward to a renewed debate on the ethics of having governments
intrude in people's private lives to enforce corporate monopolies.
------
yason
What's left to thwart the MAFIAA we need a protocol to serve anonymous/unknown
data, with plausible deniability.
Like this: "I'll store this blob of data on my computer and upload it to
anyone who asks for it as long as I can prove that I don't know what it
contains, and that I can't know what it contains."
Basically some scheme based on asymmetric encryption with the ability to
verify that the blob is encrypted. (The server owner hands one part of the key
to the user, the user encrypts the blob, sends it to the server which verifies
that it's encrypted with the key sent to the user.)
I don't know from the top of my head what's needed to implement that.
~~~
dadrian
You mean onion routing?
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Onion_routing](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Onion_routing)
~~~
jamesjporter
Nah, onion routing just bounces HTTP requests/responses around before sending
them on to their final destination (which is still a just a server somewhere).
What the GP is talking about sounds something more like freenet or
cryptosphere. When you query for some data in these systems you have no idea
where it is stored and the people who are storing it / sending it back to you
have no idea what they are storing.
------
qdpb
This is not a very accurate quote, very link baity.
------
lettergram
Why don't the admin's use The Pirate Bay for donations (on their homepage say)
to help kickstart a new more secure, encrypted, decentralized file sharing
software? I am sure if they offered a $50,000 prize they are far more likely
to get results.
~~~
pokpokpok
because who says the current admins are the best people qualified to build
that software?
~~~
lettergram
It doesn't have to be an admin, I said offer up a prize for someone who CAN
produce a product.
------
cygx
According to Wikipedia, Bittorrent as well as other filesharing solutions like
Gnutella and Kad (the eMule network) can be made to work on top of I2P [1].
The wikipedia page also lists alternative solutions like GNUnet and Freenet
with anonymity built-in from the start instead of bolted-on after it became a
concern.
[1]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anonymous_P2P#I2P_clients](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anonymous_P2P#I2P_clients)
------
mtgx
Maybe he's referring to something like Tribler or Retroshare.
[http://www.tribler.org/](http://www.tribler.org/)
[http://retroshare.sourceforge.net/](http://retroshare.sourceforge.net/)
~~~
GhotiFish
I don't like retroshare, it's a massive resource hog for something that is
supposed to be run in the background. It consumes far to many resources.
The concept I find to be too wasteful. Bouncing through multiple channels is
fine for secure communication, but for large amounts of data...
You don't watch youtube through the TOR network.
~~~
betterunix
"You don't watch youtube through the TOR network."
You might if watching Youtube could destroy your finances, your credit rating,
your ability to connect to the Internet, etc.
------
digitalengineer
It is not said in the article but I think he's referring to the dangers of
real-time tracking of torrent downloaders.
------
contingencies
OK, let's take this apart and use this thread to analyze the alleged failings
of torrent model. He raises:
(1) A security problem ("something safer"), presumably regarding
identification prior to raids and repression.
(2) A speed (asks for "something faster").
(3) Centralization (best not to "depend on a few persons").
My random thoughts:
(1) Tor offers a reasonable approach for torrent metadata accrual and
distribution, but will limit availability. As for actual content, spoofed
origins may be possible on some networks, otherwise intermediaries are
necessary and then you have Tor or a multi-VPN money-draining complexity
fetish. Moving away from the open internet exclusively to Tor/I2P would be a
great way to _educate_ the user base and bring support to those projects. Good
luck moving _all_ torrent tracking sites though... it may just force people
elsewhere. Still, the education benefit would be significant... but there's
strength in numbers and fleeing to darknets does not play one of the greatest
hands: solidarity, or social strength.
(2) Transfer speed challenges perhaps largely derive from the random
distribution; itself an asset. Sourcing content more locally (using AS based
logical topology mapping, community-reported speeds between ASs, etc.) may
provide some benefit, but ultimately may cause greater harm than good due to
increased risk of local distribution and thus prominent node identification
and the aforementioned raids and repression. With regards to _initial_
distribution specifically (versus general redistribution after initial
seeding), it may be possible to add some sort of priority, anonymous queue for
newly posted / incoming data that is based on an anonymous but
cryptographically preserved uploader reputation metric (somehow adjudicated by
trackers?).
(3) Infrastructure costs money, which is perhaps a major part of the
centralization problem with TPB - someone needs the keys to the proverbial
kingdom to keep it running. The web in general needs decentralization of
hosting, which at the moment generally both exposes identities and is too
difficult and expensive for the average user (largely therefore: Blogger,
Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, Picasa, etc.) Read earlier today someplace Firefox
has a project going in this area at the moment based upon altering consumer
browsers to participate in third party data hosting, perhaps this could be co-
opted carefully and legally armoured by to preserve an inability for
individuals to identify which content they are in fact hosting. Unfortunately
its motivator for hosting is the wont to publish one's own data .. elsewhere
.. and most people right now are net consumers rather than publishers, so this
may be brittle.
Others' takes?
------
mhurron
No wait, not yet, I'm not done download ... um ... [insert something about
freedom]
Seriously, my internet connection isn't the fastest, give me some time will
you?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
H1-B petitions drop - perseusprime11
http://www.sfchronicle.com/business/article/H-1B-visa-applications-drop-for-first-time-in-11078751.php
======
ziszis
The numbers in the headline measures the # of H-1B petitions that were
received before the USCIS decided to stop accepting more because they can meet
the "mandated 65,000 visa H-1B cap" and "the 20,000 visa U.S. advanced degree
exemption, also known as the master’s cap"[1]
Given that the agency "will reject and return filing fees for all unselected
cap-subject petitions that are not duplicate filings", it would be desirable
to limit the number of excess applications.
I am not sure that the data points in the article extrapolate to "A lot of
people are looking at America, and (wondering) if it is still a place to make
business."
[1] [https://www.uscis.gov/news/news-releases/uscis-reaches-
fy-20...](https://www.uscis.gov/news/news-releases/uscis-reaches-
fy-2018-h-1b-cap)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Enough with the dead butterflies - mjn
http://emilydamstra.com/news/please-enough-dead-butterflies/
======
syphilis2
I'm glad to have this pointed out to me. It's so "obvious" now that live
butterflies don't look that way, I'll never not notice this now. It's similar
to all the tricks video media uses for aesthetics and common familiarity: gun
cocking noises, computer hacking images, punch sound effects, and the like. It
also remind me of location specific tricks, such as how the pyramids of Giza,
Egypt are shown in pictures, or how wildlife photographers sometimes do staged
photoshoots.
I think it's a very good thing to be aware of this. So much of our information
is received through indirect means, how many things do we watch on video
without understanding how the image and sound has been enhanced? I've been
surprised before to see something in person and realize the media
representation is not accurate.
~~~
XaspR8d
> such as how the pyramids of Giza, Egypt are shown in pictures
I was totally on the same wavelength with Karl Pilkington in _An Idiot Abroad_
when he discovered they were right next to the city. It's such a weird
censoring -- would people value them less if they knew how close they were to
development?
For reference here[1] is a traditional shot of the pyramids, and here[2] is an
aerial view of the adjoining urban area.
[1] -
[https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:All_Gizah_Pyramids.j...](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:All_Gizah_Pyramids.jpg)
[2] - [https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Giza-
pyramids.JPG](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Giza-pyramids.JPG)
~~~
iamatworknow
I was in San Antonio, Texas last week and while not exactly on the same scale
as the pyramids, The Alamo has a similar middle-of-nowhere isolated feel to it
when represented in the media, while in actuality it's smack dab in the middle
of downtown -- surrounded by hotels and gift shops.
~~~
jitl
The Alamo was the most underwhelming historical anything I've ever visited.
Not only is it in the middle of downtown San Antonio, it's also rather small,
and San Antonio itself is a sticky tropical rainforest. Nothing like arid,
lonely fort of the popular culture depictions of the Alamo.
~~~
exclusiv
Isn't the fact that it's small a big part of the historical significance?
~~~
aaron-lebo
Not really. It housed 200 defenders, but it was undermanned at that capacity.
------
murbard2
To be honest, the dead butterflies do look aesthetically more pleasing. I
can't tell if it's because the image is culturally ingrained or if the shape
is simply more elegant. That said, I welcome this knowledge which opens a
whole new opportunity for me to be pedantic at parties.
~~~
farnsworth
I have to agree - the live butterfly shape is clearly more aerodynamic and
realistic, but that long leading edge perpendicular to the body just makes me
think of a stealth bomber or 747 for some reason. The dead butterfly shape is
delicate and elegant. Besides identification, maybe that's another reason that
they mount them that way.
~~~
taneq
I wonder how tightly tied your perception of 'delicate' and 'elegant' is with
'impractical' / 'less capable'?
It reminds me of this blog post on the topic of 'cuteness' in Japanese
culture:
> Female protagonists in Japanese genre productions have to be cute,
> apparently. And cuteness is, I’m told, context-dependent. Big anime eyes and
> tiny pointed noses may be necessary but they are not sufficient. There must
> also be jeopardy.
Source:
[http://www.rifters.com/crawl/?p=4843](http://www.rifters.com/crawl/?p=4843)
~~~
farnsworth
'delicate', yes I think it's absolutely tied to 'impractical' in my mind.
'elegant' maybe isn't the right word for what Im' feeling here. As an
engineer, I see elegance in practicality, efficiency, and straightforwardness.
~~~
taneq
'artistic' or 'aesthetic', maybe, for the second one?
Like you, I tend to see efficiency as most beautiful, especially when one
simple structure fulfills several complex requirements simultaneously. A tiger
or a gazelle is beautiful because it's very close to optimal for the niche
it's evolved to fill.
~~~
murbard2
The Gazelle, perhaps, but what's optimal about orange fur for a jungle
dweller?
~~~
taneq
I dunno but maybe it's the equivalent of countershading camouflage? Tigers are
ambush predators that attack from above. If a tiger's fur only accounts for a
small percentage of the sky above you, and orange and blue are complementary
colours, then small bits of orange fur plus blue sky shouldn't stand out.
------
erroneousfunk
Fascinating! I have a dozen dead butterflies, pinned in frames at home (I
really like [http://www.bugunderglass.com/](http://www.bugunderglass.com/) if
anyone's interested in unique home decorating -- I'm not associated with them
in any way, but I've been buying their bugs for almost 6 years now!) and I
used to raise moths from local caterpillars when I was a kid (you know, back
before I found computers and actually played outside).
I _knew_ the difference between dead and alive butterfly/moth wing positions,
but never consciously noticed the difference in artistic depictions. Heck, I
volunteer at the Boston Museum of Science every week and must have seen that
Monarchs poster a hundred times without noticing.
Comparing art that "did it right" and art that "did it wrong" \-- yeah, if you
do it right, it looks a LOT more realistic and "lively," even if I wouldn't
have known why before reading this article. I'll have to keep an eye out from
now on!
~~~
hobofan
Raising a death's-head hawkmoth was one of the coolest projects my mother did
with us when we were children! It is really neat to experience their entire
development process firsthand.
------
c3534l
This is one of those things you can't unsee. I'm going to be walking around
the world now seeing butterflies drawn in death-poses.
~~~
my_ghola
But do all dead butterflies get into that pose? I'm sure some of the ones with
more natural looking poses are dead too.
~~~
c3534l
I think it's like when you have a human corpse with his wrists crossed on top
of the chest. Sure, not all or,actually, hardly any people are buried with
that pose. It'd still be weird if you always drew people sleeping like that.
------
aurizon
Sadly, butterflies and other insects are pinned like this for entomological
examination, which requires the wings, antenna, legs etc are fully extended so
that all manner of detail can be seen. Many species are different in minor
ways, having reached a very similar body design by evolutionary convergence.
Numbers of spines, hairs, scales etc are all enumerated. Once dry, they get
very very brittle and you can not spread wings/legs etc in fear of breakage.
It sounds strange, but a number of beetles, butterflies and other insects have
been discovered that look the same - until you examine some of these esoteric
aspects. Genomic analysis is the gold standard in these matters. read a few of
these search hits.
[https://www.google.ca/search?q=entomological+examination+of+...](https://www.google.ca/search?q=entomological+examination+of+similar+species&oq=entomological+examination+of+similar+species&aqs=chrome..69i57.19966j0j8&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8#safe=active&q=entomological+variation+of+similar+species)
~~~
kgwgk
Your comment reminded me of something I read recently:
[http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-3036677/New-m...](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-3036677/New-
monkey-species-discovered-scientists-notice-unusual-shape-penis.html)
~~~
aurizon
Yes, insects are full of mimicry...
------
rrauenza
My wife had an interesting perspective I'll share:
"Maybe it helps to think of illustrated butterflies as a kind of
iconography...One of the first things little kids (especially girls) learn to
draw is “a butterfly” (meaning, a dead butterfly). It will not have anything
like natural coloring, and might have big friendly eyes, but will definitely
have two curling antennae and spread, uplifted wings. It’s a heraldic image,
like a lion rampant. Lions don’t look like that, but the symbol says what it
needs to."
Now all I can think of is the perl6 butterfly, Camelia...
------
sopooneo
I think this may just be another instance of the coconut affect.
[http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TheCoconutEffect](http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TheCoconutEffect)
~~~
knice
I once had a job making ice cream and it bothered me that I had to add yellow
food coloring to the banana ice cream. We used real bananas and didn't add
banana flavor. But I was told to add yellow color anyway.
~~~
compiler-guy
There is an old cooking adage that, "You eat with your eyes first."
Making food aesthetically pleasing does add flavor to that first sample.
~~~
jimmaswell
I saw something about a restaurant where the food is served in the dark a
while ago, so that this can't happen.
~~~
nocman
Wow, I'm not sure I'd want to eat in a restaurant that purposefully prevented
me from seeing what I was eating!
xD
------
J5892
LPT: If a friend has a tattoo that you now recognize as a dead butterfly, you
probably shouldn't tell them.
~~~
bm1362
I have a tattoo that is a butterfly with a skull in the middle. It's wings are
in the upright position, meaning it's dead and pinned so uh I guess it's okay?
It's a bad tattoo either way and has become a pretty regular joke.
If any of my friends are reading this; it's too late to tease me.
~~~
DonaldFisk
Butterfly? Deaths Head Hawk Moths have a skull on the thorax
([http://www.ukmoths.org.uk/species/acherontia-
atropos/adult-3...](http://www.ukmoths.org.uk/species/acherontia-
atropos/adult-3/) )· They're hawk moths, not butterflies.
~~~
bm1362
I'm aware, it's been mistaken for a butterfly (mostly my friends teasing me) a
few times so I've somewhat owned the joke now.
This is more representative:
[https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/2/2b/Ac...](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/2/2b/Acherontia_lachesis_MHNT_Female_N%C3%AElg%C3%AEri_%28Tamil_Nadu%29.jpg/161px-
Acherontia_lachesis_MHNT_Female_N%C3%AElg%C3%AEri_%28Tamil_Nadu%29.jpg)
------
strictnein
Don't anyone show her what a human heart actually looks like.
~~~
Asooka
Well, the inverted scrotum we use right now is a better symbol of lust anyway.
~~~
mikeash
Great, I'll never be able to un-see that.
~~~
anc84
For a very long time I thought <3 was a variation of :3
~~~
mixedCase
Thank you, you will now make me picture a scrotum with eyes everytime I see
that.
------
ManeSequins
See also: ubiquitous depictions of bright red shrimp, crabs, and lobsters
swimming around in the ocean.
~~~
colanderman
As a rabbit "parent", I now shake my head at every depiction of a rabbit with
_pads on its feet_ like a cat(!) (Rabbits' feet are padless and entirely
covered with fur.)
viz. every cartoon with visible foot bottoms here:
[https://www.google.com/search?site=&tbm=isch&q=easter+bunny](https://www.google.com/search?site=&tbm=isch&q=easter+bunny)
Also… rabbits don't typically eat carrots, they eat carrot _tops_. (Just like
how cats don't drink milk, and mice don't eat cheese. Sure, they like it, but
where would a mouse find cheese in the wild?)
~~~
xherberta
I guess as long as there has been cheese, mice have been eating it.
------
watty
I guess we all have pet peeves but this one (while interesting) is a bit
silly. Pillow designers are looking to create an attractive pillow that will
sell - let's face it, a dead butterfly is more aesthetically pleasing than a
living one due to the outstretched wings.
~~~
jfk13
A dead butterfly may fit more "snugly" into the frame of a square pillow, but
personally -- and aesthetics, after all, are rather subjective -- I would
dispute that it is "more aesthetically pleasing" than a living one.
(Disclaimer: this has long been a pet peeve of mine, too, as my wife could
testify!)
~~~
watty
Yes, I didn't mean to speak for everyone - I'm sure many people prefer the
living picture which has more emphasis on the body and less emphasis on the
wings.
~~~
cannam
Not just the body, but also the layering or overlap of the wing segments which
makes the sheathing mechanism apparent - that is very beautiful in itself
(even if I don't know the right terms for these things). The typical image
looks unnaturally stretched and two-dimensional in comparison.
I found the article aesthetically as well as scientifically persuasive.
------
mast
I can understand how an illustrator could be bothered by something like this.
It is your job to be accurate yet you see so many examples where others do not
meet your own standards.
Slightly off topic (and related to moths not butterflies), but this sites
includes wonderful detail on how moths are prepared high resolution scans:
[http://ottawa.moths.ca/technical.html](http://ottawa.moths.ca/technical.html)
~~~
moultano
I started following a bunch of paleo-artists on twitter and now I find it hard
to look at kids' dinosaur stuff anymore.
[http://scienceblogs.com/notrocketscience/2010/03/03/zombie-h...](http://scienceblogs.com/notrocketscience/2010/03/03/zombie-
hands-to-bird-wings-the-evolution-of-the-dinosaur-w/)
------
j_m_b
Interesting article. Something else I'll notice everywhere, like bad kerning.
Thanks ;)
------
DonaldFisk
With butterflies, it doesn't matter much if you set them in their wings-flat
resting position, as you can still see all of both pairs of wings, but with
other lepidoptera it definitely does make a difference. With few exceptions,
when moths are resting, their hind wings are hidden, but setting them in the
traditional way allows both wings to be seen. So I suppose for consistency,
butterflies are set the same way that moths (i.e. all other lepidoptera) are.
Incidentally, with a bit of practice you can sneak up to resting or feeding
butterflies and photograph them close-up (e.g. with a smartphone), provided
you don't make sudden movements. So now you can have proof of sighting and a
permanent visual record without the need to kill them.
------
notadoc
I rarely see any butterflies these days
~~~
elihu
The population of Monarch butterflies in the U.S. has declined quite a bit
since the 90's. I'm not sure if other species have had similar declines.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monarch_butterfly#Threats](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monarch_butterfly#Threats)
------
mirimir
One could write an analogous article about birds. In painting the 435 images
in _The Birds of America_ , John James Audubon probably shot at least a few of
each species. And then stuffed and mounted them.
See
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_James_Audubon#/media/File...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_James_Audubon#/media/File:John_James_Audubon_1826.jpg)
------
roguecoder
This is a great example of how detailed, specific nerd-ery about just about
any topic can be super-cool and interesting!
------
_ph_
I never noticed, but it is indeed a bit odd that most drawings show
butterflies in a position they would't assume while living. Of course there is
artistic freedom, but when a realistic display is intended, a more true-to
life posture should be used.
~~~
Declanomous
The reason why nature illustrations look a particular way is actually really
interesting. I don't have a source to show, but we actually learned a bit
about biological illustrations as part of my biology degree.
To make a long story short, illustrations tend to depict what you are trying
to show. An unnatural position might be the best way to illustrate an organism
if you are providing a guide for people to classify them with, especially if
you can only provide a single photo.
The more natural depictions of birds, etc. can all basically be traced back to
John James Audubon. Before then almost every illustration looked exceedingly
staged.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_James_Audubon#Art_and_met...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_James_Audubon#Art_and_methods)
------
darkerside
[https://leonardodavinci.stanford.edu/submissions/clabaugh/im...](https://leonardodavinci.stanford.edu/submissions/clabaugh/images/vm/leonardo.jpg)
------
eth0up
This lady's art is stunning. I highly recommend not leaving at the dead
butterfly article. The portfolio, in particular.
------
pvaldes
This would be like to say "please stop to drawn the parts of a flower and
opened fruits in botanical illustrations. Is gruesome to see all those
mutilated plants".
There is a reason to drawn both wings in the same plane, is much easier to
classificatory purposes and is needed in some special cases because
butterflies can have totally different marks in its right and left wings.
------
davvolun
I've never seen such a shocking injustice I cared so little about!
------
patorjk
Although it's a silly pet peeve, it's interesting to realize that the standard
pose society has adopted for butterflies is one in which they're typically
dead. Definitely changes the way I look at pictures of butterflies.
------
elmalto
This is really incredible. Thank you for this insightful post
------
SomeStupidPoint
Are their wings not outstretched mid flap?
I seem to recall that looking down on flying butterflies has them look an
awful lot like I see in pictures, or even when they wiggle their wings
perched, but that could be memory being fickle.
~~~
scott_s
My understanding was that it's not that the pinned position is just
outstretched, but also pulled forward. It's that forward position (I think)
that they rarely ever take.
------
pferde
Please, enough with the blog sites that do not show any article at all without
javascript!
~~~
anigbrowl
I fully agree that people should stop doing that when _making_ blogs, but you
can hardly demand that people stop _submitting_ interesting content just
because said contact has been hijacked by hyperactive designers/service
providers.
Boycotting a technology you don't like is ineffective unless it's monopolized
and there a single provider on whom to focus the boycott efforts. Extensions
that filter out such annoyances (like adblockers) are somewhat effective but
result in arms races. Subversion through 3rd party tagging or the creation of
other undesirable second-order effects seems like the best strategy. Perhaps
someone with more technical knowledge could come up with better suggestions.
It's a valid problem, which I encourage you to consider, write up, and submit
in its own right.
------
natch
OK you pronounce "Bejing" with a normal, regular, everyday hard 'j' sound as
it's supposed to be pronounced (not some fake exotic sounding airy zzzhhhhhh
sound you and everyone else just made up out of thin air) and I promise not to
kill or pin any butterflies.
I really thought the peeve was going to be about pictures of butterflies on
people's mouths (Silence of the Lambs). That bugs me, but I guess with the
movie it was supposed to.
~~~
woah
Do you want it pronounced like "edging" or "aging"?
~~~
Epenthesis
Do you pronounce those differently? Where'd you grow up? In all the English
dialects I'm familiar with, those are pronounced the same.
Regardless, it's the "j sound" of "James" (as well as of both "edging" and
"aging" for those of you who pronounce them the same) and _not_ the "j sound"
of "Jaques" (or the "z" sound of "azure").
(For those familiar with IPA, /be.'dʒiɲ/ not /be.'ʒiɲ/)
~~~
amyjess
If you really want to get pedantic, it should be an unaspirated "ch" (as
opposed to _q_ , which is aspirated like "ch" usually is in English). And if
you want to get _even more pedantic_ , it's a dual-articulated sound and not a
pure postalveolar sound like in English.
That is, IPA [t͡ɕ]
Edit: And if anyone's curious, there are four sounds in Mandarin that English-
speakers will interpret as forms of "ch", varying based on aspiration and
point(s) of articulation. In Pinyin, all four have distinct romanizations
(which is one advantage Pinyin has over Wade-Giles).
Pinyin IPA Articulation Aspirated
ch [ʈ͡ʂʰ] postalveolar retroflex Y
zh [ʈ͡ʂ] postalveolar retroflex N
q [t͡ɕʰ] dual alveolo-palatal Y
j [t͡ɕ] dual alveolo-palatal N
By contrast, English "ch" is postalveolar but not retroflex, and aspiration
depends on context: IPA [t͡ʃʰ] or [t͡ʃ].
