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antris

1,509 karma · joined February 27, 2012

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antris··on Safari's date-picker is the cause of 1/3 of our customer support issues
The most straightforward solution I can think of is to split date inputs by context. Create an `<input type="dob">` that is tailored for picking a date of birth from 1900-today. "date" is too vague of a context to create an UX that works well in all the different contexts. It'll always be bad in some contexts, if it's trying to solve all the use cases.
antris··on Extremely Linear Git History
I've done several projects rebase-only with limited resources and time constraints. In fact, it saved resources and time when we did it.

You have been repaid the time investment spent learning rebase commands, after once being able to avoid a really bad merge conflict.

antris··on Just don’t
Yes you are correct that not saying "just" isn't enough. But saying it often works towards eroding that environment and it's unproductive towards that. That's the point of the post, not that it's a magic bullet.
antris··on TikTok is “unacceptable security risk” and should be removed from app stores
> how china companies r just direct extension of CCP where party members have would directly inject themselves into the companies, go read some materials first. There no private companies in the US/EU sense in China

That's not true. In China private companies exist and can largely operate freely. China is a capitalist country. The only thing that limits corporations in China more than the US is that the companies and billionaires in China are expected to fall in line and not rock the boat when it comes to CCP. But this does not make the corporations an extension of the party, they're still privately owned and operated corporations working within a capitalist market system.

When it comes to government elites injecting themselves to the companies, that's not at all unique to China. The revolving door between government, lobbying groups, think tanks and corporations is "business as usual" in the US and EU too.

China has the power relations between govt<->corporations reversed. In US, the government elite is expected to fall in line with the capital owners, and in China it's the other way around. That's the main difference, not whether the corporations are vaguely "good", "bad", "worse" or "better". That's just simplistic and vague "china bad" rhetoric. The corporations themselves work within the same framework of capitalism, i.e. maximizing value for shareholders.

I will dismiss the personal attacks, as they are not constructive.

antris··on TikTok is “unacceptable security risk” and should be removed from app stores
You said US companies have a leash, even though US is the prime example of corporate control of government.

Companies are the same all over the world, their job is to maximize their value to investors by any means necessary. That's as true in China as it is in the US, so there's no difference.

When it comes to government, neither US nor China has any effective democratic controls on corporations. China has only one party which controls companies with authority, and the US has two parties which both represent the companies themselves.

antris··on TikTok is “unacceptable security risk” and should be removed from app stores
> American companies has a leash

And what leash is that? The US government is the prime example of what happens when corporate money enters politics. There are only two parties and both of them serve the interests of capital. The US doesn't even break up monopolies or cartels anymore.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regulatory_capture#United_Stat...

antris··on NASA finds super-emitters of methane
Our economic system has no built in incentives to stop these leaks. Considering how massive these leaks are, the budget to plug them shouldn't be a consideration. We're ruining our planet's livability with leaks like this, but since it's not profitable for anyone to do anything about it, we won't do it until there's enough political will behind it.
antris··on Pessimism is a barrier to progress
Yes, I'm talking about after the fact analysis of whether optimism wasted time or not. I didn't say that optimism or pessimism is hindsight. So I'm not sure how your comment relates to anything I said, except you taking three random words out of my comment.
antris··on Pessimism is a barrier to progress
Or you could interpret it charitably, where the person states that when looking at actions after the fact, it can be said that being optimist about an action that turned out to not work caused you to waste time.
antris··on My productivity system
> Am I just missing out on something?

Complex GTD systems are useful in unorganized workplaces where things are left to individuals to solve.. It's a way of juggling constantly changing priorities. So if you don't need them, it's likely that your workplace organizes well.

antris··on WebKit on GitHub
Source control is an inherently distributed system. Each developer has their own copy of the code that are distributed across many computers, and they need to communicate between each other. That's exactly what the primary function of the software is.
antris··on Ergo – modern IRC server written in Go
Nothing's stopping you to use IRC this way, and it's trivial to add a bot to your channel with a poll feature.

The problem isn't that nobody has designed or created such a system: it's that they're not very popular.

antris··on A conflict with a manager ended with me being disallowed to work at Spotify
There's lots of people pointing out that the developer in this case wasn't perfect.

But the underlying problem here is an organization that's supposed to give autonomy to developers, with a manager that is actively working against that. The manager, by looking at their actions, seems to want the team to take responsibility for their work, yet wants also to command and control the team. Often hiding behind indirect threats and "guidance".

