Hacker News Reader

big_spammeron Flipped Iceberg (2014)

The flipped iceberg is beautiful to see. The Antarctic iceberg crack that developed a fork isn't.

http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-39779761

big_spammeron Paul Buchheit on Lessons Learned from Investing in 200 Startups

> I don't see how you avoid some company reading your email and still have automatically indexed, infinitely scalable email in-boxes.

It's possible to with encrypted search.

big_spammeron Compiler Optimizations are Awesome

> most programming languages don't even give you a good way to express the invariants you are trying to maintain (except good ol' Ada).

What does Ada do that helps with this in ways C and other languages don't?

big_spammeron The Lioness Programming Language

I couldn't find in the source code where types are inferred.

big_spammeron Ask HN: How do you de-clutter your mind?

This is an interesting approach

https://www.rosieleizrowice.com/blog/5minutejournal

big_spammeron Ask HN: Ex-blockchain engineers, why did you get out?

Overstock accepted Bitcoin since 2014 https://www.overstock.com/bitcoin and now trades its own stock on it https://www.wired.com/2016/12/overstock-com-issues-stock-via...

big_spammeron Building Searchable Encrypted Databases with PHP and SQL

How is this different than CryptDB?

https://css.csail.mit.edu/cryptdb/

big_spammeron Interprocedural optimization in GCC

Identical code folding is slick. It's the opposite of using macros, and is harder to fold code than to generate it.

big_spammeron Growing a Compiler (2009)

This made me find and read "Growing a language"

https://www.cs.virginia.edu/~evans/cs655/readings/steele.pdf

"In a race, a small language with warts will beat a well designed language because users will not wait for the right thing; they will use the language that is quick and cheap, and put up with the warts. Once a small language fills a niche, it is hard to take its place."

big_spammeron Introduction to ARM Assembly Basics

What's with the branch instructions "Branch with Link" and "Branch with Exchange"?

What do they do? I haven't seen anything like this before.

I see some explanation in https://azeria-labs.com/arm-conditional-execution-and-branch... but the reason why branching must work this way isn't explained.

edit: I see "Branch with Exchange" switches the processor from ARM to Thumb in http://www.embedded.com/electronics-blogs/beginner-s-corner/.... But I don't see why switching processor modes must happen on branch instructions.

big_spammeron Airbnb Employees Speak Out About Bullying and ‘Toxic’ Work Environment

> Culture creation/management is taught in business school

Creation/management and being taught aren't exactly the same. I think you mean "there are ways to manage well".

big_spammeron Ask HN: What is your take on being a better writer?

True. It's probably a sign of good writing if you can elicit such a response.

"The test of a first rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function."

F. Scott Fitzgerald.

big_spammeron Ask HN: What is your take on being a better writer?

"Style: Lessons in Clarity and Grace" is better than "The Elements of Style".

https://www.amazon.com/Style-Lessons-Clarity-Grace-12th/dp/0...

big_spammeron Ask HN: What portfolio items are most impressive to you when hiring developers?

Please don't generalize without evidence to back it up.

The first version of the Linux kernel wasn't written by a team, for example, and writing an OS is clearly impressive. Linux didn't ship, get customers, and make money.

big_spammeron Ask HN: What, if anything, will come after Facebook for human connection?

Why is it "clearly virtual reality related"?

big_spammeron Ask HN: Why is Bitcoin surging in Price

Maybe because Peach became Japan's first airline to accept Bitcoin.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-05-22/peach-bec...

big_spammeron Which Tech Giant Would You Drop?

I dropped all except Amazon, because books are cheaper there. The cockroach is Amazon.

Google was surprisingly easy to drop. I use DuckDuckGo and quit GMail.

Microsoft I dropped more than a decade ago.

I never used Facebook.

I half-dropped Apple by switching away from Mac OS X, but I still own in iPhone that I'll drop when it breaks.

big_spammeron Ask HN: How do I switch from being a passive consumer to an active producer?

Hi, I would like you to buy my first product for something like $1.99. Where can I send you a link in private?

big_spammeron Ask HN: How HN helps you?

If you want to keep a list like this online I wrote a web app that keeps lists.

big_spammeron Frighteningly Ambitious Startup Ideas (2012)

I threw together something small that works for me if anyone wants to try it.

big_spammeron Tagger News takes a subset of HN articles, analyzes using ML, and applies tags

Link to try it out http://www.taggernews.com/

big_spammeron Lisp, Smalltalk, and the Power of Symmetry (2014)

On living in the REPL full time and having a better environment, is there something you wish Smalltalk could do to become a better environment that it doesn't?

What would feel better?

big_spammeron Lisp, Smalltalk, and the Power of Symmetry (2014)

> Smalltalk doesn’t need macros because it has classes instead.

I'm not sure this is true. Surely any programming language that lacks macros would be more powerful with them.

big_spammeron Lisp, Smalltalk, and the Power of Symmetry (2014)

There are alternatives that make static analysis look like the suboptimal approach.

https://pointersgonewild.com/2015/09/24/basic-block-versioni...

big_spammeron Noncompete Clauses: Signing Away the Right to Get a New Job

This extreme case of sending the modified application back is the perfect countermove!

big_spammeron Ask HN: Do you keep a journal? And Why?

I wrote software for this that helps me. The main reason is that I felt I wasn't learning anymore after leaving grad school. This helped me keep learning. If anyone wants to try it leave me your contact info.

big_spammeron Brian Eno: Composers as Gardeners

The relevant quote from this article is:

"we're so used to dignifying controllers that we forget to dignify surrenderers."

big_spammeron Show HN: 100M Books – Open a new tab, discover a new book

Opening a new tab is a channel for getting people's attention. Have you tried to do something else in the new tab instead of showing books? Is anything other than books more valuable?

big_spammeron When Medieval Monks Couldn't Cure the Plague, They Launched a Skincare Line

At some point in their studies, the friars noticed that rose petals were resistant to certain pests, and concluded that distilling the petals would create a disinfectant that could prevent humans from catching the bubonic plague. “It didn’t work at all,” Foà says, “but by 1380, they had created this rosewater tonic, which is still one of our bestsellers.” Today, the company’s rosewater products based on this original recipe are sold as skin toner.

I guess innovation can't always be planned.

big_spammeron How I got an FBI record at age 11 from dabbling in cryptography (2015)

Les is quite something. He helped setup SAIL, the AI lab in Stanford with John McCarthy, wrote the first search engine in 1961, and made the first self-driving car.

http://web.stanford.edu/~learnest/les/

https://web.stanford.edu/~learnest/les/sailing.pdf

Oh, and he made the first social network: FINGER