~~~
dghf
Am I correct in my recollection that the sound represented by "b" is actually
closer to the unaspirated "p" in words like "spin" and "spot"?
~~~
amyjess
Indeed you are.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
The Merry Pranksters Who Hacked the Afghan War - samclemens
http://www.psmag.com/navigation/politics-and-law/the-merry-pranksters-who-hacked-the-afghan-war-60873/
======
drpp
World is small. I spent a winter there, working with the Synergy Strike Force.
One thing led to another and I ended up coaching the regional basketball team:
[https://nplusonemag.com/basketball-diaries-
afghanistan/](https://nplusonemag.com/basketball-diaries-afghanistan/)
Here are some photos of home base:
[https://www.flickr.com/search?user_id=68877611%40N00&text=ta...](https://www.flickr.com/search?user_id=68877611%40N00&text=taj%20afghanistan)
One of my best basketball players, an Afghan, and SSF member, is now a
Fulbright in the US:
[https://www.flickr.com/photos/ifl/13007763495](https://www.flickr.com/photos/ifl/13007763495)
@rdl don't believe we've met but nods to you.
------
rurounijones
Hey, he received military funding to ultimately try and do good in a crappy
situation, hats off to him.
------
contingencies
Directly taking funding from an occupying army to manipulate popular behaviour
in to a centralized intelligence gathering system, then claiming some form of
moral outcome for the greater good? Somehow I missed the connection.
------
jakeogh
Antz:
[http://sourceforge.net/projects/openantz/](http://sourceforge.net/projects/openantz/)
------
chaz81
I also saw this on
[https://tinyletter.com/intriguingthings](https://tinyletter.com/intriguingthings)
5 Intriguing Things, a daily email by Alexis Madrigal I would highly
recommend.
------
sreejithr
Loved the "Beer for data" approach. It could work in a lot of other settings.
Very novel idea to mine data from otherwise hostile environments. Does he
publish this data online?
------
breakingcups
Wow, what a guy.
------
jedanbik
So this dude siphons off of the military industrial complex to feed both his
addictions and his narcissism? Count me out.
~~~
rdl
I visited/helped out a tiny bit with these guys.
It really wasn't about ego on the part of the people I encountered, so much as
frustration and genuinely wanting to see things happen.
They actually had a hard time raising money because they needed/wanted to stay
under the radar. After Mehrab's death as far as I can tell things shut down.
~~~
jedanbik
Fair enough. Sorry to be so harsh. I think it was the tone of the article that
made me upset yesterday. I definitely realize the need for accurate
information in that part of the world!
~~~
Ntrails
For me it was less about the data for beer (which in and of itself was
brilliant) and more about them using government (and their own) money to set
up small positive projects for local people.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: HIPAA Compliant Hosting Providers? - USNetizen
I have over a decade of experience in medical application development and support. Recently, I've been exploring the possibility of establishing my own company based on an idea and prototype product I've developed for the medical community over the years.<p>Long story short, finding HIPAA-compliant hosting at reasonable cost with all of the features expected of a "cloud" provider is proving to be difficult. It wasn't until recently that HIPAA amended it's rules related to hosting of PHI (protected health information) applications. Though it did not state it directly, they now require Business Associate Agreements to be signed by hosting providers and they (providers) must also abide by certain standards and rules related to vetting staff and training and such (which isn't new, but the agreement is).<p>This is nothing really new, but it opens up the possibility of using "cloud" providers now, as far as I can tell. Problem is, it appears Amazon won't explicitly state if they will sign the required BAA regarding their AWS platforms, which is a no-go as it could possibly be seen as an act of "Willful Negligence" on my part if that document is not signed by the hosting provider. They have "guidelines" on how to create HIPAA-compliant hosting setups with EC2 and S3 (http://d36cz9buwru1tt.cloudfront.net/AWS_HIPAA_Whitepaper_Final.pdf), but don't clearly state that they, themselves, are HIPAA compliant. Apparently they even have their own interpretation of the guidelines and betting on them being right is not a risk I'm willing to take at this point.<p>So, tl;dr. That being said, Rackspace and Microsoft (when paid enough money) will sign the BAA, but is their Public Cloud, in anyone's (non-legal, obviously) opinion HIPAA compliant then? Is there anyone out there with experience hosting HIPAA compliant applications using Amazon or another service?
======
nalods
There's www.firehost.com that offers HIPPA compliant hosting. It's amazingly
expensive (~$300/month for a 1GB cloud server), but the support is good and it
impresses CMOs/IT heads of potential when you they ask you about it.
~~~
USNetizen
Thanks for the advice. Yeah, my other option it seemed was to go with
Rackspace dedicated managed hosting at over $1,000 per month, which is a
little bit high for a startup's budget.
~~~
bmelton
Is it possible to just prototype the service with non-sensitive data during
development period and migrate to HIPAA compatible servers when you have
customers?
If you already have customers, bake the hosting in to the price. They're
almost certainly used to paying for things like that already, and I assume
that if your app has to be HIPAA compliant, that it probably already has a
$xx,000 price at a minimum anyway, so that should work out just fine.
~~~
USNetizen
That's a good point. I just wanted to have something lined up from the get-go,
but I see what you mean. Enterprise and health care customers are accustomed
to paying large fees for compliant environments, so baking it into the price
shouldn't be much of an issue. Thanks.
------
lemcoe9
Just use Amazon. [http://aws.amazon.com/about-aws/whats-
new/2009/04/06/whitepa...](http://aws.amazon.com/about-aws/whats-
new/2009/04/06/whitepaper-hipaa/)
~~~
USNetizen
That's the exact whitepaper I read, but it falls short of explicitly stating
that they are HIPAA compliant. You see, HIPAA requires a certain amount of
physical security (on premises at the data-center) on top of all of that
electronic security, and Amazon won't publish it all in detail. It also
requires the "hosting provider" to sign the aforementioned BAA, which Amazon
won't do. Amazon is of the mindset that they are providing an "infrastructure"
and not a hosting service, but that is a murky legal gray area that could see
me fined hundreds of thousands, even millions of dollars if they are wrong.
They even put it in the disclaimer: "AWS and its affiliated entities make no
representations or warranties that your use of AWS services will assure
compliance with applicable laws, including but not limited to HIPAA and
HITECH."
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
MadMen Inspires HubSpot's New Vacation Policy - nate
http://www.hubspot.com/blog/bid/5455/MadMen-Inspires-HubSpot-s-New-Vacation-Policy
======
brk
I'm interested in seeing how this works out for them.
We had the same policy at another startup I worked at years ago (Ucentric).
The problem was that while the idea was nice, it had a lot of "bugs".
One issue was people who either abuse the system, or more commonly are
perceived abusers by other people. People seem to like knowing that certain
perks and benefits (like time off) are rational and logical and auditable.
Sure, if all your employees are 100% dedicated top-tier people then this is
never an issue. The reality is that such a scenario becomes physically
impossible once you've grown beyond a core group.
The other, possibly bigger, issue had to do with when the time comes for a
layoff or dismissal (and again, one or the other will always happen). If you
have a defined vacation policy, then when an employee leaves there is a clear
accrued amount of unused vacation time that they are owed. OR, they have taken
time beyond their accrual amount and they owe the company $ from their last
paycheck. An employee who is leaving, voluntarily or involuntarily, in August
who has taken very little time off will generally end up pointing out all the
other employees who with less workload have been able to take 3 weeks off, and
thus this employee is owed 2+ weeks of accrued vacation time.
Basically this supposed glorious perk turned into an administrative nightmare
on several levels. Maybe it will work better now, but I'm skeptical.
------
chrisgoodrich
This is trite and over-used as a "perk" to attract people to working at start-
ups.
The problem with this approach is that you can't have this type of policy
without an underlying culture that supports it.
This is straight out of the Netflix playbook:
<http://www.slideshare.net/reed2001/culture-1798664?src=embed>
------
percept
Motley Fool's another one
(<http://www.fool.com/jobs/workplace/workplace04.htm>).
I'd guess that most adhere to the norm, but would be curious to read firsthand
information.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Has asking for a raise ever ruined your relationship with your employer? - dm03514
Has asking for a raise ever ruined your relationship with an employer? I have a good job, generous benefits, stock options, lots of PTO. I have 5 years experience in open source technologies. I believe in the company I work for, its management team and its product. That being said, many engineers have been leaving. I have been at the company for 7 months and am happy, but it's clear that right now they need senior developers and I'm not sure there could be a better time to ask for a raise. If they denied me a raise I would stay there (dont tell them). What I'm concerned about is the small???? chance that it ruins my relationship with my employer. I have a newborn and my partner quit her job to stay at home. I earn 80k and am Extremely grateful to have such a good job, but at the same time I believe with a small amount of work I could earn more.<p>I would feel like a complete idiot if I tried to capitalize on lack of ability to retain people at my current position.<p>Has anyone had negative experiences from asking for a raise??
======
socceroos
It really depends on your employer. You need to understand a bit about how
your boss works and the current position he/she is in.
1\. Find out (loosely) if your employer can afford the raise you're looking
for. Nothing worse than putting your boss in a position where he/she can't
actually help you.
2\. _ALWAYS_ give your employer a 1 page document detailing why you're looking
for a raise. No need to talk about your cancerous dog, but certainly talk
about your achievements, your worth and your vision for yourself in a 'more
senior' position.
3\. Give a number you're looking for. Don't just ask for a raise or your
employer will give you maybe 2K more per year and you'll feel ripped off. And
then, if you complain then he/she will feel hurt.
4\. Be positive. Be truthful. Your employer wants to hear that you love your
job. Your employer wants to hear that you want to take on more responsibility.
They'll respond well to that.
I did this with my last employer and was able to secure a $25k raise. YMMV
~~~
mtmail
$25k is a lot. Congrats!
I would add not to compare your salary to your co-workers (if you happen to
know their salary) when you talk to your boss. It can back-fire because you
steer the discussion to somebody else's salary which you have no idea about
past history or what other factors played into that.
------
redmaverick
I read Ashlee Vance's "Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic
Future" a while back. His personal assistant (for 12 years) Mary Beth Brown
asks Elon for a raise. He asks her to take a 2 week break so he can assess for
himself how difficult her job really was.
She was let go after the break.
~~~
hinkley
Generally I tell people if they feel undervalued, take a long vacation (at
least a week). People will either miss you terribly or you'll know where you
stand.
Just don't tell anyone that's why you're doing it if you don't want to be like
Mrs Brown.
------
brudgers
There are people who can walk in, demand a raise and get what they want. I
know I ain't one of them. There are people who can play it close to the vest
and go home with someone else's shirt, boots, and wallet. Maybe that's you.
What is your company's policy on employee reviews?
Do they conduct them according to schedule?
Seeing as you've been there about six months, an informal review is the way to
gain information for when the formal review happens. Find out how your boss is
coping with turnover...maybe it's intentional, maybe not. Find out how he
perceives the motivations of the people who left. If it's framed as
disloyalty, that's a bad thing. If it's framed as natural progression, then
that suggests how much leverage you have in regard to framing compensation to
future growth. Negotiations are all about information.
Maybe your boss thinks you're underpaid but can't give you a raise until you
ask. Maybe your boss can only give raises at reviews and according to a
formula...that formality is actually good so long as the process is reasonably
fair (and if it's not reasonably fair then the formality isn't worse).
Even if you are the demand a raise and get it type, more information doesn't
hurt. But you can't demand unless you're ready to walk. Don't fool yourself
into believing that your boss hasn't already read the tells that you are happy
and unlikely to leave even without a raise.
Good luck. Good luck.
------
jasonkester
Yeah, money ruins everything eventually.
My first true dev gig was for a really fun company. I was self taught at my
previous engineering job, and the Web was happening so I took a junior
position for $X/year.
Then I got better fast. Turns out I wasn't actually all that junior to start
with, but soon it was apparent that I was shipping things a lot faster than
anybody else on the team. After a good year of this I took a look around the
market and figured out where I would probably fit in it. I asked the company
to bring me up to $2X to get me closer to where I belonged.
They debated, scraped, and eventually found a way to offer me $1.3X. I was
gutted. This was a really fun job, with fun people. But they were not planning
to pay market rates, so in the end it was an easy decision.
I sent off a couple emails, and a week later accepted another really fun job,
with even more fun people, for a little more than $2X.
So yeah, a nice relationship soured because fun is fun but at the end of the
day, it's not worth leaving tens of thousands of dollars on the table for.
Especially when there's plenty of fun to be had elsewhere that doesn't ask you
to make that tradeoff.
------
alain94040
I never got burned by asking for a raise. So do it. However, I recommend you
read the details of how to do it properly, I wrote about it here:
[https://medium.com/@colunchers/how-to-negotiate-a-
raise-9166...](https://medium.com/@colunchers/how-to-negotiate-a-
raise-9166c977645a)
The key is to honestly measure your market worth, and not threaten at all to
quit. If you can convince your boss that other companies would like to pay you
more, but you prefer your current company (which is what you say), then it's a
solid approach.
------
coldtea
If it did, you didn't have any relationship to begin with.
------
kelukelugames
Your company knows you had a baby and you are grateful. They take advantage of
it by paying you a non-competitive wage.
------
jseeff
you have only been there 7 months. Unless you agreed, when joining, to review
salary after X months, I would probably avoid asking for a raise right now.
What I WOULD do, is ask for a chat with your boss or bosses and explain to
them: 1) you feel you have performed well and exceeded expectations by X, Y
and Z; 2) you know lots of people are leaving and you want to take on more
responsibility; 3) you know you have only been there 7 months; and 4) you want
them to think about giving you a significant raise in 5 months' time.
Then ask them for their thoughts and what you need to do in order to make that
happen.
It shows them you are committed, not trying to squeeze every penny just when
they are hurting because of departures and makes it VERY hard for them not to
give you a raise at the 1 year mark.
At that point if you don't get what you are looking for, you move away.
Good luck!
------
dm03514
I would feel like a complete idiot if I tried to capitalize on lack of ability
to retain people at my current position AND it backfired
~~~
bbcbasic
Go to some interviews. This will give you some idea of what you could get
elsewhere. If you get an offer that is more ammo, even if you don't decide to
disclose it will boost your confidence to ask for more.
Not sure how experienced you are but no matter how much you love your job it
is pretty much dog eat dog.
They wont hesitate to fire you if they need to downsize, even if they are
downsizing for the wrong reasons. Your good boss could be replaced with a bad
one, or the company as a whole decides to stack rank, or pressurize everyone
with too much work etc. Let alone they sell to another company, decide to
float, or whatever. This can happen in the future and change how much you love
this job.
So don't be scared to change jobs to get what you want, if you have to. The
grass may be greener, or less green. You can always change again.
------
mcmenon
I would never ask for a raise unless I had an option I was willing to walk to.
Even if you're happy at your current job go talk to other companies and see
what's out there. This will better inform you what you're worth as well.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
The Virtual Currency of Social Media: Gratitude - messel
http://messel.typepad.com/my_weblog/2009/05/virtual-currency-of-gratitude.html
======
gengstrand
Reciprocity is a strong driver in an abundance economy but reputation is a
better one. Take a look at <http://stackoverflow.com/> for an example and
check out the <http://ploneglenn.blogspot.com/2009/04/whuffie-factor.html> for
more insight.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
MakerBot lays off 20 percent of its staff - Opossum
http://arstechnica.com/business/2015/04/makerbot-lays-off-20-percent-of-its-staff/
======
ChuckMcM
Seems significant, and they are closing their retail stores.
I have a Makerbot Replicator/Dual which was probably the last fully open
source printer they made, and is available from FlashForge[1] boxes which
sells a clone of it [2] for $1,000 less than I paid for mine.
The difference in quality and speed been that printer and Makerbot's latest
and greatest "5th Gen" printer isn't enough to justify paying nearly $2,000
more for it, and they don't support dual extrusion any more, just when the
open community is getting some seriously interesting multi-extrusion ideas
going. (beyond the simple two hot ends next to each other).
From a 3D printer perspective they are under powered and over priced, which
has never been a position of strength for any product to build brand.
So its sad to see them fade but not unexpected.
[1] [http://www.ff3dp.com/](http://www.ff3dp.com/)
[2] Replicator/Dual clone --
[http://www.ff3dp.com/#!product/prd2/1102918641/](http://www.ff3dp.com/#!product/prd2/1102918641/)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Keeping a research/work log - SandB0x
I see a lot of discussion about to-do lists, but less about keeping a record of your work.<p>Sometimes at the end of the day I will sit and write up a few short paragraphs summarising what I've done and what I've learned. - technical notes and general thoughts about my work and study. I want to start doing this more frequently, but I want a nice searchable format rather than scattered text files. I already carry around a small notepad to scribble down thoughts and work through problems on paper.<p>What methods do you use? My current best idea is to keep this all on a local installation of Wordpress.
======
blahblahblah
What is the intent of your research/work log? Do you just want to capture your
ideas so you are able to review important TODO items, insights, and the
rationale for decisions you've made later, if needed? Or is the purpose to
document your work so that if you develop an important, patentable invention
you have adequate documentation for a legally defensible patent? If legal
defense of a patent is the intent, then consulting with an attorney about your
documentation methods long before you've invented anything is the wise thing
to do. My guess is that old-fashioned signed, dated, & witnessed dead-tree
paper records are probably still preferred.
------
aeontech
Check out TiddlyWiki [<http://www.tiddlywiki.com/>] or some other wiki
software?
There was a pretty good discussion about this kind of think on StackOverflow a
while back: [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/78756/what-do-you-use-
to-...](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/78756/what-do-you-use-to-keep-
notes-as-a-developer/78762)
------
pinchyfingers
I use org-mode to keep notes while I'm working. It's really helpful to be able
to create todo lists very easily and then clock in to specific tasks. If I get
stuck on something, I start a heading to write about what I know/don't know
and what I need to do next.
For me, org-mode is the way to go - plain text, integrated into my editor,
easy outlining, time tracking, and to do lists. Check it out.
------
fuzzythinker
I use google sheets and doc. Doc for more detailed notes about a topic, tools,
etc. Sheets for 1-liner per day journal -- 3 columns: 1 for summary of main
work/proj , 1 for eurekas (this column is 80%+ empty, by design so they stand
out) 1 for non-work, more of a diary.
------
mr_b
I just use a notebook to keep track of stuff. Evernote is one of the options
you can check out.
------
joshkaufman
Backpack + Journal app for Mac: <http://transmissionapps.com/>
------
nolite
I'm using just a google doc.. toying with the idea of throwing a small app
online for this
------
xtrycatchx
i blogged especially those that deals with programming stuffs.. i just want to
keep stuffs online at the same time share it to the community.. two birds in
one stone..
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Help my 11 year old sister not get put off of science - cvigoe
I'm an Electronic Engineer at a top US research school and I have an 11 year old sister (I'm 22). She is smart and quite good at math for her age and is a solid rational thinker. Unfortunately her teacher "finds science boring" and has somehow managed to instill this in her: I know she would enjoy science as a subject if she could see it from my perspective but I can't think of any appropriate videos / games / books to share with her (all the vsauce, veritasium, numberphile channels etc. are a bit too advanced for her)<p>Does anyone on HN know of any good videos / books that can help an 11 year old girl see how beautiful science and math can be?
======
applecrazy
Try AsapSCIENCE on YouTube, White Rabbit Project on Netflix, Bill Nye Saves
the World (also Netflix) or Mythbusters.
All are great science shows and they all have their own merits. Mythbusters
has interesting visual effects, Bill Nye is pretty well known, White Rabbit
Project has more pop culture, and AsapSCIENCE talks about the science of daily
life.
I could go on for days, but I'll stop there :)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Neither the Will nor the Cash: Why India Wins So Few Olympic Medals - nikunjk
http://m.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/08/neither-the-will-nor-the-cash-why-india-wins-so-few-olympic-medals/260693/
======
cinbun8
It comes down to whether you can make a living in India if you get into
sports. The economics around it are strong enough to force out anyone
considering sports. Cricket is the only sport in India that can get you top
dollar whether you make it big or small. The compensation provided to a person
playing hockey or table-tennis is meager in comparison.
Those that are talented and have the will + passion for the sport shine as
long as they have enough funds. Then there are those [1] that have to sell
their bow to make ends meet despite securing a silver medal at the south asian
championships. It was heart breaking reading that.
[1] - [http://www.thehindu.com/news/states/other-
states/article3278...](http://www.thehindu.com/news/states/other-
states/article3278302.ece)
~~~
ebr4him
You nailed it!
I'm an Indian.
------
michaelt
I heard a discussion of this on Radio 4's excellent More Or Less podcast
<http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006qshd>
They pointed out Korea tend to do well in per capita medal counts as Taekwondo
is a popular sport there - and there are gold, silver and two bronze medals in
four weight categories for two genders - a total of 32 medals available. On
the other hand cricket, one of the most popular sports in India, has zero
olympic medals.
~~~
w1ntermute
That can only be a small part of the story. If you look at the current medal
count, South Korea has 16 while India has just 2. But none of those 16 Korean
medals are from taekwondo. There are 3 judo medals, but that is technically a
Japanese sport, not Korean.
~~~
hazov
Korea was once a part of the Japanese empire and according to older members of
the Korean community in São Paulo* the Japanese governor outlawed Korean
martial arts and promoted Kendo and Judo at schools. Korean Kendo is known a
Kumdo.
Koreans are also crazy about archery, shooting and badminton, sports in which
they generally go well.
*I used to live in "Bom Retiro" neighborhood in São Paulo which is a center of the Korean community here, they said me that exactly.
~~~
w1ntermute
Korea was only a Japanese colony for 35 years (1910-1945). After the Japanese
occupation ended, the Koreans did their best to reject everything Japanese, so
I don't think you can base your conclusion on that.
I don't deny that the Koreans do well in other sports, just that it's not like
they have a cultural advantage or something. For example, their dominance in
archery at the 2008 games was partially due to their building an exact replica
of the Beijing archery range in Korea 2 years earlier and using it to
practice. Many other competitors had never practiced on that archery range
until they arrived at the Olympics, and it threw them off.
~~~
hazov
Don't know, a Korean friend said Kumdo is one of the most popular sports in
Korea, he lived there for a couple of years, don't know about judo but I would
not be surprised if it was that popular as well.
I'm not Korean and only said what members of the Brazilian-Korean community,
in which I have a some friends, said to me.
------
kamaal
There are some things in this article that are true and some false. And as an
Indian I can tell you that are many things that people don't understand.
India is huge country. Huge, I mean so huge that it will be difficult to truly
explain the diversity we have here. It will be easy for a German to explain
what Germany is, Or French to explain what France is and so on. But it will be
very difficult for an Indian to explain what India is in totality basically
because there are thousands of cultures, ways of lives, languages, people of
ethnic origin, color, language, religion and so on and so forth. In fact any
form of classification that you can come up to we have diverse categories in
that.
This is not true for China. Or Korea or Thailand. Because they are a single
ethnic group. People who talk of deficiencies or things not being a part of
Indian culture do not understand Indian culture.
In India you will see large metropolitan cities acting as hubs for employment,
living and opportunities. Go to villages you see poverty you also see
prosperity(Depending on where you go). You will see most advanced technologies
to old stone age agriculture methods. At one end you will see farmers in the
area of Punjab being the richest of the lot and you will also see farmers
committing suicide due to debt and poverty.
You will see people eating stomach full to people barely affording a meal a
day.
Amidst all this we have a thriving industry in every domain of business you
can imagine. We have the best colleges and universities and we also have a
huge problem of illiteracy.
We write software, we have a nuclear weapons program, despite being the worlds
most peaceful nation we have one of the largest armies in the world. We have a
space program. Yet at the same time we struggle to feed our self.
Our society still has the stains of socialism and communism from the old days.
We still have massive corruption and inefficiency in government layers.