Sure, if a manager is bullying you like this, eventually anyone will buckle under the pressure at some point. Now, if you come from an organization that is built for command and control, then also as a developer you are able to shift the responsibility to your manager and never do anything unless the manager explicitly tells you to do so. However, here the manager tries to have their cake and eat it too. They want you to do as told, yet take the blame if something goes south. This is extremely common: pretend that developers have autonomy, but still use control in subtle ways. If problems arise, you can blame the developers and the manager can wash their hands, because "it's the teams decision".

It's a recipe for disaster, and when this eventually blows up, it's very nitpicky to blame the developer for making mistakes in such an environment that's set up for failure.

Also, see the difference between the manager and the developer when they make mistakes. The developer promptly realizes going too far and apologizes. Meanwhile the manager shifts blame, denies their subtle control and keeps gaslighting the developers into thinking its all their fault.

Another huge red flag is the backchannel communication and vague reasoning behind the firing. If a manager cannot have a direct conversation with all affected parties present, they are very likely to be hiding something. Firing someone without an open discussion first is just insane.

antris··on Sámi Languages and Dialects (2015)
I was talking about Sámi history as a whole. Sámi parliament in Finland was recognized in 1995, and its authority is extremely limited. Basically they have no power over the Finnish government. Like I said, they have been thrown a bone and some positive developments have occurred in recent years, but that doesn't make the governments non-repressive as a whole when looking at their history and how they are still affected today by it. Just because you grant them some rights, doesn't erase what has happened before and the resulting societal position of the people.

Finland also has a minority of Swedish-speaking Finns. Just compare how the Finnish-Swedish population and the Sámi population were treated throughout history, and you'll see the difference. Swedish is an official language in Finland, none of the Sámi languages are. And you couldn't get an education with Sámi as your primary language until 1994.

These are very recent developments when compared to repression lasting centuries. Just like racism towards African-Americans didn't stop with the Civil Rights Movement, repression of the Sámi people didn't end with the Sámi parliament.

antris··on Sámi Languages and Dialects (2015)
Nothing about your comment disputes anything I said. I don't know why you posted this in such a contentious tone and implied that I'm squeezing "Sámi into a generic indigenous people mold". I wasn't stereotyping Sámi people, just talking about the challenges they face as a native minority people that live under a repressive government. You can find similar challenges posed to other native people, that's all I was saying.
antris··on Sámi Languages and Dialects (2015)
Sámi languages are split into many languages and dialects. Vast majority of the speakers are speaking Northern Sámi. But some have only a couple dozen speakers, and others are already extinct: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S%C3%A1mi_languages#Classifica...

The story of the Sámi people is very similar to many other native people. No independence allowed, decades and/or centuries of cultural assimilation and powerlessness. Only now the governments are starting to throw a bone to the Sámi people by funding language nests, but there is a long way to go until the Sámi people are in control of their own future.

Interestingly, some Sámi people have taken on rapping to keep their languages alive. One of them being Amoc, who raps in Inari Sámi, which has around 400 speakers: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pdjwXx531Y4

antris··on Monty Hall Problem
Strictly speaking it's not the hosts knowledge that changes the problem, but the fact that as a contestant you know how the host operates. This makes you able to extract information about the choice the host makes.

Different ways of host operation changing the outcomes are listed here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monty_Hall_problem#Other_host_...

>"Monty Fall" or "Ignorant Monty": The host does not know what lies behind the doors, and opens one at random that happens not to reveal the car. Switching wins the car half of the time.

antris··on Monty Hall Problem
Nope. That version is listed here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monty_Hall_problem#Other_host_...

"Monty Fall" or "Ignorant Monty": The host does not know what lies behind the doors, and opens one at random that happens not to reveal the car. Switching wins the car half of the time.

Swapping doesn't affect the outcome, it's a 50/50 whether you swap or not.

antris··on Monty Hall Problem
Switching doesn't change where the prize is more likely to be. That's not how the Monty Hall Problem works. It's the host giving you information about what's happening behind the scenes, by choosing a door to open and you knowing how the host operates.

Whether you end up switching or not, the other opened door is 2/3 likely to contain the prize and the door you picked originally has a 1/3. Whether you switch or not, doesn't change the odds.

antris··on Monty Hall Problem
From the article:

The original problem:

>The host acts as noted in the specific version of the problem.