Amidst all this parents feels their kids are better off studying and getting
good jobs to make a living than doing something like sports which don't offer
much incentive to make a comfortable living. There are instances of gold medal
winners pawn broking their medals to afford a day's meal.
Also there are not many facilities and training options if you want to be a
serious athlete. At the same time we don't believe China kind of policies
either.
~~~
elssar
Erm, care to point out a few of the things in the article that are false? I
could find none. The article does not try to explain what India is, but why
India doesn't win as many medals in the Olympics as are expected from a nation
this big. And it's does a pretty decent job of that IMO.
~~~
vacri
"It has never won a medal at the winter games" is pretty misleading, given
that India is largely a 'summer' country - in fact, it's pretty much just
European countries, US and Canada that win medals at the winter Olympics. And
while India's been to most of the summer Olympics, it's only been to 8
winters.
If you look at the medals won, it's clear that it's a very eurocentric
competition. Apart from China (who go crazy for cold war reasons - the article
disingenuously uses cold war countries for comparison), all the high
performers are euro culture. Sure, Japan won 400 medals overall... but Germany
has 1500... and even _Finland_ has nearly as many summer medals as Japan.
Apart from China, who has invested _heavily_ as a matter of pride, non-euro
culture countries generally don't do well.
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All-
time_Olympic_Games_medal_ta...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All-
time_Olympic_Games_medal_table)
Also, to be pedantic, the first sentence of the article is incorrect:
Bangladesh has won zero medals.
I don't think it's a bad essay, but these were a couple of points I noticed.
~~~
shasta
There are plenty of "summer countries" that win gold in the winter Olympics. I
recall one year Jamaica won gold with its bobsledding team.
~~~
vacri
Jamaica has won zero winter Olympics medals. Same with Brazil, Greece, Iran,
Israel, Mexico, the Phillipines, Portugal (I stopped looking around p - check
the link above) - all sizeable 'summer' countries with zero winter Olympics
medals.
You probably recall the film "Cool Runnings", in which the team did _not_ win;
the point was that they were plucky underdogs and did better than expected,
but they didn't place.
------
deskamess
No real interest in sports unless it is cricket. There are pockets where there
is a significant secondary interest in soccer (WB, Kerala come to mind) and
hockey but other than that it is cricket, cricket, cricket.
Where money is allocated to sports the bureaucrats insert themselves into the
pipeline. There was a story[1] where an olympic bound athlete [flag bearer]
wanted to pay for his physio guy to come along. Of the 142 member team there
are 61 non athletes. You would hope that 50 or so of them would be for the
needs of the athletes (like physio, etc). Somehow I doubt that...
So the article has the right tone... very little infrastructure and no
strategic effort in improving it.
[1][http://dawn.com/2012/07/20/indias-top-wrestler-upset-over-
la...](http://dawn.com/2012/07/20/indias-top-wrestler-upset-over-lack-of-
physio/)
------
yummyfajitas
When I lived in India, I certainly observed that no one there seemed to care
about athletics. It's just not in the culture.
I'd regularly go jogging. People would stop and stare - doubly so if I stopped
running and did pushups. In my entire time there, I saw perhaps 3-4 Indians
running, and considerably more foreigners. The Pune running club was comprised
primarily of people who spent time overseas and expats.
During a conversation with an auto driver, he told me that Indian's don't do
"poses" (i.e., yoga) - "that stuff is just for tourists". (I gather there is
some regional variation.)
So my guess that the reason India doesn't have a lot of medals is that people
just don't care to compete for them.
~~~
_debug_
IMHO, with a billion people, I believe that BOTH a) your generalization is
true, i.e., the majority is disinterested AND b) not relevant w.r.t. Olympic
medal-winning potential : it is enough for a small minority to be interested
in sport / fitness & glory to make the cut for the olympics. I believe that
the 80/20 rule applies, and is actually more of a 95/5 rule in most societies
and most achievements : 5% of the population account for the glory (, the rest
just wake the flag and feel proud, conveniently forgetting that one cannot be
proud of what one did not achieve _personally_ ).
I suspect you might find a similar proportion of everday Chinese equally
disinterested in "poses" (not sure, just speculation).
I believe that the core reason is our usual friend, corruption and red tape.
It's not just sports; in general, the meritocratic lose out because wherever
there is an opportunity in India, whatever be the form of opportunity. That
includes what is rightfully yours, such as welfare handouts, your passport,
etc; An Indian's everyday life consists of jumping through hoops to get basic
things done.
Disclaimer : am Indian.
~~~
yummyfajitas
There certainly is some 95/5 rule, or probably a 999/1 rule. But you need to
apply the 999/1 rule to the people actually interested in going for the gold.
I.e., in the US that might be 0.001 x 25% whereas in India it might be closer
to 0.001 x 5%.
My issue with theories like corruption/red tape/etc is that India is not
unique in this regard. India is pretty bad with corruption, but Jamaica is
too. Yet Jamaica tends to perform pretty well - running is popular there. You
can find plenty of corrupt and poor countries that outperform India,
particularly if you adjust for population.
China is a special case since the government basically forces people to shoot
for Olympic gold in marginal sports (e.g., discus, javelin) and trains them
from early ages to do so. They also use eugenics to breed top athletes (Yao
Ming is one famous result of this), and similar things.
~~~
w1ntermute
> China is a special case since the government basically forces people to
> shoot for Olympic gold in marginal sports
This is a common misconception. No one is "forced" to participate in the
Olympics in China. Poor parents send their children to Olympic trainers
because if their children do well, they'll get to go to college for free and
have a good, middle-class job.
------
bluedevil2k
I was working with many Indians a few years ago and they asked themselves the
same question. One had an interesting take I've not heard elsewhere - he
claimed that the large number of vegetarians in India results in poorer
athletic potential - the lack of meat and protein leading to less strength,
quickness, etc.
It was an interesting idea, but looking up some facts myself right now, that
claim could be tested by Pakistan's medal count. Same general genetic
background, same general infrastructure problems, but are not generally
vegetarians. However, Pakistan hasn't won a medal in 20 years, and only a few
medals ever.
~~~
nimrody
There have been several very successful vegetarian athletes. One name that
comes to mind is Dave Scott (The famous triathlete):
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dave_Scott_(triathlete)> ).
Quoting wikipedia:
"During the period in which he won all six of his Hawaiian triathlons Dave
Scott followed a strict vegetarian (vegan) diet."
~~~
bluedevil2k
Was Dave Scott a vegetarian his entire life, or simply converted to it when he
was a fully-grown adult? Most likely the latter.
Protein consumption as a growing child and teenager is directly proportional
to height - it's the sole reason the average white male has increased 6" over
the past 200 years. Genetics haven't changed, just our diet.
------
parfe
<http://cruelandunusualgeography.com/>
Provides per capita tracking of medals won. Currently New Zealand is in first
place with 3 golds and 4 bronzes. India has 1 silver and 1 bronze putting them
in 45th place.
~~~
Someone
Better, but per capita computation punishes larger countries because, in many
sports, the number of competitors a country can send is independent of
population.
For example, if China were to split in four, the four parts would almost
certainly win more medals in table tennis than China does now.
Similarly, 'US West' would play 'US East' in the basketball final, but the USA
will get at most one medal.
~~~
vacri
It doesn't really punish larger countries, because larger countries can send
much, much broader teams. Try and find a sport that _doesn't_ have the Chinese
or Americans competing in it. Then do the same for small-but-not-tiny
countries like New Zealand, Ireland or even Greece.
~~~
Someone
They send larger teams, but not in 1:1 proportion to their population:
China : 1347M people, 386 participants
USA : 314M people, 530 participants
New Zealand: 4M people, 184 participants
Ireland : 5M people, 66 participants
Greece : 11M people, 105 participants
(sources: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_population>,
[http://totallympics.com/forum.php?mod=viewthread&tid=231...](http://totallympics.com/forum.php?mod=viewthread&tid=2312))
So, the USA has 62 times the population, but only about 8 times the number of
competitors as Ireland. If it was a lottery, you would not expect them to win
62 times the number of medals.
So, yes, it does punish larger countries.
And, from that second link, 'HA' is the sport you asked for (I guess that is
handball; makes sense as that is easter European/Scandinavian dominated;
<http://www.london2012.com/handball/> confirms that)
~~~
vacri
I must admit, I'm very surprised at the number of NZ participants.
I still don't think it's highly punished, simply because 'best of 300M' is
likely to be better than 'best of 4M'. The US does have 2500 medals compared
to NZ's 90 - while not 60 times as many, it's still two orders of magnitude,
same as the population. Ireland and Greece are in the same 'order of
magnitude' boat with 23 and 108 medals respectively.
The 'try and find' thing was more a rhetorical statement meaning 'not many' :)
------
jezclaremurugan
Corruption and regional politics are major factors too. Suffice it to say
sports is not very meritocratic in India. A person has to be exceptionally
talented to jump through all the hoops. Quoting from
[http://www.indianexpress.com/news/corruption-in-sports-
leads...](http://www.indianexpress.com/news/corruption-in-sports-leads-arjuna-
awardees-to-annas-campaign/835202/) _Sunita Godara, a former marathon runner
and Arjuna Award winner, said, “We decided to join Anna Hazare as we have been
fighting against corruption at various levels in the sports bodies for the
past 20 years. There is favouritism in the selection process and corruption at
every level.”_
------
w1ntermute
This seems like a great opportunity for America - send some scouts to India to
find poor young children that show athletic talent, tell their parents (or
adopt them if they're orphans) that they can be American citizens if they let
them go to America for athletic training. Give them American citizenship by
the time they turn 16 (the age required for Olympic participation), and we'll
be able to easily raise our Olympic medal count. It's a win-win situation -
the US increases its medal count and the children get a vastly better life
than their parents.
~~~
eshvk
This seems like a good idea but there are a couple of issues though:
1\. I believe from anecdotal evidence most young children start serious
preparation so that by their teens, they would have to have a significant
portion of their technique mastered so that talent can start playing a
significant role. However, I am not sure how easy it is identify the kids pre-
teenage.
2\. Investment costs: Importing a group of people just for the sole purpose of
racking up medals (non withstanding the inherent creepiness of it) will be
tremendously expensive. How do you justify the expense if the children don't
want to do it eventually?
~~~
w1ntermute
> However, I am not sure how easy it is identify the kids pre-teenage.
I'm not sure how the Chinese do it, but this is exactly their approach.
Children with talent (or at least some signs of it) are taken at a very young
age (~5 y/o) and intensively trained.
> Importing a group of people just for the sole purpose of racking up medals
> (non withstanding the inherent creepiness of it) will be tremendously
> expensive. How do you justify the expense if the children don't want to do
> it eventually?
Will it be expensive? I made this suggestion based on the assumption that, as
with the IT industry, it's more cost efficient to bring in workers from abroad
than to depend on domestic talent. In any case, from what I can tell, the main
costs come from buying equipment and hiring coaches, not from the children.
All you have to do is pay for their food, shelter, schooling, and other basic
needs.
The children of course will not be forced to remain in the program if they do
not want to. Contrary to popular belief, this is the system used by China - no
one is kidnapped or coerced into participating, although that no doubt happens
in North Korea.
In any case, the US policy would be that at any point, they can quit and go
back home, if they so desire. Citizenship would be reserved for those who
stick with the program until they are of Olympic age (of course, there would
be weeding out as well, so the numbers would be relatively low). And even if
they end up going back at the age of 10, they would have greatly benefited
from just getting nutritious food during a crucial part of their childhood -
child malnutrition rates in India are almost 50%, even higher than those in
sub-Saharan Africa. Childhood malnutrition leads to lifelong physical and
mental infirmity, so the children would no doubt benefit.
There's no denying the creepiness to some people, although I don't see it that
way (America is a nation of immigrants who came for a better life, and that
would describe these kids perfectly). This would be a cost-efficient and
humane way to reassert US Olympic dominance over China, something that a lot
of people are concerned with.
~~~
vacri
_Will it be expensive?_
Sending a scouting network into a foreign country that largely doesn't speak
your language in order to watch a broad swathe of children isn't going to be
cheap.
Given that the US already leads the board in total medal tally, do they really
need to game the system that way? Besides, it makes an even further mockery of
the idea of 'amateur athletes' when you're essentially buying them from the
other side of the world.
_Citizenship would be reserved for those who stick with the program until
they are of Olympic age (of course, there would be weeding out as well, so the
numbers would be relatively low)._
Lure a family to an entirely different culture with promises of wealth and
wellbeing, then if they aren't gloriously successful for whatever reason,
throw them away like trash, back into a culture they're now not used to,
particularly the kids? All so you can increment your medal tally to stem the
'yellow peril'? This is morally reprehensible.
~~~
w1ntermute
> Sending a scouting network into a foreign country that largely doesn't speak
> your language in order to watch a broad swathe of children isn't going to be
> cheap.
Translators come cheap in a country where English is relatively well spoken.
> Given that the US already leads the board in total medal tally, do they
> really need to game the system that way?
How long do you think that's going to last? China is going to beat us in both
total medal count and the number of gold medals within 2 or 3 Olympics (if not
this one), and then we'll have no hope at all.
> Besides, it makes an even further mockery of the idea of 'amateur athletes'
> when you're essentially buying them from the other side of the world.
Hey, fight fire with fire. What do you think the Chinese are doing? It's not
like these children are going to be mistreated. And I don't think giving them
proper food, shelter, education, and clothing can be equated with "buying"
them.
> Lure a family to an entirely different culture with promises of wealth and
> wellbeing, then if they aren't gloriously successful for whatever reason,
> throw them away like trash, back into a culture they're now not used to,
> particularly the kids? All so you can increment your medal tally to stem the
> 'yellow peril'? This is morally reprehensible.
OK, so set up some training centers in India instead. If they make it to the
age of 10 or so without being weeded out, bring them to America. Anyone who
comes to America and stays for at least 6 months can be guaranteed
citizenship, even if they don't win. How does that sound? These are just
details. My post was intended to lay out a general plan, not to invite
nitpicking over the details of every word.
And the "yellow peril" you talk about (racial connotations notwithstanding) is
a very real thing. China is going to dominate the world very soon. The best
way we can fight back is to rely on America's basics, one of which is
immigration.
~~~
vacri
_Translators come cheap in a country where English is relatively well spoken._
This one point is supposed to suggest that the rest of the comment would also
be cheap? However you carve it, it will be quite expensive, once you throw in
trained scouts, administration for scouts and moved families, foreign
bureaucracy, domestic bureaucracy...
_China is going to beat us_
So? The spirit of the games is supposed to be participation, not grinding
other people's face in how awesome you are. Be the bigger person and say
'congratulations'.
_It's not like these children are going to be mistreated._
Tossing them away like trash into a now-foreign culture because they don't run
fast enough for you is pretty heavy mistreatment.
_The best way we can fight back is to rely on America's basics, one of which
is immigration._
"We'll let you in if you do our work for us" does indeed seem to be the modern
US opinion on immigration, yes. Or you can fight back by not spending
shitloads of money to chase shiny baubles.
But in the end, so what if the Chinese game the system by heavy investment?
Everyone knows they do it. When they take and keep the #1 spot, no-one is
thinking that they're simply superior physical specimens - that's old cold war
thinking at play. All you do by purchasing athletes from other countries is
dirty your own hands and making people think the same of you. Worse, even -
'the US had to import its talent to stay ahead of China's native talent'.
~~~
w1ntermute
> This one point is supposed to suggest that the rest of the comment would
> also be cheap? However you carve it, it will be quite expensive, once you
> throw in trained scouts, administration for scouts and moved families,
> foreign bureaucracy, domestic bureaucracy...
I'm not denying that there will be expenses. Obviously, some detailed
calculations would have to be done and a cost-benefit analysis performed.
However, my intuition tells me that it will be worth it when China starts to
dominate. Moreover, the cost of living is low in India, so it would be a lot
cheaper than training athletes in the US.
> So? The spirit of the games is supposed to be participation, not grinding
> other people's face in how awesome you are. Be the bigger person and say
> 'congratulations'.
Oh please, those are just empty words you tell kids. No one really believes
that, least of all the American or Chinese teams.
> Tossing them away like trash into a now-foreign culture because they don't
> run fast enough for you is pretty heavy mistreatment.
First of all, I already gave you a solution to that problem. And no matter how
you look at it, these are children that would otherwise end up physically and
mentally deformed, and often illiterate. Any cultural issues pale in
comparison to those very real problems.
> "We'll let you in if you do our work for us" does indeed seem to be the
> modern US opinion on immigration, yes.
And there's nothing wrong with doing that. One of the reasons that the US
doesn't have the demographic timebomb faced by the rest of the developed world
is that we encourage large-scale immigration
> Or you can fight back by not spending shitloads of money to chase shiny
> baubles.
That would be entirely antithetical to the spirit of the modern Olympics, so
that's a non sequitur.
> But in the end, so what if the Chinese game the system by heavy investment?
Regardless of their methods, they _will_ be lauded. It would be remiss of us
not to do everything legal and ethical in our power to fight back.
> All you do by purchasing athletes from other countries is dirty your own
> hands and making people think the same of you.
Once again, we wouldn't be "purchasing" them. They wouldn't be slaves or
indentured servants. I don't understand how this would be a bad thing. These
children would be given a chance at a vastly better life. It's not like they
would be deprived of something because of our actions.
> Worse, even - 'the US had to import its talent to stay ahead of China's
> native talent'.
Except that is what the US is all about - we are a nation of immigrants. While
the rest of world might scoff at our short history and lack of ethnic
homogeneity, we take great pride in that fact.
~~~
vacri
_And no matter how you look at it, these are children that would otherwise end
up physically and mentally deformed_
You really need to keep your racism in check. I really don't know what else to
say if your view is this twisted.
~~~
w1ntermute
No, you really need to stop restorting to ad hominem responses and face the
cold, hard truth. It is a fact that nearly 50% of children in India suffer
from malnutrition. It is a fact that malnutrition is a condition that is
universally accepted within the scientific community to cause lifelong
physical and mental deformity. This has nothing to do with race. It could
happen in any country, to any ethnicity.
~~~
vacri
Taking umbrage at your statement that all Indians are mentally and physically
deformed is not an 'ad hominem' response. Seriously, think about the extension
of what you said - it would mean that every Indian national is physically or
mentally deformed. You've pegged it back to 50% with this comment, but even
then, is your mythical scouting network _really_ going to be looking at
malnourished children?
Then you compound it by wanting to be given a pat on the back because you're
willing to save a mere handful if they happen to perform well. It's like
saying that blacks in the US don't have to worry about poverty so much because
there's the NFL to save some of them.
Also, "It is a fact that -foo- is universally accepted within the scientific
community" is an 'appeal to authority' fallacy. Besides, malnutrition comes in
a range of degrees - it is _not_ synonymous with kwashiorkor or marasmus, not
among the scientists you claim as your authority. Hence, it _also_ refers to
the diet of obese Americans (and there's also mild undernutrition as well).
Given that the obesity rate in the US is climbing towards 30%, it's not so
much of a gain to go from a culture with 50% to a 30% malnutrition rate.
------
manojlds
While the article is true, it misses the point that the games and sports that
India does excel in, do not feature in the Olympics. Cricket, kabadi, kho kho,
chess etc.
I am really surprised that GB did not make an effort to have T20 Cricket in
Olympics, as that format is much more amenable to Olympics and arguably, more
popular with today's spectators.
Another point that is missed is the Indian diet. A large portion of the
population is vegetarian ( and not all kinds of meat are eaten ). And Indians
are foodies that like to eat spicy, oily food etc.
~~~
eshvk
> Another point that is missed is the Indian diet. A large portion of the
> population is vegetarian ( and not all kinds of meat are eaten ).
Could you clarify further what proportion of the population is vegetarian?
Surely, there are high protein vegetarian diets (say something concentrated in
Whey) that athletes could do?
> And Indians are foodies that like to eat spicy, oily food etc.
Not sure how this is relevant. Assuming that there is a inherent cultural bias
towards spicy food, it is not that difficult for a competitive athlete to go
on a stricter regime while working towards victory.
------
sunjain
I would attribute this to the following: 1\. As a society, and culturally
India historically has not given sufficient importance to physical fitness. So
while historically there was great importance given to spiritual and
philosophical pursuits(they had universities setup more then thousand years
back dedicated to philosophy - Nalanda), the physical/bodily aspect was not
only overlooked but considered almost an overhead/obstacle to ultimate goal in
life. Even Yoga's birth(in India) was related more to spiritual pursuit. Not
surprising to see origins of Chess in India(even though Chess is a sport, but
it is mental). And India does reasonably good in Chess even now.
2\. Even the food habits, historically, in India are geared more towards
supporting this bent towards mental/spiritual aspects than physical. Hence
prevalence of vegetrianism. Now vegetarianism can be one of the healthiest
lifestyle(there has been known triathletes who are pure vegetarians)...but
that requires a well balanced diet - which is not the case for majority in
India(for most in India, vegetarian diet has lot of grease and less
nutrition).
3\. There is a reason why Cricket is the most popular sport in India - it does
not require great physical fitness yet you can play it for hours. And cricket
does grab a lion share of sporting opportunities in India (and most
lucrative).
3\. Prevalent thinking still is that sports is waste of time, and you are
better of spending that time on studies...hence you will see abundance of
Indian American spelling bee champs even here in US, yet you will not see many
in athletics
4\. Combine that with lack of creativity and focus from Government in India in
identifying(and persisting) with a sport which can fetch medals (like Turkey
etc)
------
dsushant
Every Olympic medal winner is an expert at his/her sport. Given that attaining
expertise requires about 10 years of "deliberate practice" under the
supervision of a capable coach, the deficiencies in India's sports management
come under focus: 1\. The lack of native coaches is evident from the need to
depend on foreign coaches. This leads to obvious challenges for an aspiring
sportsperson. For instance, many potential sports persons may just not be
talent-spotted. 2\. The incentives to pursue a career in sports are weak: The
middle classes - who can think of funding their child's sports ambition -
usually give in to the fear of being excluded from a "regular" career, usually
based on education qualification.
------
hazov
Brazil and Mexico suffer from the same problem, they are middle income
countries with more than a 100 million people and yet they are not much better
than Kenya, and although not a country with much people Israelis are richer
than the majority of the world they do not go well in the Olympics either, so
money just do not buy a good Olympics performance like the article tried to
sell.
One thing that can explain is culture, Australia has a culture for
competition, for example Australian lifeguards compete in the Surf Life Saving
competition in aquatic sports, it's not a coincidence that Australia goes well
in aquatic sports in the Olympics, Swimming, Rowing and Sailing are
responsible for half their gold medals.
------
tathagata
India is a big country with a huge population. As with many other complex
phenomena, there is no one reason which can explain why India is not doing
well in sports. My guess is that the country is just going through a trough.
Wait for a few more generations and see.
In general, as economic forces level the playing field for most countries
around the world, the medals tally will start correlating well with the
population.
------
mailarchis
"Sport was never a priority for a majority of [Indian] parents and their
kids," this line says it all. India doesn't have a culture that encourages
sports. In a typical middle class family, the parents are actively involved in
education of their kids but when it comes to sports they will draw some ground
rules like 4 to 6 pm for playing, then studies and no play time during exams
and that's about it.
------
anuraj
India is an impoverished nation. More than 55% of people are severely
malnourished. To top it, the militant brahmanic Hindutva of North India
advocates vegetarianism - which equates to further lack of proteins. And the
caste system that looks down upon manual labor and subsequent sedentary
lifestyle for last 3000 years have made Indians a weak race. To top it
corruption and lack of self drive.
------
laktek
What India can do is persuade IOC to include cricket as an event (but still
with counterparts such as Australia, South Africa & Sri Lanka their chances
could be thin).
~~~
dsr_
They would have a better chance of doing that if a cricket match actually
lasted an hour, rather than days...
~~~
laktek
Well, there's actually T20 Cricket which lasts in about 3 hours.
------
ck2
I wonder how much building their nuclear weapons cost.
------
flurie
How does a country that bans guns entirely give athletes access to them?
~~~
five18pm
Guns are not banned in India. It just takes more effort to get guns. You need
a license to own a firearm. One of the high courts declared that unless there
is something adverse against the candidate one cannot be denied license. This
effectively makes it a right to own a firearm.
~~~
bdunbar
_This effectively makes it a right to own a firearm._
Disagree. If the government _gives_ you something, it's not a right. It's just
something they can take away from you when convenient.
------
spitx
Despite the in-vogue arguments that come with sparse evidence to support that
a vegetarian diet can indeed match the athletic predisposition and performance
of a non-vegetarian one, I find it highly suspect that regions of the world (
including India ) which have had to rely exclusively on plant protein for
hundreds of generations would yield the same athleticism predisposition rates
as regions that haven't had such a constraint.
Consistently high preponderance in vegetarianism (in India) has to share some
of the blame for a lack luster interest in athleticism and athletic
activities.
There is simply no other very large land mass that has a cultural history of
very high (and almost exclusive) dependence on plant protein.
This does not even begin to tell the tale of the deleterious effects of a diet
entirely devoid of testosterone-laden red meat.
------
alpine
I also think it is a healthy sign that Indian democracy is working well in at
least some respects. Their great rival China is apparently kidnapping some
children who show signs of athletic potential and subjecting them to a life of
intense training for a chance at an Olympic medal to promote the greatness of
the mother country. India clearly hasn't chosen this route despite the
pressure there must be to match China in all fields.
~~~
maxwin
I smell jealousy here. Although it's a fact that China spent a great sum of
money and effort training their athletes and the children usually go though
excess training(well, like Russia, Korea etc) , i don't think the athletes are
being "kidnapped" or forced to become athletes. Many of the young athletes
came from very poor family and this is a way to improve their lives (including
their families and even the whole village). In fact, it's a privilege to be
chosen.
~~~
arn
I read this story today which makes it sound like, at least in this one case,
the truth may be closer to alpine's take.
[http://www.sfgate.com/sports/ostler/article/Missy-
Franklin-s...](http://www.sfgate.com/sports/ostler/article/Missy-Franklin-s-
sunny-outlook-on-life-3761900.php)
"Chinese 16-year-old Ye Shiwen astounded everyone with her finishing kick in
the 400 IM. London's Daily Mail newspaper sent a reporter to Ye's hometown to
interview her parents.
They told of their only child being selected at age 6 to be schooled in an
elite full-time swim program. At 11 she turned "pro" and entered what was
basically a work camp for kiddie phenoms, one of 20 selected from a pool of
20,000 candidates. Between ages 11 to 14, Ye was allowed one brief visit with
her parents each week and one brief phone call home, many of them very
tearful.
The parents talked of missing their daughter terribly, but Ye's mom said, "In
the West, you pay a coach to turn you into an athlete. But in China, the state
pays, so you have to sacrifice something in return.""
~~~
maxwin
Right. This is all true. I'm not supporting their system. But the parents are
not forced. They have a choice. They choose to sacrifice something in return
for a good economic life and future for themselves and their children. There
are tens of millions of chinese workers who left their village or town to work
at big cities. Many of them only see their children once or less per year. In
comparison, the chosen athletes life is so much better. Sure, china should
definitely improve their system but I don't think it's fair to demonize them
when it's simply not true.
~~~
kamaal
That's the only option those parents have.
If you are very poor and the party offers your kids education, food and a
career. I doubt if any parent wouldn't let go their kids.
Its basically like putting up your kid for adoption. People do that when they
have no way out. If they had absolutely any other option, trust me they would
keep their kids with them.
~~~
w1ntermute
Well, they don't have another choice, and so this is a good option. It's
better than what happens in India, with almost half the child population
suffering from malnutrition - it's even worse in India than in sub-Saharan
Africa, which is saying something.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Is it wrong to steal someone's design, but then change the theme? - nmaio
Ethically? Legally? I've already started building the front-end and it's pretty much complete. Even though the theme/idea of the site will be totally different, should I be having second thoughts?
======
staunch
You shouldn't literally copy/paste anyone's stuff. That's not only unethical
it may land you legal trouble.
You should take significant inspiration from other people, as long as you re-
create it yourself and change it in a meaningful way.
------
cstrouse
A lot of people heavily borrow from existing site's designs; however, it'll
probably hurt your portfolio. If people realize that your designs aren't
actually original they may not want to hire you or they may insist on reduced
pricing.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
China will scrap limit on presidential term, meaning Xi Jinping can stay on - antman
http://www.scmp.com/news/china/policies-politics/article/2134624/china-will-scrap-limit-presidents-term-meaning-xi
======
jacquesm
Did anybody seriously doubt this would pass? This vote was utterly
meaningless.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
I Know You’re Mad at United But… (Thoughts from a Pilot Wife About Flight 3411) - coryfklein
https://thepilotwifelife.wordpress.com/2017/04/11/i-know-youre-mad-at-united-but-thoughts-from-a-pilot-wife-about-flight-3411/
======
taylodl
This "pilot wife" provided a better response than United's CEO. That's the
_real_ story here: it's how United has handled this unfortunate event.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
At 97, lithium-ion battery pioneer says his work is not done - sohkamyung
https://cen.acs.org/people/profiles/Podcast-97-lithium-ion-battery/97/i35
======
hwillis
I'm torn on Goodenough's (and his other main author, Maria Helena Braga)
academic contributions lately. They are doing a lot of investigation into
glass electrolytes, something that is very important and potentially the
future of li-ion. Sodium-ion batteries are also intriguing, although at this
point it's questionable they'd be cheaper.
Solid state batteries may eventually be much smaller (heavier, but more energy
per kg as well) and hopefully cheaper. Volume is one of the main drivers of
the cost of batteries, simply because it's proportional to the amount of
material processing. Increasing the specific energy (watt-hours per kg) of a
chemistry typically means you can cheaply tweak a material input and your
production line is suddenly far more productive.
Nobody has a great pitch on how we'll actually _make_ solid state batteries at
scale, but if we figure it out it'll probably also mean we can stop using so
many solvents. Currently both the anode and cathode are made from a _very_
carefully curated mix of very tiny spherical grains. Great pains are taken to
produce a properly sized mix of sizes as close to spherical as possible-
spheres make the chemical reaction as uniform as possible, and the size of the
grain determines the ratio of charge (volume) to the rate charge can flow
(surface area). It's critically important to tune those to match your
performance profile and minimize stress on the battery.
The solvents come in to the picture when you need to spread these materials
onto copper/aluminum sheets without letting it compress too much, so it mixes
with the electrolyte and doesn't crush the grains. You mix the material in
with volatile liquids, spread it ever so carefully to keep it even, and then
bake it under heat to drive off the solvent, which is recaptured. That solvent
is one of the greatest current health risks and pollution sources during the
production of batteries. Some is lost and just being around the stuff is not
great for you. Obviously you'll have a better recovery at LG than in some
random Chinese factory, but the pollution and risk to health is a loss for the
whole of humanity.
ANYWAY: Goodenough's/Braga's research output! It's... very sketchy. They've
published a number of papers that make extraordinary claims, some of which
implicitly break the conservation of energy. There's a real lack of rigor, and
a lot of questionable choices. They often present information that obscures
the real performance of their work- like showing a battery under maximum
discharge (without giving cycle life) and maximum cycle life (without giving
discharge). Matt Lacey did a really excellent review[1] of two 2017 and 2018
papers.
I haven't read his latest papers and I have to get to work unfortunately. If
you want to read them, Maria Helena Braga is _excellent_ about sharing her
work freely, and puts everything up [2]. It's a real credit to her and despite
my criticisms she is a great scientist because of it. I really, genuinely hope
to be excited by his research without seeing claims about ever-increasing
capacity, or batteries that plate lithium on the anode. I really hope he gets
a Nobel and I think that LCO (his original creation) absolutely deserves one.
May update this once I check out his latest. Meanwhile, here's a twitter album
of making a pouch battery! [3]
[1]: [http://lacey.se/2018/07/05/glass-battery-
part-2/](http://lacey.se/2018/07/05/glass-battery-part-2/)
[2]:
[https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Maria_Braga4](https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Maria_Braga4)
[3]:
[https://twitter.com/realscientists/status/106450287687207731...](https://twitter.com/realscientists/status/1064502876872077312)
------
m-p-3
IPFS mirror
[https://ipfs.io/ipfs/QmdpuFwmHJUeMGAxqUnSS85BJSVJCN9c6fWDdZZ...](https://ipfs.io/ipfs/QmdpuFwmHJUeMGAxqUnSS85BJSVJCN9c6fWDdZZmSeZrhs/)
[https://cloudflare-
ipfs.com/ipfs/QmdpuFwmHJUeMGAxqUnSS85BJSV...](https://cloudflare-
ipfs.com/ipfs/QmdpuFwmHJUeMGAxqUnSS85BJSVJCN9c6fWDdZZmSeZrhs/)
~~~
ozymandias12
Care to share how you do this?
------
bonestamp2
Scientific work aside, I'm more interested in how he's still this sharp at 97?
------
timerol
Having your choice of thesis advisors be Enrico Fermi and Clarence Zener must
have been awesome, even if neither of them wanted grad students at the time.
------
latchkey
Last year, he was still at it too!
[https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-battery-pioneer-who-at-
age-...](https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-battery-pioneer-who-at-age-96-keeps-
going-and-going-1533807001)
~~~
dmix
I've read this same story a few times now.
------
random_savv
Clearly not good enough yet? :-)
------
JudasGoat
In the interview, it's mentioned that tuition was $900 in 1940 at Yale. That
works out to $16,493.85 in "2019 Dollars". Yale costs $49,480 today. I
apologize for being off topic but I wonder if John was college age today, what
college would he have attended with very limited parental support, $35
specifically.
~~~
filleokus
To continue the OT: According to [0] which quotes your $49,480 figure, the
average net cost (after all financial aids) is $18,319. Still higher than the
inflation adjusted price, and also disturbing that probably a large chunk of
that aid becomes a transfer from the government to the colleges.
I just checked it out because I remember that a very small part of even Ivy
League students pay sticker price.
[0]: [https://www.collegedroid.com/colleges/yale-
university/cost](https://www.collegedroid.com/colleges/yale-university/cost)
~~~
overcast
Even my alma mater is $45,244 a year, and most kids definitely do not get a
full ride like the big Ivy League schools. Education is absolutely ridiculous
now.
[https://www.rit.edu/admissions/aid/costs#2018-2019-estimated...](https://www.rit.edu/admissions/aid/costs#2018-2019-estimated-
cost)
------
aetherspawn
His last name is hysterical for a scientist if I’ll be honest!
~~~
taneq
For bonus points his middle initial is B.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_B._Goodenough](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_B._Goodenough)
~~~
hwillis
Go Johnny go!
~~~
taneq
(After demonstrating a lithium cobalt battery cathode in the early '80s)
"I guess you guys aren't ready for that yet. But your kids are gonna love it."
~~~
Infernal
It didn’t happen to be a 1.21GW battery did it?
~~~
krustyburger
Charging stations? Where we’re going we don’t need charging stations.
------
YeahSureWhyNot
not goodenough
------
dangxiaopin
Goodenough!
------
Endy
His work isn't done, but I'd say it's definitely good enough.
I'll get my coat.
------
KibbutzDalia
He missed a chance to say it’s not “good enough”
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: How much of Techcrunch's reporting is just re-blogs of stories from HN? - nighthawk
Is it just me or are other people noticing that a lot of TechCrunch's content showed up on HN several hours before it shows up on TechCrunch?<p>Which leads me to wonder, how much longer will mainstream media outlets be relevant? And is TechCrunch really that much different / better than a "content farm" like ehow, which they seem to dislike so much?
======
benologist
You can't really expect much from them, their job is to move ad inventory and
HN is willing to throw large amounts of traffic at them for many things. I
think their days are numbered for two main reasons:
1) At some point (if not already) it will be more beneficial to launch your
startup here directly and get 100% of the HN traffic instead of losing most of
it on a TC page.
2) There's no space on TC for startups who don't have an a-list cast of
founders and/or investors.
HN is probably going to be what makes TC irrelevant which is ironic because
they pour so much energy into securing this audience.
Are they better or worse than a content farm? I think the line is blurred a
little but in TC's favor. They write news, some of it's pretty mediocre and a
lot of it makes you wonder when they'll come out and admit they're Engadget
and Tuaw's ugly green bastard child, but it's news and it's now, not generic
content tailored to suck search engine traffic for years.
------
xuki
It's actually 2 ways street. I've seen many articles from TechCrunch on HN.
------
glimcat
The net echoes.
------
petervandijck
16.8%
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Are you an early adopter? - AndrewLeeMiller
Guys:<p>I do marketing and growth for a b2b SaaS company in the travel space. We're launching this really sweet concept that uses Big Data(in the form of millions of uncategorized traveler reviews) to match users to hotels...without them needing to search and sift through reviews themselves...launching soon and I'd love for HN dudes to be give me snarky beta tester feedback.<p>See the future of travel before anyone else: www.hotelmatch.me
======
mtmail
Read the guidelines on
[https://news.ycombinator.com/show](https://news.ycombinator.com/show) for
better exposure. Avoid linkbait titles. The title should be what the product
is about.
Sorry, you asked me to be snarky. Your post will be seen by more users using
Show HN.
P.S. HN isn't just 'guys' and 'dudes'
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
FogBugz is Developer-Driven (Thank Goodness) - bmccarthy
http://www.userdriven.org/blog/2007/9/19/fogbugz-is-developer-driven-thank-goodness.html
Joel and his crew are so very user-driven in my estimation because they themselves are the users.
======
nirs
Zed Shaw thinks FogBugs is junk:
<http://www.zedshaw.com/rants/fortune_favors_big_turds.html>
------
michaelneale
Does this mean that the best software by developers will always be consumed by
developers?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Someone used my IPFS gateway for phishing - jstanley
https://incoherency.co.uk/blog/stories/hardbin-phishing.html
======
imhoguy
Sorry to hear, but you are not alone [0]. It was matter of time for a new tech
to be exploited like that. Providing IPFS gateway is like opening up public
HTTP proxy (popular back in 90s). You had good intentions, but there will be
lot of nasty things going thru your machine. Of course guys like Cloudflare
can absorb arising liability but I think they will shutdown their gateway at
some point.
I think the best way to popularize IPFS will be out-of-the box support in
major browsers. I think Mozilla may be the first one here.
[0] [https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/phishing-
atta...](https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/phishing-attacks-
distributed-through-cloudflares-ipfs-gateway/)
~~~
akerro
Mozilla talks a lot and don't do much in this direction, they promised Tor
integration like 4-5 years ago and all they did is setup 3 middle-nodes.
Brave Browser already has Tor integration in private tabs and working IPFS
integration on -dev channel since beginning of this year
[https://github.com/brave/brave-
browser/issues/819](https://github.com/brave/brave-browser/issues/819)
~~~
jerheinze
> they promised Tor integration like 4-5 years ago and all they did is setup 3
> middle-nodes.
They never promised any Tor integration for the near future, see:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17205441](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17205441)
and the first comment. Brave can do Tor integration because its user bases is
much smaller than Mozilla's (scaling the Tor network to support the load from
all FF users still requires much work).
------
iknowstuff
>Around the same time that this email was forwarded to me, DigitalOcean
disabled the network interface on my VPS in order to stop the phishing attack
from working. Fair enough, can't really expect them to do any more than that.
I disagree. I don't think this is okay. Aside from this IPFS story,
DigitalOcean in general does not care about abuse. Unlike providers such as
OVH, DigitalOcean will simply nullroute you when you fall victim to a DDoS
attack. I wish they stepped up their game - until then, after hearing those
stories, I will not be using their service for anything I care about.
~~~
rmdoss
Yep, both DO and Linode do the same thing. Just null route your IP and take
forever to remove it once you fixed whatever problem it was (even if it was a
false alarm).
------
paranoidrobot
"And if you know a hosting provider that is less likely to switch your
networking off, I'm all ears."
No reputable hosting provider is going to ignore abuse complaints. The best
you can hope for is a 24-72 hour window to respond to any complaint.
------
Scaevolus
Proxies are XSS-as-a-service, so you should expect abuse complaints. At least
the US provides some protections as a carrier.
------
cwkoss
How does GMA.html send the creds back to their server?
Interesting question of who has culpability:
\- Server receiving creds seems clearly in wrong
\- OneDrive hosting the html file which can be used to exfiltrate creds is a
bit murkier
\- Hosting a link to the onedrive url on IPFS is murkier still.
~~~
jstanley
Note that the link to the OneDrive URL does _not_ come from IPFS. It comes
from the URL fragment, which makes it even _more_ murky as to whether the IPFS
hash should even be blocked! Perfectly legitimate sites could be using exactly
the same content with no knowledge of the phishing attack. It is just copy and
pasted from [https://itty.bitty.site/](https://itty.bitty.site/)
I didn't look into how GMA.html works, but a quick look just now shows that it
posts to
[https://searchurl.bid/joyceesther0101/finish1.php](https://searchurl.bid/joyceesther0101/finish1.php)
~~~
cwkoss
Ah, I didn't catch that the Base64 string was part of the query param, not
stored in IFPS. Yeah, seems like IFPS data isn't offending whatsoever in this
case.
Interesting that it is 'facilitating' phishing (as in dependency in attack
chain), but only to the extent that would apply to a number of general-purpose
open source libraries, or the browser, or any OS or ISP.
Seems like DigitalOcean made the wrong choice, but the technical complexity of
the situation is enough to not put too much blame on them. Unresponsive
support is disappointing.
~~~
jstanley
I agree that it's too complex to expect front-line abuse support to work out
what's going on, but yes I did expect them to turn my networking back on after
I blacklisted the hash.
~~~
miyuru
Digitalocean disabled network access to one of my droplets too. They won't
respond to your emails, but poke them on twitter and hopefully you will get a
response back. mine to 10 days to get a reply.
I switched to scaleway afterwards.
------
ChuckMcM
Hmm, doesn't bode well of IPFS. To the extent that bad actors can "easily"
disable swaths of infrastructure in a difficult to parse/manage way.
~~~
LeoPanthera
Web-IPFS gateways are not part of the IPFS infrastructure, nor are they
essential.
~~~
setr
They are, however, essential for the transition to it; at least as long as
they continue the goal of becoming the new web.
~~~
jstanley
If you want to use IPFS without using a public gateway, it is very easy to
install and use a local gateway.
If you also use a browser extension like "IPFS Companion", it can
automatically redirect all IPFS-looking URLs to your local gateway.
I agree this doesn't help for casual users who have never heard of it, but
it's at least better than "everyone has to use a public gateway all the time".
~~~
sneak
Neither of these things you mention are very easy on my primary computer, an
iPad Pro.
~~~
phyzome
You don't have a general-purpose computer, you have a locked down browser.
(But point taken, a lot of people aren't using general-purpose computers.)
------
mynameisvlad
> (although their hosting provider doesn't appear to have switched their
> networking off).
I doubt that _Microsoft_ Azure is going to switch off the networking for all
of _Microsoft_ OneDrive over this.
~~~
rhplus
That's not a OneDrive URL
("[https://onedrivepreinhabitat.**blob.core.windows.net**"](https://onedrivepreinhabitat.**blob.core.windows.net**"))
- it's Azure Blob Storage (equiv to Amazon S3). Microsoft could absolutely
disable that account.
------
sigi45
We all should take actions against evil participants. Blocking that URL is
part of it.
------
sitepodmatt
It's very shitty of DigitalOcean to not at least give you a small window of
opportunity to investigate and remove offending content, especially if first
complaint. Given that their investigation would of been limited too (unlike
yours) it makes it somewhat easy to knock off someone on DigitalOcean with a
flimsy complaint.
~~~
askmike
> especially if first complaint
Well:
> It was sent by PhishLabs to DigitalOcean, and DigitalOcean forwarded it to
> me.
I don't think this is the first complaint from PhishLabs to DigitalOcean. I do
think DO would have "investigated" up to the level where they'd click the link
and see "yep, that's a google sign in form". It's not up to DO to dispute
claims made by people who send them abuse e-mails. As for the dispute itself,
we all seem to think the IPFS was not hosting the content. But I'm not sure if
that holds up in a legal case (the PirateBay is also not hosting any illegal
content).
~~~
jstanley
IPFS isn't even linking to illegal content.
IPFS has no knowledge of the illegal content whatsoever, it all comes from the
URL fragment and Microsoft Azure.
~~~
sitepodmatt
By the same merit, any site (big, small, government or otherwise) with an XSS
like el.outerHTML = window.location.search or el.outerHTML =
window.location.query is vunerable to be shutdown if hosted on DO. Makes one
think..
------
gassed
Leaving an IPFS gateway open seems as intelligent as running a Tor exit node.
~~~
mindslight
Indeed it is - stage 6. Individually acting for the good of others and the
future, rather than short term self interest.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_Kohlberg%27s_stages_o...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_Kohlberg%27s_stages_of_moral_development)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Apricity beautiful Linux distro based on Arch - acd
http://apricityos.com
======
dzsekijo
Why is Chrome, a proprietary software packaged when there is a practically
equivalent FLOSS software (Chromium)?
Or, the more general question -- how Pacman packages and Apricity apps relate
to each other? The answer seems to be not straightforward, as if Apricity apps
were just sugaring for a subset of the Pacman pkg set, then Chromium would be
packaged (given Arch ships Chromium, not Chrome).
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Show HN: Interviews with open source maintainers and developers - Jefro118
https://sourcesort.com
======
Jefro118
Hey, "editor" here. When I started working as a developer a few years ago, I
barely considered that there were people devoting their free or paid time to
all of the open source software I depended on. Of course, every piece of
software you depend on has one or more humans behind it, and they have stories
to tell which might be instructive for others. Hence this site (the framework
for which is heavily inspired by IndieHackers).
I have 3 main goals with SourceSort: 1) discover and share best practices (and
learnings from failures) for other open source maintainers and developers 2)
promote the projects and maintainers I interview and 3) Satisfy intellectual
curiosity. I hope I've managed all three with this first set of interviews,
but I'd love to hear any feedback.
And thanks to all of the developers who took part in this first set of
interviews, all of whom have been very friendly and generous with their time.
(p.s. if I interviewed you and it isn't up yet, don't worry - I'll get them
all finished before the weekend)
~~~
souprock
Have another:
I maintained procps from roughly 1997 to 2007. (do "man ps" and search for
"Albert")
I started because I insisted that mixed syntax like "ps x -f" and "ps u -u u"
could be parsed and be useful. I wrote the code to prove it, got in a conflict
with the existing maintainer after Debian was already using my code, forked
the project, and won.
The early days were wild. I was less experienced and it was a different era. I
would write the code late at night in my dorm room. I didn't yet have
regression tests, so one release went out that hid all processes whose PID
started with the digit "3".
Usage growth was dramatic, with the package being chosen to be in the default
install for all Linux distributions.
The community was difficult. I had one reliably helpful person, the Debian
package maintainer Craig Small. I had somebody show up with a rewrite of
"top", which I regretted accepting. It was overly complicated, then abandoned
by the author when I insisted on compatibility with older config files. I got
random patches here and there. Package managers for most Linux distributions
turned out to be kind of hostile, doing things like adding bugs and swiping
command option letters that I had reserved for other purposes.
The workload put an end to my involvement. I was able to manage with 3 kids
and a job, and I was able to manage with 5 kids and no job. Things started to
fall apart with 5 kids and a full-time job at a startup, and then really fell
apart when I added another kid. (am at 12 kids now) I had no time to respond
to email or work on the code, and I never did resolve the problem of
incompatible patches being applied by Red Hat and others.