>Switching wins the car two-thirds of the time.

The random door pick:

>"Monty Fall" or "Ignorant Monty": The host does not know what lies behind the doors, and opens one at random that happens not to reveal the car.

>Switching wins the car half of the time.

antris··on Monty Hall Problem
You're the one who's saying the odds change when the door is opened. I'm the one saying that the odds remain the same (or rather, increase to 50/50) if the doors picked are random.

If the host knows where the prize is, the odds change when the host picks a door, because we know the hosts strategy. If it's just random, then the odds don't change and changing the door doesn't matter, because each unopened door has the same chance of revealing the prize (1/3 before a door is revealed, 1/2 after).

Look up "other host behaviors" on the Wikipedia article, especially the table with "Ignorant Monty", if you don't believe me.

antris··on Monty Hall Problem
If the door the host chooses is random, and the door you choose first is random, then it's 50/50, because there's only two doors left and neither door choice was made with any information of what's behind the door.

Your chances improve from 1/3 to 1/2 when the host opens the empty door, but whether you stay on the first door or not doesn't matter.

antris··on Monty Hall Problem
>The problem statement doesn't permit him to choose the prize

Doesn't disallow it either. That's the problem: if you describe the problem without all necessary details, it doesn't work like the Monty Hall Problem is supposed to. If you fill in the details yourself (host never showing the prize in this case) then of course the problem becomes complete and then works like Monty Hall Problem again.

antris··on Monty Hall Problem
That the host opens a door without prize.
antris··on Monty Hall Problem
The part about never having a prize behind it was not explained to me.

It was just "you pick a door, host opens a door without prize". That doesn't imply that there's never a prize behind the door that the host opens.

antris··on Monty Hall Problem
The fact that the show host knows what's behind the doors and never chooses a door with the prize behind it is crucial. The host leaks information about what's behind, as he chooses a door.

I was told about this problem and the person telling it didn't say anything about that, just that you pick a door and the host opens another one which doesn't have a prize behind it. So I thought the probabilities don't change at all because the host just picked a random door. Then everyone who heard of the problem before piled against me like I'm a dumbass, but never really explaining why I was wrong.

Yes, I'm still salty about it.

antris··on Ask HN: Burnt-out, directionless but want to turn it around
Yet companies turn a blind eye towards people who abuse alcohol, even throwing parties where people are encouraged to drink alcohol. If your chosen substance is alcohol, you can even be an alcoholic and still keep your job if it doesn't affect performance.

Every hire is full of risks. Nobody knows whether they'll get into a car crash, get cancer, or get shot, or become a substance abuser. Whether they admit their medical history or not. That's because they are human beings. Humans are inherently risky. If you want to eliminate risk, then hiring humans is not for you.

All you do by punishing people who are honest about their history, is to encourage even more people to lie in interviews. Those people are only the tip of the iceberg, and a significant number of people companies hire already have such history but they just keep their mouths shut.

antris··on Ask HN: Burnt-out, directionless but want to turn it around
>How would I even know they are clean?

This question applies to all employees. You don't, because it's none of your business if it doesn't affect their work performance. It is entirely possible, and probably likely that some your current employees use drugs. And almost 100% sure that some of them use alcohol, which is stronger and more problematic than many illicit substances. Many companies even throw parties where they give out free booze to the employees! How's that for a double standard?

People have always used drugs, and always will. Pretending to care about substance abuse only when you come across someone who openly admits their history is insane. You are treating the honest people worse than the people who hide their problems from you.

antris··on California Right to Repair Bill Dies in Senate Committee
When it comes to US, adding more candidates doesn't change the politics. Genuine grassroots campaigns have an almost impossible climb against establishment endorsed candidates in both major parties, and creating your own party does nothing either. Without a large battle chest, you ain't gonna win against a candidate with a huge corporate campaign budget. If anything, adding more candidates creates a "spoiler" effect, where the establishment candidate doesn't need as many votes, because the opposition vote is split due to two or more opposition candidates. And even if you manage somehow to get elected, you'll have a hard time getting anything done if you don't tow the party line.

The US system steers naturally towards two parties that both advance corporate interests, and that's what's happening now.

antris··on California Right to Repair Bill Dies in Senate Committee
>why are so few people interested in becoming politicians?

Uh... what? There's a shortage of politicians nowhere, lol.

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