There were probably weeks I put in more than 40 hours, and there were many
weeks when I did nothing. Perhaps 10 was near the average, but it is hard to
say.
Other than time, the biggest obstacle was the inability to keep Linux
distributions from hacking things up. They would add crasher bugs, and then
I'd go fetch their modified package to find out what had been done. They would
change behavior, sort of making a proprietary interface. There is simply no
possible way to say "no" to a Linux distribution and have it stick.
My hopes will probably be dashed now that I am not involved. I liked how "ps"
would concisely print a help screen that covered the key options, but that is
now gone. I liked how "kill" was capable of sending a signal to PID -1 for
signalling everything, but that was broken last I checked. (still in the man
page though) I liked the fact that "ps" avoided default sorting so that it
could run on systems that are low on memory (a good reason to run "ps") and so
that it could produce at least partial output on systems having kernel lock
trouble. I liked having low CPU usage by "top" itself, partly due to parsing
64-bit ASCII decimal with a custom parser and partly due to doing word lookup
with perfect hashes and computed goto. Letting go has been hard, but I simply
don't have the time anymore.
The advice I have for other open source projects and maintainers is to prepare
better for the day when you can't work on the project. Document the reasoning
behind design decisions, including for things that are purposely left out.
Documentation usually covers things that exist, but it also needs to explain
why things are deliberately missing. Be sure that your successor will have
your extra odds and ends, like test suites, even if you suddenly go missing.
~~~
Jefro118
This is really interesting, great to read about a project that started in a
slightly earlier period.
Did you want just to share this with HN or to go up on the website? (Happy to
put it up if so, I think a lot of people would find this interesting)
~~~
souprock
It's up to you. I followed along with your questions, in the typical order, so
you can just add in the matching headers if you like.
The notable difference is that I'm a former maintainer. Also, it was core
system utilities written in C.
------
sillysaurusx
[https://sourcesort.com/contribute](https://sourcesort.com/contribute) is an
interesting list. How is it generated?
I'd love to hear a bit about the backend code too: how the search works, what
stack powers the site, any libraries/tools you find indispensable, etc. I like
the minimalist design.
~~~
Jefro118
Projects are found using the GitHub API, searching for projects first on
whether they have issues labelled for new contributors and then also by
language, topics, etc. After that you can write a bit more code to get metrics
like percentage of first time pull requests accepted, median time until a
maintainer responds to a new contributor, etc. Results are then placed on an
Algolia index (stored in Postgres first) which is what powers the search +
Algolia React components.
For the interviews, I write/edit them with a self hosted version of Ghost and
then use their webhooks to sync them with my own Postgres database (I need to
add extra fields like for projects/people and Ghost doesn't allow you add
custom fields yet).
Backend is Node.js/Express, I just use EJS templates for the other less
interactive pages since I think React would be overkill there.
I was until this morning hosting it on Heroku but switched over today to Dokku
+ DigitalOcean (mainly because I have a load of free credits and didn't want
to end up with a large bill in case this hit the top of HN). First time using
Dokku and it's pretty great.
Besides the GitHub API, which I need to get the project info, I wouldn't say
anything else is indispensable. Heroku/Dokku is pretty important because I'm
not much an expert with managing servers.
Glad you like the design, I think the search UI could be better. For the
interviews I just tried to focus on typography first and foremost. Matthew
Butterick's Practical Typography is a great book for reference.
That's a lot of info, hopefully not too much. Hope it's informative!
~~~
tropo
The search UI needs negations.
For example, you offer a checkbox ("Code of Conduct") to select projects with
lots of nasty political fighting to distract from the engineering effort.
Maybe somebody would rather focus on nerdy hacking.
Another example is "Has full documentation". That is a bad thing if you want
to contribute by writing documentation.
~~~
Jefro118
Yep, those are fair points. For documentation (and for other things) it would
be better to be able to search on that directly by e.g. looking for projects
that have open issues around documentation. Will try and add these soon, I've
just been focused on the interviews recently.
------
JMTQp8lwXL
It's good to see new voices. I often see the same names in my particular niche
within open source.
~~~
Jefro118
Which niche are you in if you don't mind me asking? It's only been a few
months of me trying to get more involved in open source myself and I'm still
trying to understand better how these ecosystem/communities work.
~~~
JMTQp8lwXL
Front end / JavaScript.
------
panpanna
Linux Voice (RIP) did non-technical interviews with famous devs on the last
pages. I learned some very important things from those interviews.
(back issues are freely available )
~~~
Jefro118
Thanks, I'll look it up for comparison. What was it that you learned from them
if you don't mind me asking?
~~~
panpanna
How they work, what tools they use, how they organize their life so they have
time for FOSS development, that sort of stuff.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
10 Years of Red Hat Enterprise Linux - zhiping
http://www.redhat.com/10yearsofrhel/
======
edwinnathaniel
I'm very happy to see Red Hat to grow every day.
Let's hope one day Red Hat could supplant the dominance of Microsoft/IBM in
the "enterprise" area (so instead of the expensive .NET tools, we could use
JBoss with standard JEE6 and/or Seam+Hibernate).
I secretly wished Red Hat to acquire more "enterprise" software stack out
there (i.e.: Zimbra, Alfresco, Liferay, Compiere) and MySQL
(gone)/EnterpriseDB to provide more end-to-end offering.
------
btbuilder
Congratulations to Red Hat for producing a Linux distribution that I have used
for most of those 10 years. Stable for many years at a time with binary
compatibility, it has always been a given that if a commercial piece of
software supported Linux it will run on RHEL.
------
the_wanderer
Passed the RHCE back in 2006, at the time was spending the days (and many
nights) running high end RHEL systems. Stability wise everything was great,
except issues with EMC drivers and booting from SAN. These were ironed out by
vendor support - which is why it can pay to have that level of enterprise
support; it just depends on your environment.
These days, I use Ubuntu everywhere including here -
<http://hackertarget.com>. It is just easier to quickly get up and running
(not because its Free I could be using CentOS).
So good job Red Hat, and good job Ubuntu!
------
strictfp
Great job. RedHat makes some awesome stuff. I just wish that they could drop
some of the "not invented here" and "luser" culture, which bit me more than
once and made me leave for Debian. Somtimes I miss the good 'ol days :-)
------
zentrus
And RHEL packages are still from 10 years ago...
------
jpeg_hero
Not one mention of Centos.
Did ec2 launch with RHEL AMI's or with Centos AMI's?
~~~
KonradKlause
CentOS does not mention Red Hat and Red Hat does not mention CentOS. That's
the deal...
------
rafalG
I don't understand how they got to 10 years?
~~~
jlgreco
What about that do you not understand? They keep RHEL as up to day as most
businesses care to have it, the only thing really connecting RHEL 1 and RHEL 6
is the name, and there isn't much reason for that to wear out..
Unless maybe you are talking about Redhat the company, not RHEL? This article
is about 10 years of RHEL.. Redhat has been around for nearly two decades now.
~~~
nailer
There was AS 2.1, then RHEL 3. But yes.
~~~
jlgreco
Ah yes, you are correct.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
From the Brains Behind TiVo, a New Vision for Internet Video - superchink
http://www.wired.com/design/2014/02/guys-behind-tivo-trying-revolutionize-tv/
======
zoowar
"Brains behind TiVo"? TiVo just modernized video recording by digitizing it.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Show HN: Lightweight Threads, Channels and Actors for the JVM - pron
http://blog.paralleluniverse.co/post/49445260575/quasar-pulsar
======
zmmmmm
Ignorant newbie here, but would love to hear views on this: I always treat
with great skepticism claims that you can implement an inherent operating
system function (eg: threads) on top of said operating system more efficiently
than can be done by the OS itself. Usually it means the implementor simply
didn't understand the next level down (eg: how the kernel works) and therefore
couldn't tune it to their needs. But they understand the next level up
extremely well. And there's nothing wrong with this, especially since one is
platform independent and the other is (usually) very tied to specifics.
The one thing that seems evident to me is that native threads, in Java, all
require a stack frame and this consumes memory. At some point millions of
threads will, if nothing else, require gigabytes of memory for stack space.
However in this era when the kind of computers that are likely to run these
applications can easily have hundreds of GB of memory, I'm not even sure if
that is an inherent limitation.
So to tldr; - can someone give me the insight, what is it that makes this more
efficient at the language layer than the kernel layer? Why can a high level
language magically scale to millions of threads and the OS can not? What is it
that allows this?
~~~
saurik
I don't disagree with other answers, but I believe the situation can be
described more easily: it isn't the same primitive, so, it isn't actually the
case that someone is attempting to provide the same thing but faster: the OS
is giving you "pre-emptive threads", whereas these alternatives are giving you
"cooperative threads".
The argument is that for restricted use cases "cooperative threads" (which are
the "dual", in a mathematical sense, to "evented" execution) are going to be
faster than pre-emptive threads (which would require locks around even very
short shared data usage, due to the unpredicability of the scheduler).
If the OS provided true cooperative multitasking, maybe it could do it faster,
but that's something that has been pretty much decided to be a flawed OS
primitive between processes ("OMG Mac OS 9 / Windows 3.1" ;P), and within a
single process may as well be implemented in userland with little performance
loss.
~~~
chongli
GHC's runtime (an implementation of Haskell) uses pre-emptive scheduling for
its threads and has no problem handling millions of lightweight threads.
~~~
saurik
This starts turning into a semantics problem. GHC is a compiler that modifies
the code it has compiled to add "synchronization points" that are used under a
cooperative threading model, allowing it to know with certainty that certain
kinds of operations or even functions it detects to have certain properties
will not be pre-empted. Given that the overall language semantics are then
pure functional, the costs associated with pre-emptive scheduling are removed,
but again this is only because they "cheated" and didn't build a real
"preemptive" scheduler: tasks must cooperate.
In fact, there are trivial kinds of operations you can perform (such as
involving FFI) that simply will never pre-empt. The primitive the operating
system provides, which I maintain is a fundamentally different primitive than
what people are building in these user-space modifications, is "no matter what
you do, whether on accident or on purpose, whether with benign or malicious
intent, you will be time-sliced; your time-slicing will thereby happen at the
discretion of the system, and you will not be trusted to request or demand
excessive modifications to your time". GHC is not some magic exception: it is
still cooperative multitasking.
------
shinolajla1234
Selective Receive sounds great. Any idea how to handle messages that continue
to pile up behind your actor when they're never handled? Do they get culled
somehow after a period of time? If not, how do you handle the inherent memory
leaking where every actor piles up messages that were never handled, and
wastes processing time by replaying them every time you do handle a message?
Works okay when you have lightweight processes that are completely
independent, like in Erlang - on a monolithic process like the JVM, not so
much.
Also, with the lightweight threads using CPS - how do you prevent the kernel
from deciding to do some housekeeping tasks on your core? Using APIC or
something in Linux to assign the JVM process exclusively to cores so you're
guaranteed no interruptions? User-level hardware affinity is not exactly the
JVM's strong point.
~~~
pron
Regarding selective receive: the messages aren't replayed whenever a new
message comes along. The receive operation keeps a pointer into the queue to
the last message scanned. Whenever the inner receive returns, the outer
receive continues to scan the queue wherever it left off. Now, in general it's
a good idea to use bounded queues so messages don't pile up indefinitely. When
the queue overflows, the queue's owning actor (the receiver) will get an
exception. When it gets the exception, it will either want to terminate or
flush the queue.
If you need affinity, I recommend Peter Lawrey's Java-Thread-Affinity library
(<https://github.com/peter-lawrey/Java-Thread-Affinity>).
~~~
shinolajla1234
If you're not replaying unhandled messages, you're not doing selective
receive. To quote LYSEFGG, "Ignoring some messages to handle them later in the
manner described above is the essence of selective receives"
(<http://learnyousomeerlang.com/more-on-multiprocessing>). Erlang also doesn't
limit mailbox size, so while it's great that you offer bound mailboxes (which
is also great for performance since they can be array-based), it's not quite
as flexible. And since you haven't begun to implement supervision or OTP,
you'll have to handle failure as well when you break your bounds.
I'm a big fan of Martin Thompson's Mechanical Sympathy concepts, and I'm very
intrigued in Peter Lawrey's work with Chronicle as well. That said, that
hardware affinity library relies on native C code, and you better know what
you're doing when you put it in. The topology of the CPUs and locality mean
you have to be smart in your assignments, lest you end up message passing via
QPI/Hypertransport between sockets at a latency of ~20ns/message. Point being,
either be intimately familiar with your box and reconfigure for each kind on
which you deploy, don't ever use a hypervisor, or pin and pray.
Are you able to introduce bulkheads and failure zones with your lightweight
threads via CPS? If not, isolation of dangerous tasks on a thread that could
impact other actors could be an issue. Akka does this by allowing you to
specify what thread pool (preferrably forkjoin-based) you want to use for each
actor.
Look, this is neat stuff you're doing. I'm not concerned that you don't like
Scala, but Akka can be used from Java as well so that's a non-argument. It's
merely another approach. And while you certainly CAN block in an Akka
application, there are plenty of tools for asynchronous coding in Scala
(Futures, Async) to help you avoid that and only block when you absolutely
must.
~~~
pron
The skipped messages will be replayed in the "outer" receive. Obviously,
selective receive has its drawbacks, but it's part of what makes Erlang
simple, and it can significantly help in modeling complex state transitions.
And yes, you can assign a fiber to a ForkJoinPool of your choosing (although
I'm interested in what a "dangerous task" may be).
~~~
shinolajla1234
I agree that using selective receive helps in dealing with messages that
arrive out of the order of a specific state transition. Akka gives users the
ability to stash messages if they want to. On the JVM, a long-running actor-
based application (which is one of the reasons for using actors in the first
place) can struggle with it. It's one of the reasons the original Scala Actor
library is no longer in use, though there are other important reasons - such
as Akka's use of ActorRef, analogous to Erlang's PIDs, which mask the instance
of an actor from those who wish to communicate with it, as well as it's
physical location. As you scale actors across a cluster of machines, that
becomes really useful.
That's great about assigning the fiber to a FJP. A dangerous task would be
anything that could take down an actor, which can be worrisome depending on
what state the actor is holding. There are varying kinds of such state,
including that which can easily be retrieved again from an external source,
that which is "scratch" data and inconsequential if lost, and that which
cannot be recovered if lost. In actor-based applications, we want to
encapsulate mutable state and use message-handling single-threaded interaction
to prevent concurrency issues, right? If we're going to do something that
could cause the actor to fail and risk losing data, we want to export that
work along with the data needed to perform the task to another actor and let
IT fail rather than risk the important one. There are ways to pass such data
between incarnations of an actor on the JVM by carrying it with the Exception,
but it's not free and you have to know when to use it.
So a dangerous task could be asking for data across an unreliable network or
non-replicated source, it could be dividing by 0, anything that could cause
typing errors (even in Erlang), you name it.
~~~
pron
But how would a dangerous task affect the entire pool?
Also, I don't know if there should even be "important actors". Like in Erlang,
we want to let it fail. Important data should be kept in a shared data
structure that supports good concurrency, not in actor state. Like I said in
the post, I don't think every aspect of the application should be modeled with
actors.
~~~
shinolajla1234
With a thread pool shared by actors, even yours, if one of the actors fails,
that thread is gone until the pool creates a new one (as needed). That's one
less available thread until the recreation occurs. To minimize the impact on
other actors, you put known dangerous tasks on their own small pool so that
their probable thread death has no impact on others.
What you're not seeing is the relevance of a supervisor hierarchy and OTP.
Yes, you want to let it crash. But you want isolation of failure as well, and
only with failures of increasing criticality do you want it to be escalated
through the hierarchy. There is a difference between a database call failing
because a SQL command failed and all database interactions failing due to
network partition. OTP via Erlang and Akka allow you to model that in your
actor tree.
Important data kept in a shared data structure? Globally visible? Managed with
what, STM? That won't fly at scale - STM is great only when you're dealing
with small datasets that don't change very often. Immutable, persistent data
structures? Also not good at scale due to fixed size allocations constantly
happening as structural sharing is enforced. Allocations are cheap and
hopefully the objects are short-lived and GC-friendly, but it's still far from
a free ride.
The whole point of actors is a concurrency abstraction. They are meant for
isolating mutable state from being affected by multiple threads at the same
time. OTP and supervision is just a nice way of organizing them and learning
when failure occurs on another thread.
Should an entire app be modeled with actors? Probably not. A subsystem
certainly can be. Depends on what you're doing, of course.
~~~
pron
How would a failed actor (huh :)) take down the thread? All exceptions thrown
by the FJTasks tasks are caught.
The shared data structure was a reference to my previous post, not to STM:
<http://blog.paralleluniverse.co/post/44146699200/spaceships>.
------
buster
Am i the only one who had to smile at the sentence "At Parallel Universe we
develop complex data structures and distributed data grids, which require a
lot of low-level programming, so I do most of my work in Java."? :)
Also, i wish they would have some Java code on the page? As i understand it's
available for Java as well? I love the actor model, but i have no intention to
learn clojure.
~~~
pron
Quasar is Java (Pulsar is a thin Clojure API to Quasar). There's no
documentation yet (there will be soon), but the project page directs you to
some examples.
All the code examples in the post are in Clojure because I wanted to
demonstrate how the Erlang model is fully implemented, and the Clojure API
easily mimics Erlang's. The Java API doesn't have pattern matching, and so
would make it harder to see the resemblance to Erlang.
But as good as Java is for low-level, high-performance code, and even though I
don't find its verbosity to be problematic in the least, Clojure is a
beautiful, elegant language worth learning even if only for its concurrency
and state-management philosophy.
~~~
cgh
I think the OP was smiling at the notion of Java as low-level. It's anything
but.
------
oinksoft
How does this compare with <http://code.google.com/p/jetlang/> ?
How does this work with garbage collection? Is the GC per-process ("fiber"),
like in Erlang?
~~~
pron
Jetlang doesn't offer lightweight-threads. It uses an event-driven processing
of messages (like Akka), so fibers can't block and you can't do selective
receives.
The JVM's GC isn't per actor (I know actors are called processes in Erlang,
but let's keep the nomenclature consistent), but its GC is extremely advanced,
and some implementations work on a per-thread basis. The ramifications are
that we can't offer the same level of isolation as Erlang, at least not on
HotSpot. An actor could theoretically produce a particular kind of garbage
that will cause a GC pause to the entire system. But other than isolation, the
JVM is very performant (much more than Beam), and handles concurrency
extremely well.
I don't understand your last question (on load distribution).
~~~
oinksoft
Re: distribution, I just deleted this question from my comment. I had not
payed attention to the item in "next steps" in your post which mentions
Galaxy.
I'm excited to see how you guys go about trapping errors and such, as you
mention in the "next steps."
Thanks for answering my small questions.
------
rektide
There have been several attempts of porting actors to the
JVM. Quasar and Pulsar’s main contribution — from which
many of their advantages stem — is true lightweight
threads[1]. Lightweight threads provide many of the same
benefits “regular”, OS threads do, namely a single, simple
control flow and the ability to block and wait for some
resource to become available while in the meantime
allowing other threads to run on the CPU. Unlike regular
threads, lightweight threads are not scheduled by the
operating system so their context-switch is often faster,
and they require far less system resources. As a result, a
single machine can handle millions of them.
[http://blog.paralleluniverse.co/post/49445260575/quasar-
puls...](http://blog.paralleluniverse.co/post/49445260575/quasar-pulsar)
Excellent area to contribute to. In 2006-2008 there was Kilim, which uses some
code-rewriting to accomplish similar greenthreading on the JVM to support an
actor system with extremely lightweight lock-ree message massing.
Kilim comfortably scales to handle hundreds of thousands of actors
and messages on modest hardware. It is fast as well – task-switching
is 1000x faster than Java threads and 60x faster than other lightweight
tasking frameworks, and message-passing is 3x faster than Erlang (cur-
rently the gold standard for concurrency-oriented programming).
from
[https://github.com/kilim/kilim/raw/master/docs/kilim_ecoop08...](https://github.com/kilim/kilim/raw/master/docs/kilim_ecoop08.pdf)
Kilim: <https://github.com/kilim/kilim>
~~~
swannodette
fwiw, he did in fact mention Kilim in the footnotes. Sriram also chimes in on
the comments.
~~~
rektide
His point about Kilim being a monolithic solution is well taken- getting all
three of these right (from both the end-user perspective and transformational
perspective) is hard!
(i) ultra-lightweight,
cooperatively-scheduled threads (actors), (ii) a message-passing frame- work
(no shared memory, no locks) and (iii) isolation-aware messaging.
There's a stackoverflow thread on continuation libraries for the JVM. There's
some coverage of the unnamed coroutine library in in Quasar-
<http://stackoverflow.com/a/4687050/72070>
Thanks for the note swannodette, I'd missed the reference.
------
gtani
Could you enumerate your specific perceived shortcomings of akka that you
allude to in blog post?
~~~
rektide
Elsewhere in this discussion-
Jetlang doesn't offer lightweight-threads. It uses an
event-driven processing of messages (like Akka), so fibers
can't block and you can't do selective receives.
<https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5646097>
Akka relies on operating system threads- when you block in Akka, you block in
real life.
~~~
tmarthal
According to this Akka document -
<http://doc.akka.io/docs/akka/1.3.1/scala/dispatchers.html>
"Akka supports dispatchers for both event-driven lightweight threads, allowing
creation of millions of threads on a single workstation, and thread-based
Actors, where each dispatcher is bound to a dedicated OS thread."
I also, would like to see the perceived shortcomings of Akka, since
lightweight threads can't be the problem.
~~~
pron
Akka calls them lightweight threads, but they really aren't as they can't be
blocked. In short - they're not implemented as continuations.
Basing the implementation on real lightweight threads gives you selective
receive and other goodies mentioned in the post, while maintaining the API
simple. I think Quasar/Pulsar are much simpler than Akka, and they will stay
simpler for said reason.
All in all, Akka feels a lot more complicated than Erlang. Also, Scala isn't
everyone's cup of tea, and Akka doesn't mesh well with Clojure.
Quasar tries to join the power of Erlang with the power of the JVM. Pulsar
tries to join the beauty and elegance of Erlang with the beauty and elegance
of Clojure.
~~~
gtani
All well and good, another measure of "lightweight" that is often quoted is a
little over 300 words of overhead/erlang BEAM process and 300 bytes/akka
actor, do you have comparables for Quasar?
<http://www.erlang.org/doc/efficiency_guide/processes.html>
[http://doc.akka.io/docs/akka/snapshot/general/actor-
systems....](http://doc.akka.io/docs/akka/snapshot/general/actor-systems.html)
(300 bytes: way at the bottom
~~~
pron
Quasar actors consume even less memory. An idle actor occupies about 500
bytes.
------
jqgatsby
[http://thornydev.blogspot.com/2013/01/go-concurrency-
constru...](http://thornydev.blogspot.com/2013/01/go-concurrency-constructs-
in-clojure.html)
Michael Peterson has also done some good work implementing go-style
concurrency in clojure
------
jared314
The subtitle is a better fitting title:
"Lightweight Threads, Channels and Actors for the JVM".
------
willemsst
Interesting ! Regarding to your own Queue implementations, did you consider
using the disruptor (<http://lmax-exchange.github.io/disruptor/> \- which is
actually an advanced ring buffer)? Martin Thompson was also involved in that
project.
~~~
pron
Yes. I've been asked that elsewhere. See my reply here: <http://www.java-
gaming.org/index.php/topic,29466>
------
SatishPuranam
I am newbie to go, but running the go version took about 186.053167ms, wonder
how to explain this behavior <http://play.golang.org/p/flK5QV-mDC> Go Version
: devel +740d244b2047 Thu May 02 18:59:39 2013 -0700
~~~
pron
What was MAXPROCS set to? It's a lot faster to run this particular benchmark
with only one thread.
~~~
SatishPuranam
1
~~~
pron
Yeah, that's what I figured :) Set it to the number of (virtual) cores on your
machine.
------
Scramblejams
I didn't see anything in there about ensuring that the messages passed between
actors are immutable. Did I miss it?
~~~
pron
It's not enforced by Quasar, and Java, obviously can't ensure that, but in
Clojure everything is immutable.
~~~
Scramblejams
Ah, thanks for the clarification, I missed that Quasar was aimed at Java,
which threw me off. (Apparently I can't be expected to read the first sentence
carefully.)
After enjoying the benefits of immutability and lightweight message passing,
I'd hate to give up the former -- but if you're stuck with Java, I suppose all
this is gravy.
~~~
pron
You're not "stuck with Java". Sometimes it's the best tool around. In any
case, Quasar is the foundation. Pulsar wraps it with a nifty Clojure API.
Perhaps we or someone else will come up with APIs in other JVM languages (I
have my eyes on Kotlin).
------
alexatkeplar
Looks cool, but what's the distribution story? I'm not sure I understand the
comparisons to Akka without one.
~~~
pron
We intend to provide distribution on top of Galaxy
(<http://puniverse.github.io/galaxy/>).
~~~
alexatkeplar
Is Pulsar + Galaxy + Zookeeper + presumably some new code/project still
simpler than Akka? It sounds kind of complicated.
~~~
pron
Galaxy doesn't require Zookeeper (it's an optional dependency). And Galaxy
isn't there just to support Quasar/Pulsar. It's there to support a
distributed, concurrent, consistent in-memory database. Actors are just part
of the story.
To simplify, Quasar/Pulsar + Galaxy is, in Erlang parlance, like Erlang +
Mnesia or Erlang + Riak (only with a consistent database that assists in
parallelization)
~~~
alexatkeplar
Cool, thanks for clarifying pron. Looking forward to giving it a spin!
------
vj44
Great work Ron!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Foobar2000 - the ultimate audio player - shin_lao
http://www.foobar2000.org/
======
buster
I loved that player a few years ago, it's great. Ever since changing to Linux
i have missed it :(
~~~
iamdave
Wine.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
The Story of the GnuTLS Bug - bqe
http://blog.existentialize.com/the-story-of-the-gnutls-bug.html
======
tunesmith
Is that first snippet accurate? It makes it look as if it would never return a
positive value. It returns only 0 or a negative value.
~~~
mpyne
It's accurate, but the calling convention of the top-level function is such
that _any_ non-zero value is accepted as boolean true (i.e. a valid CA) and
only a zero return value is understood as false.
Because of this problem of returning the errno-style result code as a boolean-
style result code, the cert being looked at would always verify as correct.
That's why the fix simply added another label to clear the result variable (to
be logically false) before running through the cleanup code and returning the
result.
------
bananas
Ugh I really don't like the brace style in that code. Seen it a few times in
GNU code and it's a PITA as everyone else does it differently resulting in
merge/patch issues. It's ugly too.
~~~
epistasis
GNU C style is by far my least favorite style out there, but at least it's a
style, and can be automatically checked.
IMHO, any style can be adjusted to once one gets over the initial aesthetic
revulsion. I haven't yet found a formatting style that is truly better or
worse than others, once one has learned it and its quirks.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Responsive Web Design is bad for performance - craigkerstiens
http://www.guypo.com/technical/responsive-web-design-is-bad-for-performance-there-i-said-it/
======
jfaucett
Personally (probably dreaming here), I'd just like to have a standard http
header like "Screen-Width: 958", that I could then parse on a per request
basis to decide what to send in my http body content. This would make RWD a
whole lot easier...
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Should one give honest feedback after quiting a job? - DrinkWater
You quit your job because management sucks. Do you give honest feedback?<p>Imho, i dont know what to do in that situation. I feel that it will gain me nothing, but brings me in a risky situation concerning my future.<p>Be completely selfish for this consideration and just ask yourself "whats in for me?".
======
kls
The time to raise your concerns was while you where part of the organization.
If you did so and they where ignored, then they will be ignored in the exit
interview. Problems can be addressed politely while you are in a job, if you
did not take the opportunity to resolve the issues while employed there is no
reason to do so in the exit interview.
------
vetleen
Don't bother. You're frustrated and want to vent, that's understandable.
However, your feedback will most likely not be taken seriously. Instead, take
the lesson to heart and be better when it is your turn to be a manager some
day.
------
arvit
No!
Whatever the reason, do not tell them.
There is no benefit to you. There is unlikely to be benefit to them -- most
people can't deal with even polite criticism.
An exception can be when the reason is politically "OK" and obvious, e.g.
leaving the job to be a full-time parent.
If you have VERY good relations with your employer, then they will know your
feelings in advance anyway.
------
gesman
If your future employer will come over anything negative (from you or about
you) - he will not want to deal with you.
So just let it go.
------
shyn3
If you talk to HR on your exit interview that feedback will go up through the
management channels in an attempt to learn from that feedback. When HR talks
to the managers they will know the person who provided feedback. When you look
for a new job one of those managers might be at the new company you are
looking to get hired at.
I would recommend to hold your tongue.
~~~
DrinkWater
Isn't HR required to give my criticism to the managers anonymized?
~~~
mingpan
Even so, "a recent member of X team with Y role and Z complaint" is pretty
uniquely identifying.
------
adrian_pop
Maybe you should just tell the truth about the management. Of course, you
should not be too angry, because is your decision, is not like someone fired
you.
Maybe, my opinion will be read by someone higher than the management and take
action.
~~~
adrian_pop
But... check if you're the only one with this problem :)
------
codeonfire
Your feedback will not just be ignored, it will completely fail to process.
They won't understand why you are telling them your feedback. They will be
simply be confused about what thing you are trying to get by talking to them.
If you are lucky they will have had some training that sometimes ex-employees
will try to give a thing called 'feedback' which they should write down and
file appropriately for legal purposes.
If you want empathy find yourself a good robot to talk to. With no robot
available, write everything out in a letter then don't send it.
------
mansigandhi
I gave feedback to my VP & direct manager when I quit, in a very reasonable &
friendly manner. I was leaving on amicable terms to start my startup so there
was no bad blood. Nonetheless, he didn't really bother with my feedback and
continued with how things were. (8 people in my team quit in a span of 6
months because of the bad management).
Edit: So => don't bother
------
RougeFemme
This may be naive, but I would be honest and reasonably objective. Not "the
mgt sucks". But the "mgt style was not a good fit for me. There was too much
micromanagement." Not "the job sucked". But "the job was not what I thought it
would be, based on the job description and interviews."
------
DrinkWater
OK, so I was right with my tendency. The bad thing is, like mentioned in the
comments, you can't vent. Thanks everybody!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Do Developers Need Free Perks to Thrive? - conductor
http://www.datamation.com/careers/do-developers-need-free-perks-to-thrive.html?
======
conductor
Related discussion: <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1007750>
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Show HN: Deskzero – Find inspiring spots to work remotely with wifi and coffee - lorenzobr
http://deskzero.co
======
lorenzobr
Hi HN! I and a friend of mine made this in our spare time just for fun and
because we need it.
The whole website is powered by WordPress that seemed to us the easiest
solution to do things quickly and ship this MVP in less time. Right now we
only cover London (we live there) but we plan to unlock new cities soon with
the help of local editors that are already getting in contact with us, such as
Los Angeles, Vancouver, Amsterdam, Milan (feel free to drop us a line if you
would like to help us! :) ). If you know cool spots in your own city, please
let us know using the link on the top right corner of Deskzero. Much
appreciated!
Our core future at the moment is that you can invite someone to meet you in a
place right from Deskzero. You type the name and email of your guest, pick up
a time and we send an email invitation for you with all the info (time, venue
name and address and eventually your message).
We have couple of ideas to monetise this, among which creating beautiful city
maps of the spots we cover and offering a subscription to nomads for perks in
these venues (what benefits would you like the most?).
We’d really like to have your feedback from a technical, business and user
perspective (we’re not sensitive but be gentle, this is still a side project
so it does have bugs!! :)). Thanks!
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Dealing with Burnout - dlikhten
Hi, I have been dealing with the issue of programmer burnout for the last few weeks. The problem is that I cannot just stop working for a week or so.<p>I think its affecting my productivity on all areas and am looking to make adjustments in my life to help cope with the burnout, at least while there is so much work to do.<p>Things competing for my time: full time job, part-time work as a co-founder, wife + kid, physical exercise, friends, sanity.
======
thorie
I don't understand why people choose to have so many things competing for
their time, and then talk about "burnout". Of course you will be burned out.
I could be trying to go to college, work full-time, have 6 kids, train to be
an olympic athlete, learn to be a master of 26 different musical instruments,
write 16 novels in parallel, and then say: "I'm feeling burnt out".
The real problem isn't being burned out. The real problem is why you think you
can do all of that and NOT be burned out. Why take on so many things?
I think it comes down to greed. You want it all. But basic economics says that
you cannot have it all. If you don't find too many people trying to help you
while you're trying to have everything all at once, it's probably because
nobody really likes people who are that greedy.
If I was in your situation, I would get rid of my full-time job, get a
divorce, make sure the kid goes to the mother with the divorce, stop
exercising, get rid of friends who arn't related to my start-up, and forget
about sanity. Sanity is for conformers.
It's kind of like a hoarder collecting so much junk that he can't let go of,
that the junk weighs him down. You have to prioritize, and live with the
necessities. Which is more important to you: your family or your start-up? And
can't say both. It would be like saying I want to keep my $20,000 AND get that
new Car. Well of course, everyone WANTS both, but that's not how the world
works. Nobody WANTS to make sacrifices.
But you have to make sacrifices. Nature will sacrifice something in the end
for you, if you don't want to decide. Your health will deteriorate, or your
family will be troubled, or the start-up will fail. If you don't choose,
something will be chosen at random for you and you probably won't like the
result.
I'm not really making any suggestions to you, as your situation has many
details I don't know about. But I ask you to at least consider whether or not
you are simply desiring too many things and being stubborn about seeing
reality.
The most important adjustment to make is to set expectations that allow you to
do less.
------
jarrettcoggin
I had a similar situation while I was at a university. I was taking extra
classes, trying to work a part time job as close to 40 hours a week as I could
to pay the bills, interviewing, and a significant other. I did this for about
a year before it all came crashing down. When it did come crashing down, I was
apathetic for about a month. I bombed out of classes, almost got fired from my
job, and the SO stopped seeing me for a while.
My biggest suggestion is to find something that lets you blow off a lot of
steam/release a lot of stress in a short amount of time. For some people it's
sports or boxing or whatever. For others, it's partying. Whatever it is, it
has to be something you do alone, away from everything else. When you do this
activity, it has to be your full focus. You can't think about the startup or
the job or anything else.
I didn't figure out what this release would be for me until I had graduated
and was working. It turned out to be lifting weights and just fatiguing my
body until I pretty much couldn't walk. I tried to do this before everyone
else woke up so there was no one there to grab my time. I did my best to make
it to the gym 3-4 times a week at 6am-7am. There were plenty of days I aimed
to be in the office at 8:30, but I would be so exhausted that I would need to
nap for 15-20 minutes. I still made it a point to get in by 9am.
My three requirements for something like this is:
1\. It has to be physical. 2\. You have to be alone. No one interrupts this
sacred time. 3\. Whatever it is, put more than 110% effort into it. Make sure
you are putting everything you got into it and that you aren't spending any
energy thinking about something else.
On the other side of this coin, you need to talk to someone about it. Let them
know what's going on and that you need someone to vent to. The worst thing you
could possibly do is bottle it up.
This is what works for me, but at the same time, your mileage may vary.
~~~
dlikhten
Thanks! I actually just started hardcore biking. It does help. I'll keep this
in mind. Biking fast = physical excersise which helps with the physical
fatigue, and having to pay attention means that you can't think about other
things. Also the more effort you put in the more you think about muscle
movements and not about random thoughts (like those about work).
I actually used to play games, but they caused the same problems as working,
too much mental engagement. I don't recommend video games as a form of stress
release.
------
joshuahays
I completely understand your struggle. I'm working on our startup with two
other team members. We're all in our mid-twenty's, two of us married, one of
us with a kid, working full-time (sometimes more-than-full-time jobs).
We've been doing it for a year, and as much as we continue to push, we just
don't seem to have time for anything. Our finances have taken a hit, our
personal lives have taken a hit... sometimes it's hard to see the light at the
end of the tunnel and sometimes it feels like we're just building until
someone notices.
The only thing I can tell you is that the harder you work now, the better
you're life will be and the more fulfilled it will be later. Remember:
entrepreneurs work 16+ hour/day jobs to avoid working 8 hour/day jobs for
someone else. Keep your head up!
~~~
dlikhten
You are not kidding there. Good to hear others are in the same boat.
Definitely helps knowing people trying to deal with this as well.
~~~
joshuahays
No problem!
------
gogogadgetlegz
Step 1: Simplify - do less
Step 2: Build your foundation to decrease cortisol (it destroys your brain and
makes you stupid):
\- Eat Primal/Paleo (marksdailyapple.com)
\- If you do chronic cardio or crossfit, ditch it and lift heavy (low reps)
and sprint instead just a few times a week.
\- Say "fuck it" more and don't attach your sense of self to your results. As
much as you can, treat things like playful practice rather than do-or-die. The
book, "The Practicing Mind" is a great short read on this.
Step 3: If all else fails, take an epic road trip to re-understand who you are
without defining yourself by what you do.
Step 4: Get enlightened. Its another project, so best done when you have a bit
of breathing room. kennethfolkdharma.com is a great resource.
------
rick888
This is the problem with working on a startup while you are working a full-
time job...you are essentially working all the time.
I can't imagine having a wife+kid to deal with too.
This is why I quit my main job to pursue my startup (with a year of savings).
I now have time for my friends and personal life and can work on my own
company.
I know it may not be possible in your position, but this is what you
eventually need to do.
~~~
dlikhten
no question, this can't be sustained for long periods of time. The goal is
usually get funding and work on the startup, but for now that's not the case.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Percentages for New Hires... - far33d
Engineer, 5 years experience. Product close to launch, series A finished, in a specialized field. What option percentage should this engineer expect?
======
cperciva
It depends.
A company such as you describe ("Product close to launch, series A finished,
in a specialized field") might have 20 engineers building the project; or it
might have 3 people and several million dollars of hardware. Obviously in the
later case a new employee would make a greater impact on the company and thus
be able to demand more options.
An engineer such as you describe ("engineer, 5 years experience") might be a
23 year old who got an entry-level programming job straight out of high school
and has no particular expertise; or he might have a PhD and be a world-
recognized expert in the particular specialized field in which the company is
working. Obviously in the later case he would be able to demand more options.
All I can say with confidence based on the information given is that he should
probably expect somewhere between 0.01% and 25%.
~~~
far33d
Ok.. let's say the person falls in the middle of all your described ranges.
Less than 10 engineers, not a phd, not a high school kid, but experience is
specific to what they are working on.
Obviously, that person wouldn't fall in the middle of your options range (12%
is really high).
~~~
ph0rque
hmmm... how about a logarithmic mean? This comes out to 0.5% (log10).
------
theremora
a tenth of a percent .001 to a quarter of a percent .0025 at best.
~~~
far33d
The venturehacks site has slightly higher numbers...
[http://www.venturehacks.com/articles/option-pool-
shuffle#mar...](http://www.venturehacks.com/articles/option-pool-
shuffle#market)
~~~
theremora
sorry to split hairs but 5 is less than 5+ so they say Manager or Junior
Engineer 0.2 - 0.33
with the top range being for proven elite contributors.
going into the deal everyone has to receive similar stock offers, but after
you prove yourself, the standouts can double or more, what the original grant
was.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
IPhone fantasies, Android phones realities: Android outsells it - CrankyBear
http://www.zdnet.com/iphone-fantasies-android-phones-realities-7000004154/
======
mtgx
Google pulled off what Microsoft couldn't with Windows Mobile. They made it
the "Windows" of smartphones.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Faster pathfinding using Jump Point Search - harada
http://harablog.wordpress.com/2011/09/07/jump-point-search/
======
praeclarum
"speeds up pathfinding on uniform-cost grid maps"
How useful are uniform-cost grids? Every implementation of A* I've ever used
has been applied to varying-cost grids.
~~~
jemfinch
Any game vaguely resembling Wolfenstein uses a uniform-cost grid.
------
pixcavator
What a strange use of the word "symmetric": "Two grid paths are symmetric if
they share the same start and end point and one can be derived from the other
by swapping the order of the constituent vectors."
~~~
demallien
How so? That would be a 2-fold rotational symmetry, wouldn't it?
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rotational_symmetry>
~~~
pixcavator
Two pieces are rotated, that doesn't make the whole thing symmetric.
------
wingerlang
Is it just me or does the Vanilla-A* algorithms look too bad? I mean
especailly in the second image [(d) A* (Adaptive Depth)], why does it search
behind itself?
~~~
harada
This behaviour exists because A*'s heuristic function assumes there are no
obstacles when estimating the remaining distance to reach the goal. As the
difference between the heuristic estimate to the goal and the actual distance
increases, some nodes "behind" the start location will appear more promising
than other nodes which are eventually proven to be on the optimal path.
------
sonar_un
Quick, someone send this to Toady One!
~~~
malu
Problem is, the traffic designations make the grid non-uniform-cost. Edit: But
you could probably remove the possibility of traffic zones if this was
implemented.
------
GoGlobal
Any speed ranking against alternatives?
~~~
harada
In the paper we make an apples-to-apples comparison with a recent optimality-
preserving state-space reduction method called Swamps and an apples-to-oranges
comparison with an approximate pathfinding algorithm, HPA*.
Swamps is a nice technique for narrowing the scope of the current search; it
achieves ~5x maximum speedup and could be combined with Jump Point Search to
go faster still.
The comparison to HPA is summarised in the article. Additional evaluations are
the subject of further work :)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Solo – Time Tracking and Invoicing for Individual Professionals - activis
https://itunes.apple.com/app/apple-store/id1169529109?pt=118068070&ct=HackerNews&mt=8
======
activis
Last weekend I published my new app for time tracking and invoicing on
AppStore.
I will be happy to get some feedback.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Show HN: Marketplace for programmers that have contributed to open source - rhc2104
https://www.codedoor.com
======
zackmorris
This might be a good place to list some issues I have encountered while being
a contractor online:
* I've been burned a few times charging by project or by milestone instead of hourly. So I appreciate that you are starting with a daily rate.
* I've also been caught between getting too many small contract offers and failing to land large contracts. It would be really helpful to magically figure this out for me (this is the killer feature that I dream of, matching contractors to the jobs that resonate with them). It may involve being able to join groups of other programmers or having your site play more of a recruiter/HR liaison than usual, to shelter us to some degree from being public facing, but also get our feet in the door.
* Escrow is great and I also really like that oDesk guarantees you will be paid for any hours worked under their timer. But if you could find a way to do this without the timer, perhaps with a peer review of some kind that says "this person knows what he or she is doing", it would really relieve the tension of being watched over the shoulder. Also roughly half of the mental work I do now is subconscious, which limits me to perhaps 4 billable hours a day of visible work. Another way to say this is, I have trouble crossing more than 1 or 2 items off my to-do list each day because I have to do XYZ first, or fix something that used to work, or finish subcomponents first, and so much of my day would look like idle time to an outside observer, even though I am thinking hard.
~~~
rhc2104
Hi,
I'm glad you like the daily rate.
I'm hoping that a daily rate will prevent contracts that are too short (as you
it's not that cost efficient to get)
I like escrow in general, and want it to make sense for hourly/daily rates.
Obviously, I wouldn't make a timer like oDesk- no sane top programmer would
want to use that in this hiring environment. A nice thing about fixed price
contracts is that I could just demand all the money in escrow (this is what
ooomf does).
Let me know if you have any ideas for improvements. If so, open an issue!
------
3riverdev
BIG kudos for open sourcing your code with a usable license. This sounds like
an interesting project!
One nitpick: I signed up for a programmer account and, when I was originally
presented the "add your details" page, I'm 90% sure that a save button wasn't
visible at the bottom. I had to hit enter when focused on a text field. The
Edit button is there, though.
~~~
3riverdev
One other point of frustration was that it appeared to find only contributions
within my and other _user_ accounts, but not _organization_ accounts. For
instance, my (and others') forks of Hibernate ORM was picked up, but not the
original within the Hibernate organization.
~~~
rhc2104
Unfortunately, this is more of a feature request than a bug.
Right now, there is an interface where you can manually add repositories that
you have contributed.
Did you see the interface? If not, how can I draw more attention to it?
There is no simple API call to fetch the repos you have contributed to, which
means I would have to crawl through every fork to see if changes made it
upstream.
I could do it as a short-term fix (the long-term fix is to crawl all GitHub
data), but I have about 5~ish things on my queue that are definitely more
pressing.
Of course, it's open source, so if you want to add that functionality, it
would be awesome!
------
sqs
Looks cool! I tried searching for C and Go programmers and got no results. I
saw one for JS, though. Just signed up and will check back.
It would be cool if there was more info about the site's role in the
marketplace. Will CodeDoor be the go-between? Any guarantees? Any vetting?
~~~
rhc2104
Hi,
We literally just launched, so that's why we don't have that many developers
yet.
CodeDoor is the go-between, although we haven't implemented payments yet.
Soon!
The vetting is the open source contributions- the idea is that technical
clients can decide for themselves if the OSS contributions makes a programmer
worthy of hire.
~~~
sqs
Awesome! Good luck with the launch. Looks like it could be very useful.
------
tokenrove
It would be nice if you supported ohloh in addition to github, since it tracks
a much broader set of open source projects.
~~~
rhc2104
That's a great idea! Why don't you open an issue?
[https://github.com/CodeDoor/codedoor/issues?state=open](https://github.com/CodeDoor/codedoor/issues?state=open)
------
insteadof
Where is the page on payment terms? Is there one? Unless you have it buried in
the Terms.
~~~
rhc2104
Contractor fee + 12.5% = Client fee
So, CodeDoor ends up taking 1/9 of transactions.
I've commented out the payment stuff I have right now. Obviously, I'd like to
get that out soon...
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Latest Ebola Statistics - natural219
http://ebolastats.info/
======
lotsofmangos
Donation pages for Médecins Sans Frontières:
[http://www.msf.org.uk/make-a-donation](http://www.msf.org.uk/make-a-donation)
[https://donate.doctorswithoutborders.org/](https://donate.doctorswithoutborders.org/)
I have been posting these two links to quite a few Ebola threads. I am not
associated with MSF, I just think it is a very good idea to send them money.
If you are feeling brave and have appropriate medical experience, it would be
even better to volunteer with them, as they are more in need of medical staff
right now than money.
~~~
swombat
I made a donation of £1k in the middle of last month, when it seemed like MSF
was the only organisation doing anything about this. Since then, the WHO and
the US Govt look like they pulled their thumbs out of their arses... but
they're still taking their sweet time. MSF is on the ground right now.
I run a successful business. If there's one business risk I don't want to deal
with, it's a highly contagious haemorrhagic fever spreading through the world
like fire through gunpowder.
If you run a business and you want it to continue to grow and exist, donate to
MSF. Forget the charity - this is for your own sake.
~~~
oskarth
I know you make it out to be a selfish thing, and while that might be true on
some level, it's fundamentally a selfless act. It's actions like these that
are the opposite of the tragedy of the commons. If even 10% of people with
means acted in a similar way, the world would be a better place in very
tangible ways.
------
DocSavage
NPR has a good infographic on the infectiousness of Ebola relative to other
agents:
[http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2014/10/02/352983774/no-
seri...](http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2014/10/02/352983774/no-seriously-
how-contagious-is-ebola)
~~~
robomartin
The problem with averages is they can break down pretty quickly when facing
reality. Example from yesterday: I took my kids fishing on a party boat. Lots
of kids on the boat. They congregated around the live bait tank. I noticed one
kid who was obviously sick. He was coughing constantly all over the place. I
watched him cough directly into other kid's faces. And, I am not talking about
a gentle cough at all. He coughed on nearly every surface he came into contact
with. If this kid was carrying active ebola or something else I would guess
twenty to thirty people may have been exposed. I made it a point to have my
kids avoid him, yet, in that scenario, there is no way to control exposure.
For example, everyone shared one bathroom. With over 50 people onboard, the
"about 2" idea is just a suggestion and in two or three weeks it goes
exponential.
Yes, I tried to find the irresponsible parent and even asked the captain to
make an announcement. He couldn't care less, which further throws off the
"about two" rule in the face of reality.
~~~
nostrademons
But there's a further difference between the common cold and ebola: a cold
spreads through aerosols, so all those kids standing around the sick one are
breathing in live virus. Ebola spreads only through infected bodily fluids, so
he'd have to be vomiting directly on the other kids for them to catch it.
Usually by the time someone is vomiting or bleeding from Ebola, they feel far
too sick to go on a fishing trip.
While it's possible that Ebola could mutate and become airborne (this is the
plot of the movie _Outbreak_ , after all), scientist believe it pretty
unlikely. In humans, it preferentially attacks the gastrointestinal track, and
virus loads are pretty low in the respiratory system.
So yes, averages do obscure specific circumstances that affect reality.
However, the averages are low _because_ the specific circumstances that would
cause high averages are rare.
~~~
asciimo
According to the CDC,
"Although coughing and sneezing are not common symptoms of Ebola, if a
symptomatic patient with Ebola coughs or sneezes on someone, and saliva or
mucus come into contact with that person’s eyes, nose or mouth, these fluids
may transmit the disease."
[http://www.cdc.gov/vhf/ebola/transmission/qas.html](http://www.cdc.gov/vhf/ebola/transmission/qas.html)
~~~
vasilipupkin
yes, but it doesn't get transmitted through the air. You have to literally
sneeze on someone not in their general vicinity
------
Alex3917
Once the number of ebola patients exceeds the number of beds (which has
already happened), won't the growth rate look pretty much linear regardless of
the actual numbers?
~~~
DigitalJack
I would have thought it would look exponential.
~~~
Alex3917
Well if you have the capability to diagnose 500 patients per month, then you
are going to be reporting around 500 new infections each month regardless of
whether there are 500 or 500,000. Some of the articles from last week made it
sound like most of the blood testing labs are already at capacity, which would
make these numbers basically meaningless.
~~~
maaku
Not all patients are diagnosed in hospital.
------
dons
[http://cpid.iri.columbia.edu/](http://cpid.iri.columbia.edu/) uses
statistical models of infection and has predictive capabilities.
------
AtlasLion
Can someone please explain to me the cause of the sudden outbreak? The ebola
virus doesn't seem to be that new. Here in an excerpt from a Patent dating
back to 2008:
"The family Filoviridae consists of two genera, Marburgvirus and Ebolavirus,
which have likely evolved from a common ancestor'. The genus Ebolavirus
includes four species: Zaire, Sudan, Reston and Cote d'Ivoire (Ivory Coast)
ebolaviruses, which have, with the exception of Reston and Cote d'Ivoire
ebolaviruses, been associated with large hemorrhagic fever (HF) outbreaks in
Africa with high case fatality (53-90%)2."
[http://www.google.com/patents/CA2741523A1?cl=en](http://www.google.com/patents/CA2741523A1?cl=en)
~~~
tomjen3
The other outbreak has been (as far as I understand) in super remote areas
where you are not going to infect others.
This one made the leap into the slums.
------
marvin
Would be nice to also see these statistics on a logarithmic plot - the purely
selfish concern in the Western world is whether the epidemic is still in
unchecked exponential growth, or if the growth rate is slowing.
~~~
nfg
It's getting the stats from here:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ebola_virus_epidemic_in_West_Af...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ebola_virus_epidemic_in_West_Africa#Timeline_of_cases_and_deaths)
There's a log plot on that page:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Evolution_of_the_2014_Ebol...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Evolution_of_the_2014_Ebola_outbreak_in_semiLog_plot..png)
~~~
collypops
Here's another visualisation I put together, based on the same data collected
on Wikipedia. It tries to mix a narrative with the growing number of
cases/deaths.
[http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-07-31/ebola-timeline-
deadlie...](http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-07-31/ebola-timeline-deadliest-
outbreak/5639060)
~~~
zhte415
Nice. I placed a link to New:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8415886](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8415886)
------
njx
Here is a dataset on Github [https://github.com/jf22/ZEBOV-2013-WAfrica-
data/blob/master/...](https://github.com/jf22/ZEBOV-2013-WAfrica-
data/blob/master/SEIRDh_data_flat.txt)
And corresponding visualization
[https://my.infocaptor.com/dash/i.php?viz=njendjlm&mode=embed](https://my.infocaptor.com/dash/i.php?viz=njendjlm&mode=embed)
------
omg2k
Is the graph cumulative or showing the number of people who are currently
being treated for Ebola?
~~~
3rd3
Correct. There are about 3300 reported deaths:
[http://healthmap.org/ebola/#timeline](http://healthmap.org/ebola/#timeline)
------
robomartin
Must not ignore the footnote:
"WHO has stated the reported numbers "vastly underestimate the magnitude of
the outbreak", saying there may be 2.5 times as many cases as officially
reported [Reuters]. Cases in remote areas may also be missed."
------
3327
My math is a little rusty but that reminds me of e^x.
~~~
gms7777
You're not far off. Not an epidemiologist, but I think these sorts of things
generally follow a logistic (S-shaped or sigmoid) curve (1/1+e^-x). Initial
growth is approximately exponential, then you hit a point of saturation,
growth slows, and eventually levels off.
~~~
tomjen3
The key question is how long does it take for it to level of?
Right now it its infecting 1.7 persons per infected person (avg) so it is
still growing, however it is also in the slums of the poorest area on earth.
------
taivare
Anyone is free to use this donation poster to bring awareness.
[http://bit.ly/1vF1COO](http://bit.ly/1vF1COO)
------
edvinasbartkus
Looks like Startup Growth
~~~
TeMPOraL
In this case I would really appreciate it having an exit and killing the
product.
~~~
pyre
The real question is who can you convince to make it a talent acquisition?
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Mayor Bloomberg Unveils New York City Venture Fund (NYC Seed) - fortes
http://dealbook.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/06/03/mayor-unveils-new-york-city-venture-fund/
======
johnrob
One has to wonder, if a government institution gets involved in a fund, what
kind of regulations would be at play? Quotas for race/gender ratios?
------
Alex3917
Would-be NYC founders don't need another source of seed funding, they need a
community. What NYC really needs is the equivalent of the Y-Scraper and a nice
space for like-minded folks to hang out and work together and mingle with
potential funders and mentors.
~~~
Frocer
NYC High-Tech Meetups usually have very good turn outs
~~~
fortes
I'm new to NYC -- any meetups in particular that you'd recommend?
~~~
Frocer
<http://newtech.meetup.com/1/>
This is the one run by the Meetup folks. Usually the first Tuesday of every
month. They get 6-7 startup to demo their product. The turnout is usually
great, at least 500+ people will show up.
------
fortes
Quick summary:
"Unveiled on Monday evening as part of New York’s Internet Week, NYC Seed will
provide up to $200,000 of investment into New York-based technology start-
ups."
<http://www.nycseed.com/>
"We encourage first-time founders. There is no set formula for why we invest
in a company, but there are some qualities we would like to see. We are
looking for a team with a compelling idea that makes sense today. Your team
should be technically savvy, with members that possess a proven record of
completing complex technology projects. We will ask to review a prototype of
your product. "
Note: Must be in NYC.
~~~
helveticaman
Their specs sound a lot like Ycombinator's.
------
nick_a
their application looks suspiciously like the y-comb app ;-)
<http://www.nycseed.com/nycseed%20application.pdf>
~~~
Alex3917
Sort of a cross between YC and the DMV.
------
brandonkm
I can only guess this is an attempt to make NYC startup scene more
competitive. I think this is a really cool thing for a city to do, maybe more
cities need to take note?
~~~
j2d2
As a New Yorker, I'm psyched for this. I had a lengthy discussion with a
coworker about how NYC is far less likely to breed the mind of an inventor. I
showed him PG's recent article (<http://www.paulgraham.com/cities.html>).
I hope this brings the entrepreneurial spirit to NYC. There's LOTS of creative
people here but many get blinded by the dollar signs of some fairly mundane
industries. I'd love to see some dollars backing innovative ventures too.
~~~
eugenejen
I am also in NYC, but I feel this fund will not work out. The problem is for
East Coast VCs and Government funds, they are too timid to make themselves
like fools. Unfortunately things are just like what PG said in his video that
showed up yesterday in HN. "In technology venture funding, if you are too
careful, you lose." Unfortunately, only few VCs such as Fred Wilson in East
Coast have the courage to make themselves like fool once in a while but reap
big rewards.
Of course, if this fund is run by Fred Wilson, then I will have more
confidence, but it is not.
~~~
j2d2
Hmm... I am curious. I don't have much experience in this regard, but I have a
tendency to think the people of NYC would rather invest in financial
instruments which a) they know very well and b) have astronomical returns
without requiring everything involved in a start-up.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Reporter: Google successfully pressured me to take down critical story - MBCook
https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/09/reporter-google-successfully-pressured-me-to-take-down-critical-story/#p3
======
sctb
Yesterday's discussion:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15145176](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15145176)
------
mcguire
" _[In 2011,] Hill was a cub reporter at Forbes, where she covered technology
and privacy. At the time, Google was actively promoting Google Plus and was
sending representatives to media organizations to encourage them to add "+1"
buttons to their sites. Hill was pulled into one of these meetings, where the
Google representative suggested that Forbes would be penalized in Google
search results if it didn't add +1 buttons to the site._
" _Hill thought that seemed like a big story, so she contacted Google 's PR
shop for confirmation. Google essentially confirmed the story, and so Hill ran
with it under the headline: "Stick Google Plus Buttons On Your Pages, Or Your
Search Traffic Suffers."_"
" _" I was told by my higher-ups at Forbes that Google representatives called
them saying that the article was problematic and had to come down. The
implication was that it might have consequences for Forbes, a troubling
possibility given how much traffic came through Google searches and Google
News."_"
Ugh. Google was reportedly throwing their _search traffic_ weight around.
~~~
deadalus
This is why I am scared to criticize Google. It knows who I am and it knows
all the other businesses/websites that I own. It might try to
damage/demonetize them subversively if it thinks that I am against it or its
owners in any way. There will be no way I can prove it. It also shares it data
with the US government.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In-Q-Tel](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In-Q-
Tel)
[https://gizmodo.com/how-google-gives-your-information-to-
the...](https://gizmodo.com/how-google-gives-your-information-to-the-
nsa-512840958)
~~~
e40
_This is why I am scared to criticize Google_
You just did, in what followed that comment.
------
Sylphine
"Disclosure: My brother works at Google." We all know who is getting fired
today. _grabs popcorn_ Edit: Dupe already! Man do googlers on HN work fast.
------
lern_too_spel
Threatening to retaliate against the press is another thing (after the no-
poaching agreement) Google should not have copied from Apple.
~~~
Jtsummers
Not doubting you, but what instances were there of Apple threatening to
retaliate against the press? Nothing is coming to mind when I try to recall
such incidents and I imagine you have some specific ones you could point to.
~~~
lern_too_spel
[http://www.zdnet.com/article/apple-prs-dirty-little-
secret/](http://www.zdnet.com/article/apple-prs-dirty-little-secret/)
[https://www.cultofmac.com/255618/how-apples-blacklist-
manipu...](https://www.cultofmac.com/255618/how-apples-blacklist-manipulates-
the-press/)
~~~
Jtsummers
Thanks for the links, I think I'd read the ZDNet article once before.
------
smegel
> Hill thought that seemed like a big story
It is a big story still. It sounds illegal.
------
jklinger410
To me this article feels like bandwagoning and hearsay. I am all for the
critical attention aimed at Google, but there is simply no teeth to this story
at all.
Edit: Thanks guys for the criticism about using the word hearsay in this
context. I'll never use it that way again, pinky promise.
~~~
saas_sam
Hearsay is a legal term to prevent court cases from proceeding on information
gleaned from witnesses who are not present. So, if you refuse to go to court
as a witness, your coworker who overheard you talk about the case cannot sit
in your place.
When someone writes a story about someone else's experience, that's not
"hearsay," that's just "journalism." You may not think this story sounds
credible, but if so you should come up with a different reason than "this is a
story about someone else's experience therefore it's unreliable."
And anyway, you can just read the original article written by the person who
experienced this, if you want to circumvent the "hearsay" thing:
[http://gizmodo.com/yes-google-uses-its-power-to-quash-
ideas-...](http://gizmodo.com/yes-google-uses-its-power-to-quash-ideas-it-
doesn-t-li-1798646437)
~~~
jklinger410
Pardon me for using hearsay colloquially. Since we are not in a courtroom, I
didn't think anyone would presume I'm using legalese, but I digress.
The issue I have with the article, referring my toothless remark, is this part
>told me that I needed to unpublish the story because the meeting had been
confidential, and the information discussed there had been subject to a non-
disclosure agreement between Google and Forbes. (I had signed no such
agreement, hadn’t been told the meeting was confidential, and had identified
myself as a journalist.)
So no one told you that the meeting was confidential, it was, and they asked
you to take it down.
Ok, yawn.
Then from the article you posted:
>Somehow, very quickly, search results stopped showing the original story at
all.
Pics or it didn't happen.
Then you follow through to see no proof anywhere. "Bandwagoning" as I said
previously, on how this other group lost funding for criticizing Google. Then
an email confirming the NDA and that Forbes willingly took down the article.
The whole time this person has no evidence or proof of these things actually
occurring. Saying things like "it stopped showing up in search" "I couldn't
find it in the cache" "no one told me there was an NDA" "I heard Google say
the +1 button helped your rank" all lack any ability to verify.
Journalists love to journal, though. So let's continue with this gossip.
~~~
saas_sam
I totally get it, I would like to see more evidence also, so this story
shouldn't be taken as gospel truth. However, it should also not be discounted
as false. Google needs to respond to these accusations and make it clear what
their stance is on this sort of behavior. Not because the accusations
themselves are super credible, but because the accusations speak to a deep
concern many of Google's customers have about the power they wield.
~~~
jklinger410
>I totally get it, I would like to see more evidence also
Right, me too. I can't find Google doing anything wrong here. The article was
under NDA so Forbes and Google took it down willingly.
No proof of the +1 statement. No proof of Google censoring the article. We
have no story here.
Unprovable accusations don't help your side of the fight, though. Even if they
hint at something that is true.
~~~
saas_sam
It's totally provable though. Whether or not it will be proved is another
matter. Other witnesses were presumably around so they might chime in.
Certainly Google can step in and tell their side. The thing about these sorts
of situations is corporations are very hesitant to come out and blatantly lie
because it can come back to bite them in a huge way later on. So if Google
comes out and refutes these claims, that will suggest they are PROBABLY not
true, or at least very different than what we are being told. Not a perfect
barometer for the truth, as they certainly can lie and get away with it, but
it's better than nothing.
~~~
jklinger410
Google did chime in. Clearly you didn't read the article you linked to me.
~~~
saas_sam
You misunderstand, I was referring to WHY these sorts of articles have value,
which seemed to me to be the topic of our exchange. Google would not have
released a statement on this topic without this article. Likewise, if others
have additional information (such as witnesses or journalists at other
companies) they are more likely to come out with it.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: How did Microsoft hold back the Internet for 6-7 years? - biznerd
I binged (jk googled) and couldn't find anything.<p>This was in a comment located here:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8673760<p>And it piqued my interest.<p>How did this happen? Or did it happen?
======
wrs
The very short, oversimplified version:
Microsoft leveraged their dominance of desktop computing to gain dominance of
browser installed base with IE. Having won the battle, they stopped improving
the browser as an application platform.
During the first period, Microsoft developed and deployed a variety of browser
technologies such as Dynamic HTML (aka the DOM) and XMLHTTPRequest that moved
the browser toward being a viable application platform. During the second
period, IE stagnated and it was left to Firefox and, later, Chrome to pick up
the baton. But they had to fight for market share for several years before
having enough influence to make significant progress. IE has recently caught
up, but that still leaves several years before enterprise customers will
deploy the improvements.
Thus in 2014 there are still major gaps in the browser platform that really
should have been solved some years back, and a large portion of installed base
still using the transitional IE 8 and 9.
~~~
tacos
Microsoft tied browser development to OS development. After Windows XP (Oct
2001) they didn't release an OS until Vista (Jan 2007). Things far, far more
important to Microsoft's overall strategy than HTML parsing stalled during
that gap.
------
Joeri
The truth is more shaded than saying they held back the web. What I remember
is that IE 5 came out in 1999, and was a significantly better browser than
netscape 4, which was my favorite browser at the time. So, netscape had an
inferior product. Meanwhile microsoft also decided to bundle IE with windows,
for free, on all new PC's. So netscape had a worse product _and_ worse user
acquisition. If you're a startup in that position, what is the logical thing
to do? Well, netscape decided the most logical thing was to start a multi-year
rewrite of their entire product, with the goal of having an identical UI, but
a fresh codebase. IMHO, it is fair to say microsoft helped netscape into the
grave, but it is also fair to say netscape did much of the walking.
So, from about 2000 until about 2006 IE was the only game in town because
there just weren't any viable competitors (well, ok, there was opera, but...).
Looking around and noticing they didn't have competition, microsoft figured
they didn't need to iterate their product, so they didn't.
Now, this will sound strange to say now, but IE 6 had the best standards
support, in 2001. However, it also had a lot of proprietary features which
made things easy to do that were hard to do using W3C standards, which as
standards tend to be weren't as developer-friendly as they could have been (I
still think CSS's layout model is a big mistake). Web developers being web
developers they couldn't resist those features to build stuff quicker, and
they ended up building a lot of IE-only sites, which created the legacy which
we are still battling today. And that made it very hard for upstart browsers
like firefox to gain marketshare.
Now, again IMHO, it is fair to say microsoft did nothing to discourage people
from using those proprietary features and getting locked into a dead-end
platform. However, it is also fair to say you could and can build a standards-
compliant codebase which is IE 6 compatible so developers were helping the
jailer put on the chains.
I think blaming it all on MS is easy but inaccurate. It was a shared blame
across netscape, microsoft and the web development community of the early
2000's, which ended up in a stagnated browser market from 2000 to 2005/2006.
~~~
melling
No, it's pretty accurate. When you gain a monopoly and people stop testing on
other browsers, you create a big problem. I never stopped using
Netscape/Mozilla. It doesn't matter if IE was better for a period of time.
Once it became dominant and incompatible, all other browsers fought a huge
uphill battle. IE is still the most widely used desktop browser.
~~~
TazeTSchnitzel
This is unfortunately starting to happen once again with Chrome.
~~~
Joeri
The irony is that many sites now have poor compatibility with IE due to using
proprietary webkit-only CSS styles. On mobile it's even worse, with most
"mobile optimized" sites being broken even on firefox and opera. Even big
sites perform poorly. Engadget's mobile version is broken on anything that's
not webkit. It is frustrating to see that people never learn. They're quite
happy to change jailers, but quite unwilling to free themselves.
~~~
TazeTSchnitzel
Yeah, it's gotten to the point that some alternative mobile browsers are
starting to support -webkit- prefixes.
------
hnriot
The very short answer is that they of course didn't. It's utter nonsense. I
was around in those days, worked on Mozilla and Nutscrape etc. Back in the day
there were many browsers, all spun off the Spyglass original code, the
internet was pre javascript and it was a very different place. Then the
browser wars started, there was Netscape and IE and others, back then it was
viable for individuals to actually make a competitive browser, but over time
they got to be big complex pieces of code, basically a VM. Security became a
big deal and the open source movement built the best browsers, Mozilla,
Phoenix and Firefox ten years ago. Microsoft tried to get the Internet to come
to it rather than the other way round, just as companies like AOL did. They
tried to add proprietary technology to lock in the internet to their Windows
platform. Can't really blame them for that, but meanwhile every user on the
planet was free to install any other browser they wanted. Just because they
didn't isn't Microsoft's fault. They didn't prevent you doing so.
These days the internet has shifted from the desktop to laptops to mobile
phones and tablets where Apple and Google have the lock in as Microsoft did.
Apple allow other browsers provided they don't want fast javascript. Yet
nobody's accusing Apple of holding up the internet.
The main things that really did hold back the internet was bandwidth, it
was/is the phone and cable companies because they really do have a
stranglehold on their customers.
Others here have suggested microsoft tried to stop others from innovating.
Again, total bullshit, they forced exactly nobody to use their software.
I am no fan of MSFT, I haven't used their products in years, but someone who
was around then really needs to set the story straight.
~~~
saranagati
this is a very narrow minded view. microsoft began creating plugins for
utilities that did not follow web standards such as activex that would
integrate the browser with the operating system. on top of them being horribly
flawed with security bugs, these plugins would then only work for ie.
microsoft then pushed people creating web content to use these non-standard
plugins in their site because they would not modify ie to include w3c
standards that did the same thing. so now many people and companies were
forced to use ie because some site they needed to use required one of those
plugins.
this continued on until so many major security flaws were found in ie that it
drove people who didnt even know what a web browser was to firefox.
~~~
tacos
This too is a narrow view. Another way to look at it is that people were
building apps in the browser and they needed to do real stuff. Browser apps
needed to talk to devices, legacy systems, card readers, EEPROM programmers,
medical imagers... whatever the hell it is that people jam into Windows. And
those devices weren't magically going to sprout a REST interface. There had to
be a transitional period.
Microsoft had been making developers happy for a decade by giving that exact
sort of functionality in local file Explorer, in Word, in Excel, on the
desktop, via COM/OLE/VBScript and god knows what else. So they tried it.
The blood/brain barrier between OS and Browser remains up for debate a decade
later.
The W3C remains woefully understaffed and even today hasn't solved basic
problems that were solved in the dumb terminal era of the 1970s.
There's a lot of shit that got shoved into the browser when we were excited
about browsers that shouldn't be there. Likewise there's a LOT of OS-level
functionality missing from the browser that may or may not belong there, but
which I don't see appearing in the next 10 years either.
------
Ollinson
I hate to give just a wikipedia link but I really have nothing more to add
than what is there:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend_and_extinguish](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend_and_extinguish)
While this might not explain "6-7 years of holding back the internet" it
definitely was not beneficial.
------
general_failure
Short summary: there was a time when people paid for browsers. Microsoft
started bundling IE for free along with the OS. This killed the paid browser
market completely (bringing down companies like Netscape) as everyone started
using IE since everyone was using windows. Once their position was
established, Microsoft stopped developing IE. The IE team was mostly disbanded
and there was no updated in IE for many many years.
Not progressing the internet was in MS' best interest. They wanted a world
where desktop apps running in their OS was the future.
~~~
pyre
> bringing down companies like Netscape
To be fair, Netscape Navigator could be a real POS, and IE 5/6 were actually
leaps forward at the time. The real problem was Microsoft killing off all
competition and then, having won the Browser Wars, disbanding the IE
development team, leaving IE to stagnate.
Other issues:
\- Killing off competition made it so that the browser landscape on other
platforms was barren.
\- MS having a separate version of IE for Mac that was a _completely_ separate
codebase with it's own set of bugs/quirks also didn't help with the browser as
an OS agnostic platform.
\- IE's lack of standards compliance paired with it's "still work even with
HTML horribly broken" also had a hand in things. E.g. for years a good portion
of the Internet was delivered as broken HTML because it "worked in IE" and
other browsers were "broken" because they were more strict about the
standards.
~~~
icantthinkofone
Netscape was NOT a POS except in the eyes of those trying to get web sites to
work in it that worked in IE. Microsoft created IE with various APIs that only
worked in IE but would fail in Netscape.
~~~
skrebbel
I strongly doubt you ever tried to make a site work in Netscape 3. If you'd
nest layers (yes, the <layer> tag) more than 2 levels, random stuff would
break.
You talk about APIs but really, if JS compat was your only problem you were a
happy developer. It was the markup engine itself that was crap. IE's was
simply also crap, just in a different way.
~~~
icantthinkofone
In 1998 or so, Scottrade, my broker, advised me to quit using IE and only use
Netscape because of all horrible issues they had making their code work with
it and that they advised all their clients to do the same. That's almost a
quote.
------
twa927
"Microsoft cast a shadow over the software world for almost 20 years starting
in the late 80s." It was not only the internet. In some way it was an evil
monopoly that did everything to prevent others from innovate and forced usage
of it's own crappy software. The citation come's from PG's essay from 2007
"Microsoft is dead" [0].
[0]
[http://www.paulgraham.com/microsoft.html](http://www.paulgraham.com/microsoft.html)
~~~
throwawaykf05
Just like today's "mean people" essay, PG was likely wrong in that essay as
well. Firstly, regarding the "shadow that was cast", let's look at some data
rather than rely on what "everyone knows", shall we? Here's a relevant paper
that looks at some data (caveat - it only covers events up to 2000, but then
that's the period PG talks about as well):
"Did Microsoft Deter Software Innovation?", Josh Lerner,
[http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=269498](http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=269498)
Spoiler: It follows Betteridge's Law.
And of course Microsoft is not "dead" or "irrelevant" and does not produce
"crappy software", as much as the Silicon Valley hive-mind would like to think
so. This is trivially disproved by looking at 1) their revenues and 2) their
ranking in the top brands worldwide over the last decade and a half.
~~~
jasonm23
> disproved by looking at 1) their revenues and 2) their ranking in the top
> brands.
Enjoy chowing down on McDonalds, because apparently, by your own measure, it's
not crappy food.
~~~
throwawaykf05
Heh, I actually happen to like McDonalds! I think it has the best fast food
you can get out there, especially for the price. Imagine that, people have
opinions contrary to yours!
Now imagine something harder to believe: the _vast majority_ of people have
opinions contrary to yours.
------
Rizz
They didn't hold back the Internet 6-7 years. IE was far, far beyond whatever
competitors offered, it might be more fair to say that Microsoft released IE6
years too early. AJAX, CSS, JS, all the cool technologies that make the web
today were part of IE 6 (but not quite at the level they are today of course),
and in addition to that there were some DirectX accelerated graphics, an
advanced plugin system while other browsers only supported NSAPI, etc.
After that there was little innovation from Microsoft, but there was little
need for innovation either, most developers looking for advanced capabilities
used Flash instead of addressing the web browser natively, because that was
the trend back then and Flash works on other brands of browsers as well, and
for a while because a lot of people still used older browsers. For those
reasons there was no developer demand for more advanced features, the features
that were offered were hardly used for a long time
For example AJAX was publicly introduced in IE5 in 1999, while other non-beta
versions of competitors appeared from 2002 to 2005. Websites using AJAX thus
were rare until about 2004-2005. There was no need for Microsoft to add more
technology until the competitors caught up. Unfortunately for Microsoft, the
competitors didn't just catch up, they overtook them and implemented some
features differently than in IE, those missing and different features in IE
have caused plenty of grief for web developers ever since.
------
protomyth
I think it is more than a fair statement to say Microsoft held back the web[1]
for 6-7 years, but we settled on the web browser as the delivery for internet
services and are still trying to shoehorn everything into it.
Microsoft had a monopoly in the OS market, gave IE away free, and provided
tools and incentives to develop for IE and nothing else.
From a company's point of view, it makes a lot of sense. Cost and 90% of
customers don't have any problems. The company has a standard development and
testing platform. Cost is an amazing motivator and having that OS monopoly was
an easy leverage point.
1) there are still issues with using educational / testing sites in any
browser but an outdated version of IE. The college textbook with integrated
websites could really use some disruption
------
T-A
Just venturing a guess, I'd say it's a reference to early versions of Internet
Explorer (particularly IE6, but also later) which combined a dominating
position (thanks to Windows) with (1) an insistance on doing things their own
way instead of following standards and (2) a very slow pace of innovation.
This forced coding to a very low common denominator and/or duplication of
effort for advanced features and different browsers. The impasse ended when
other browsers became popular enough to make IE's dragging its feet
counterproductive for MS, too.
~~~
x0x0
Very slow pace of innovation? There was no innovation for a period of roughly
5 years until growing firefox adoption forced their hand. I seem to remember
the internal team was disbanded and had to be reconstituted as well. Microsoft
intentionally retarded the development of the browser as an application
development target to protect their OS monopoly. And, indeed, exactly what
microsoft feared came to pass: once apps targeted the browser, you have
chromebooks, tablets, and phones displacing windows. It's not like you need a
full desktop to browse facebook, twitter, instagram, pinterest, youtube, or
gmail.
[1]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_share_of_web_browsers#Net...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_share_of_web_browsers#Net_Applications_.282004_Q4_to_present.29)
~~~
throwawaykf05
This is oft-repeated but wrong. Sure, there was no innovation _in IE_ , but
innovation elsewhere on the web never slowed down. Even when IE dominated the
browser market, browsers like Opera kept developing new features. Opera in the
late 90s had features that I still don't see in most browsers today.
Now, those other browsers were less popular for a while, but let's not
conflate "widespread use" with "innovation".
~~~
x0x0
No.
I worked on web apps in the early and mid 2000s. What we could do was defined
by the capabilities of ie 5-6. Everything else, with it's whopping up to 10%
market share, was irrelevant.
Plus, innovation on its own is worthless. If I can't use feature X in the
browser that the vast majority of my customers use, it may as well not exist.
------
alyx
[http://www.hanselman.com/blog/microsoftkilledmypappy.aspx](http://www.hanselman.com/blog/microsoftkilledmypappy.aspx)
------
danieltillett
I think it interesting that no one here has brought up the fallout from the
dot.com bust and 9/11\. Both of these had far more effects on the pace of
innovation than anything Microsoft did or didn't do.
------
rythie
It terms of how (from memory + fact checks on Wikipedia): Microsoft and
Netscape battled over browsers throughout the late 90s with Netscape starting
in the position of the dominant/only browser and IE was seen as a joke, that
quickly, by the time IE5 (1999) was released Netscape seemed completely in
technical debt with it's product when they couldn't support even the most
basic CSS support in Netscape 4.x. IE5 was also the release that added support
for what is now called AJAX.
IE6 was released August 2001, at which point it had most of the market, IE
also existed for the Mac and most people I knew at the time thought of
Mozilla/Netscape as completely irrelevant as a development target. Opera has
basically always been irrelevant in my view. This started an era of IE-only
sites which further damaged the competition.
Microsoft disbanded it's IE development team and it wasn't until a few years
later that people realized that this happened (It wasn't announced till 2003)
- people seemed to assume Microsoft was working on new version of IE, which
was natural since it was pretty much the only browser in town.
WHATWG was formed in 2004 so everyone else (except Microsoft) could work on
web standard because this had basically stopped at that point.
Firefox wasn't released till November 2004, which was the first time it looked
like there would be a credible threat to IE (though it had been pretty good
for a year before with Mozilla, but still unknown to most).
Acid2 test was created 2005 which further highlighted the problems with IE6's
rendering:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acid2](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acid2).
IE7 was released in October 2006, by which point web developers who had been
trying to more and more with the web were thoroughly frustrated with IE and
it's rendering bugs. IE7 was a big disappointment because it whilst it fixed
some long standing problems like it's box model, it was still a long way off
the standards that had been produced since IE6 and it didn't pass that Acid2
test.
In terms of why: I've wondered why for a long time now. Mostly, I think IE6
was already too good at being web application platform and Microsoft was
worried (as they had been with Java) that this would make Windows irrelevant.
Given that IE was effectively free the probably assumed there would be no
viable competition due to the lack of business model. Microsoft stopping work
on IE they could allow websites to work, but continue to make web apps that
were too clunky to use so people would write native Win32 apps.
~~~
tacos
Reasons for "why" not often discussed: 1) Vista consumed the top systems devs
at Microsoft for seven years 2) the IE team wasn't "disbanded" so much as
loyal to management at Microsoft that was discarded (Brad Silverberg, David
Cole) 3) enterprise customers were plenty happy with IE6 4) the dotcom bust
quieted the indie developer ecosystem 5) Microsoft honestly thought they could
get NT kernels + .NET on small devices and leverage massive developer support
and existing tooling in the late 90s.
------
naner
Now it seems ISPs have been holding back the Internet (in the US). There's
almost no competition on price, bandwidth, latency, etc. Nobody is pushing the
envelope.
~~~
icantthinkofone
Nobody? In the last few years, Charter has gone from a few Mb/s downloads to
100Mb and my monthly price has been cut in half and there are no data caps.
------
bascule
If it is actually referring to IE6, in some ways IE's stagnation was helpful.
Prior to IE6 was an arms race-like flurry of different browser vendors
haphazardly slapping on features to their products, and the IE6 code freeze we
saw thereafter gave standards-writers like the W3C and WHATWG time to catch up
writing specifications for the web.
~~~
1337p337
It was a good thing. Not just for the standardization bodies, for everyone.
The "Fierce Idiocy of 'New!'"[1] died down for a little while and briefly it
was possible to rely on a stable development environment. Features are great
if they're the correct ones and they're done well, but stability and
reliability are even nicer.
1\. [http://www.constitutionaldaily.com/index.php?id=737%3Athe-
fi...](http://www.constitutionaldaily.com/index.php?id=737%3Athe-fierce-
idiocy-of-new&format=html&option=com_content)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
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Ask HN: What's the job market like in Alaska? - xzatious
Thinking of making a drastic switch and moving to Seward, Alaska. A lot of puzzle pieces are falling into place making it seem possible. Just wondering about the IT market there. I'm specifically a BI and database developer in the Microsoft stack, not sure if that's the right place to take those skills. Maybe have to try and get something in Anchorage or do something remote? What do you think? Should stick around Florida and work on medicare software or pack up the wagons head to the north?
======
jeffmould
Had a friend who lived in Anchorage, and while he enjoyed the living there, he
said outside of tech support/help desk type positions, developer positions
were difficult to come by. Most was outsourced or handled by internal groups
within the lower 48. Not sure how Anchorage compares to Seward though. One
thing you should be prepared for is the salary difference. You may be able to
find something in government or education though. Just curious why Alaska? You
may also want to go visit for a few weeks to get a feel for the land/job
market prior to making the move. My friend did say it was a drastic move and
did require substantial time to get used to. Things that can be easy in the
lower 48 (shopping, mail, gas, banking...) can be challenging at times.
~~~
xzatious
thanks, that's kind of what I was thinking in terms of life being generally
harder. We spent about 3 weeks there a few years ago traveling from Seward,
Talkeetna, Yukon, and Haines. The tech sector definitely seems to be located
in the cities which may be unfortunate for me, but we'll see how it plays out.
The forces of life are pulling me that way so I won't resist it.
~~~
jeffmould
When I was in high school about 25 years ago we took a trip to Anchorage. I
would love to go back and I think it is incredible up there, can definitely
respect the pulling and not being able to resist. I think the hardest part
isn't the job, but overcoming the difference in living conditions. You can
always find something remote and make it work, it's just a question of being
comfortable. The other thing you may want to check though is the internet
connectivity in some of the smaller cities. May find a use for some of those
old AOL dialup CDs :)
Good luck.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Facts No One Really Checks (2012) - aburan28
https://rjlipton.wordpress.com/2012/07/25/facts-no-one-really-checks/
======
llull
What a strange statement/article. I had to check all three of those as an
undergrad, associativity of matrix multiplication was definitely first year
linear algebra, and I think elliptic curve product was first year number
theory.
(and it still is, theorem 3.4 in these first year notes
[https://wwwf.imperial.ac.uk/~kb514/M1GLA.pdf](https://wwwf.imperial.ac.uk/~kb514/M1GLA.pdf))
"It is that they are felt too tedious or technical to prove in a course or
even a textbook." Was my degree unusually tedious?
~~~
dallbee
Nope, my lame state school made us check these as well.
------
orm
A lot of matrix concepts sound a lot more natural to me if I first think of
what they mean in terms of vector spaces.
For example, I think one can derive associativity of matrix multiplication
less tediously from the observation that every matrix corresponds to a linear
transform from a vector space to another, multiplication corresponds to
function composition, and function composition is associative.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Computer animation software from 1969 - GENESYS - aeontech
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GYIPKLxoTcQ
======
aeontech
So amazing, I had no idea they were doing anything this advanced at that time.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Show HN: My two Linux tips – terminal titles + local wiki - NY_hudson
http://vsido.org/index.php?topic=1040.0
======
NY_hudson
Just to give a little motivation, the first is changing your titles on a
terminal when you use man, less or vi...so instead of having 5 terminals open
all with the same cryptic title of "someuser@somehost - Terminal" you can
actually tell which man page is which (pretty good, I think)
The second is how to install a local wiki on your box. It's a great way to
access local docs, keep notes for projects, etc. My example uses MediaWiki but
Docuwiki also works. Check the pictures I posted and you can see a good
example of its use.
Anyway, hope someone finds this helpful ;-)
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Ask HN: Complex tech idea with no coding experience - what to do? - stocktradr
As my name suggests, I do a lot of stock trading. In my past experience, I've ran website development divisions and what not. I have a lot of tech experience but minimal coding experience.<p>I have an idea uses a lot of principles from stock trading and brings it to the consumer front without them ever knowing. Vague description, yes.<p>My questions is how do you go about developing an idea with not much money and little coding experience? From my knowledge, the formulas I need are extremely complex and the coding required for them is complicated as well. I would try and learn but I can't seem to wrap my head around just javascript (and I know I need more than that).<p>I've looked up a lot of articles on this but every time I try to find someone to help, they require a ton of money or just aren't interested in putting in the time.<p>Any advice/ideas? Cheers!
======
carbocation
Three options, with some color for each. In essence, this could be viewed as a
time/money trade-off, although I think there's more to it than that:
(1) Learn to code. Start with a language that makes it easy to do what you
need for the most complicated part of your app. What is that part? Do you use
a research-grade algorithm that is only implemented in one particular
language? Use that language. Do you use run-of-the-mill machine learning?
Consider Python, or any language you like and just farm out the hard part to
R. Do you just need to express complex algorithms without re-deriving them?
Then really any language should do.
(2) Find a co-founder. This is tough because without any programming
background, how do you evaluate whether someone would be a sufficiently
technical co-founder for you? I'd say that this implies some aspect of #1 in
that you'd need to get a bit more comfortable with programming.
(3) Outsource. This requires more money, less time. One might imagine that
someone who does a lot of stock trading should actually have more money and
less time than most, but I don't know you and it doesn't really matter anyway.
You could outsource your technology. You'd just need to tightly control the
schedule and the key elements of the product (e.g., make sure that they've
correctly implemented your desired algorithms).
~~~
stocktradr
Cheers, thanks for the advice. Learning to program is definitely a barrier
since much of the formulas I'm looking at using would require bit of power
(makes me lean towards Python or Javascript - depending on end use).
I'm pretty leery about outsourcing. Back when I managed a web division, it
always seemed that when we outsourced, things would go horribly wrong. I'll
have to reach out to friends and find some good outsource recommendations.
Thanks for the advice!
------
kremdela
Programmers perform the same type of risk assessment that you would do
managing a portfolio. A coder is exchanging their time in exchange for your
money or equity. Without a doubt, there is a challenge in finding someone with
the right combination of experience, availability and interest in your
project. If you are trying to attract coders, try to appeal to them my
minimizing their risk. An experienced coder but first time entrepreneur will
be more likely to join you if you can demonstrate a history of successes,
experience executing / bringing products to market, or validation that there
is a market for your product.
~~~
stocktradr
Great idea, thanks a ton. Thinking on it, it may be that my pitch to them is
too complicated or convoluted. Its not their realm to know stocks (typically)
so creating the pitch to peak their interest is a good starting point. Thanks
again!
------
edent
It's easy to have an idea - but it's hard to execute. Here's what I would do.
Step one - get an idea of the scale of the project. Usually the best thing to
do is to write a description of every interaction the user will take with your
service. Or, if you're able to, draw out the screens.
As a thought experiment, try doing this for a piece of software you already
know. Think about all the different ways it can be used.
Ok, done?
Step two - what is the minimum thing you need to do in order to see if this
idea is possible? The bare minimum.
Break it down into a series of very small steps.
For example, "The app needs to retrieve all tweets with stock symbol ___".
Then, "The app needs to look up the stock price of symbol ___" Then, "If the
tweet contains the word "awesome" and the stock price is over $X, sell the
stock" etc.
Here's where you have to make a decision. Either learn to code each the bare
minimum aspect, or find someone who can do it for you.
Having worked out exactly what you want your app to do, how many individual
steps it will take to do it, and how the app should react in certain
situations will make it a lot easier when you come to code it or hire someone
to help.
So, refine your idea, then work on building it.
~~~
stocktradr
Great advice. Its all in my head at this point so this seems like the logical
next step. I think this will also help me refine the pitch as well. Thanks a
bunch!
~~~
kremdela
No problem. Lean Startup
([http://theleanstartup.com/principles](http://theleanstartup.com/principles))
and Noah Kagan both have some great guides about methods to potentially
validate your idea or find potential customers.
------
jehna1
"brings it to the consumer"
If this a consumer product and your money is tight, you definitely want to
start by making a crowdfunding project out of it (like Kickstarter or
Indiegogo).
There you can raise the money and get your first critical group just by
creating an awesome video out of your idea.
------
bowerbird
are you rich?
if not, i don't trust your stock-trading advice.
if so, then why don't you believe in your idea enough to spend money to bring
it to fruition?
if your idea requires "complicated coding" of formulas that are "extremely
complex", then it's not surprising it will require "a ton of money".
and since you said you have run website development divisions "and what not",
i'd think you'd know that.
-bowerbird
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
How Hard Could It Be?: Lessons I Learned in the Army - terpua
http://www.inc.com/magazine/20080301/how-hard-could-it-be-lessons-i-learned-in-the-army.html
======
xirium
Dup. See <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=125572>
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Watch Out Facebook Connect, Apple Pushes Twitter Sign-Ins In iOS 5 - fjabre
http://techcrunch.com/2011/06/06/watch-out-facebook-connect-apple-pushes-twitter-sign-ins/
======
ignifero
Excellent choice, but a little odd. Is Apple planning to buy twitter? They
could use a few extra servers ....
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
The deadly truth about a world built for men – from stab vests to car crashes - pat2man
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2019/feb/23/truth-world-built-for-men-car-crashes
======
mcv
Not only is it bizarre that crash tests are done only with male dummies, it's
also bizarre that they're only done with average dummies. Nobody is average.
You want cars to be safe for unusually tall, short or heavy people as well,
don't you? The sexism of the situation makes it even worse, but even if you
ignore the sexism, it seems really hard to justify such limitations on safety
tests.
------
xupybd
I think the issue is the world is built for the average. Try being really tall
and doing the dishes in a normal sink. Your back aches after bending over the
entire time. Then there is finding your self on the hall floor with blood
everywhere trying to figure out what just happened. Turns out the meter box
was just a little to low for your head to clear.
------
yesenadam
That was fascinating/depressing, sounds like an important and overdue book.
So far the only comment was the shameful one by "xndgg" who at least
apparently had the decency to feel ashamed enough not to want the comment
linked to their usual username. And at least it was quickly [flagged][dead].
------
weddpros
Lunar calendar was invented by women to track their periods?
~~~
mcv
Impossible to prove, but a plausible theory. It's incredibly useful for women
to know when 28 days have passed. It's significantly less useful to men.
There's no real basis to assume why a man would have made that calendar, and
yet, quite often that assumption is made, because women tend to be forgotten.
~~~
weddpros
[https://www.thedailybeast.com/the-ishango-bone-the-worlds-
ol...](https://www.thedailybeast.com/the-ishango-bone-the-worlds-oldest-
period-tracker)
Apparently, the periods hypothesis is not favoured for a variety of reasons...
And just because counting to 28 is more useful to women than men (men and
women who tracked the moon phases for millennia don't agree) doesn't make it
more likely to be periods counting.
Plus the numbers on the bone are not 28 but "are understood to indicate 9, 19,
21, 11; 19, 12, 13, 11; and 7, 5, 5, 10, 8, 4, 6, 3"...
9+19=28, here it is!
LOL that's numerology, not science...
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
Elon Musk is now richer than Warren Buffett - heshiebee
https://www.cnn.com/2020/07/10/business/elon-musk-warren-buffett-billionaires/index.html
======
SCAQTony
His spectacular monetary gains are unrealized.
~~~
xkjkls
So are Warren Buffett’s
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
On the prowl for local startups - itsa_phire
Hi, all. I'd like to introduce my "ugly baby", Startupolitan; a site bridging local startups with the people in their community. From launch date, local startups will have exposure to the crowd that matters most. Users can select their location and browse through the latest startups in their area. After spearheading a few myself, there was always one buzzkilling, undying question that arose with every single one, "how will I get the word out?" In the midst of answering that question repeatedly, I realized a few things, 1) just how little support startups really have, 2) how creative I really am and 3) how much money I can plow through within less than 24 hours.<p>Startupolitan is an idea that I've been toying with for a little while now and I've just decided to put it out into the universe as I feel it is certainly needed by many.<p>It's been a ridiculous challenge trying to maneuver through those who've already received either enough recognition or enough VC funding to be well on their way. What I'm looking for most are the indie, likely bootstrapped startups. Be my guest and submit a neat startup that you know of, or even better, one that you're behind. Would love to hear back from some of you.<p>http://www.startupolitan.squarespace.com (Yes, it's a trial. Yes, it's Squarespace. For the moment. I’ve learned from my financial mistakes.)<p>Cheers,<p>Saphire, Editor
======
Mankhool
Cool. Done. The groovy photo ask was kind of annoying, but then I got over it.
~~~
itsa_phire
Great company. Thanks for the submission!
------
Mz
This is what the world sees currently at that link:
_Squarespace trial accounts are not visible to the public. When you are ready
to publish your website, upgrading your trial will make your site active to
the world._
You can get to the site to see it but there are a few hoops to jump through.
Given that there are other free platforms which don't make people jump through
those hoops to even see the site, you might consider moving it to some other
free platform.
Also, I am failing to understand what the site is supposed to be doing for a
startup. I am seeing a short list of companies with location in the city +
state format. Maybe I am just stupid, but I just don't see what the value here
is supposed to be. The About page (called _411_ ) is not really helping me
wrap my head around it.
~~~
itsa_phire
The site will soon be moved to another platform, the domain will be registered
etc. I really just wanted to get it started, bare bones.
The objective now is to build a list of great startups and create traffic flow
to the website. It is a passionate mission of mine to give startups the
exposure they need from day one. In essence, Startupolitan is to be the
destination for people to go to discover startups in their area. To my
knowledge, no such place exists.
~~~
Mz
Sure. Maybe you weren't looking for constructive feedback, just members? I
don't know. I have a number of projects but nothing I would call "a startup"
and although some of those projects are location-oriented, nothing is really
location-based per se because the plan is to make money online. So I am,
unfortunately, not a good candidate for joining your site. But I like being
helpful and I know sometimes an outsider perspective is a good thing. Thus,
the comment.
Best of luck.
| {
"pile_set_name": "HackerNews"
} |
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