imakesnowflakes

I am not sure why you think It is unexpected behavior. And even if it is, it is not even in the same league as the quirks of Php. It would be if 3/2 outputs 1 but 7/2 outputs 3.5, both in Python 2. Then that would be unexpected behavior in the same league as that of Php's.

> it won't happen overnight but the trend is there, strong and growing.

It is just appearance. Just movement, not progress. I just provided you with an example on how new features added follows the same incompetent design, consistant with Php's track record.

>No such thing as a perfect programming language since everyone has a different definition of perfect.

Yea, there is no perfect one, But there is something that is too bad that should not be used. Php is that. It is not going to change.

>They added new sane features..

Have you heard the expression, "A chain is only as strong as the weakest link?". So adding strong links after a weak link does not "improve" the strength of the chain.

And that is assuming that these new features added are actually sane. From what I have seen, it is not the case. see here [1]

So you cannot improve php with out making it "not php". And I don't think even if the same people started who are working in the language started from scratch, today, it will be much better than Php. Because they are simply not competent (refer [1]), because if you are competent, and has the vision to see the flaws of the language and the community, you won't go anywhere near it. So I think there is zero chance of Php becoming "sane", let alone nice...

[1] https://np.reddit.com/r/PHP/comments/3j88v4/something_about_...

> The language is improving drastically

This is a myth. It is adding new features. That does not mean it is improving.

> It received way too much beating from the community in the last couple of years..

I think it didn't get the beating it deserve. If it was by merit alone, this language should be dead by now. People keep saying that it is improving. But actually it is not. The rotten core, what makes php php, very much remain, and it is still a very dangerous language to use for anything serious [1].

[1] https://www.reddit.com/r/PHP/comments/41bm7j/new_rfc_allow_s...

Php is faster than python because it lacks so many dynamic capabilities of Python. So you are loosing all that and gain a little in performance, but not anywhere near that of a compiled language. A lose lose situation...

Macbook Pro 13 inch - Mid 2012 - Upgraded to 16Gb ram and 256Gb Samsung SSD. It cost me 70000 INR (Approx 1000 USD).

Absolutely love everything about it. The charger, the backlit keyboard, the El-Capitan OS, everything. Everything about this machine is beautiful.

I think it is the best value for money if you are looking for a laptop.

The only thing I miss is my mechanical keyboard. But the trackpad makes up for it, to an extent..

>Git might qualify as best FREE version control system...

No way it is the best. I think Mercurial easily holds the winning position for the version control with most power to weight ratio...

The best way to understand Git is to learn Mercurial. It teaches you the things that matters with none of the useless implementation bullshit.

If you start with git, you won't have a clue where the interface ends and the implementation details starts. Which is why, I think, people find git hard.

I still hope that the whole development world will come to their senses and start using Mercurial more and more...

I had created a SPA for doing this using javascript in browser itself. Anyone can use it directly from browser. This is actually a part of an angular app I made sometime back.

It has watchers for an HN thread, a reddit post or comment and it can even watch multiple reddit inboxes if you run a small python script locally.

Here [1], just enter the thread id to watch for any replies under that thread

[1] http://z-petal.com/ceasium/#/hackerNews

[2] http://z-petal.com/ng-ceasium/ceasium-html5-angularjs-app-fo...

> I would like to see examples of the language actually doing something useful.

A Haskell program I wrote to find and match subtitle files for a particular release of the movie I have.

https://hackage.haskell.org/package/hastily

I have looked at both Rust and Go. What I have felt is that, Rust is too restrictive. I mean, you have to fight the compiler a lot harder then you have to do in Go. Some times, for example, if you are writing device drivers or real time embedded programs, then that is great.

But for web services? I think it is overkill. I think Go strikes a nice balance. I would love to be convinced otherwise though. So please tell me, what am I missing?

I want an easy way to test food items that I buy from local shops for harmful levels of toxins/pesticides.

> I don't think free internet to farmers will do any bad..

Does it intend to serve ads? How does ads work? Isn't one aspect of ads involve creating needs where there were previously none? Does it involve injecting insecurities (Ex: You are a loser if you are not fair) into the minds of the gullible and make them buy buy buy...

So, what If the end result of this is that suddenly the teenage kids of these farmers starts to spend more amount of money on cosmetics (because of Ads or to make them look good in "selfies"). Will that do them good?

It never worked for me.

The hash/filesize will be different even if the movie has been ripped from the same source. Right? So unless someone has made the subtitle for the exact same file, that you have, as opposed to a file with the same timing as the one you have, your search will not find it. Right?

It does not use the movie file at all, so yes.

What it does is this. It goes and fetch all available subtitles for a movie (You can limit this if you provide a partial release name). It then selects a candidate dialog from all the subtitle files based some criteria and prints out the time at which that dialog appear in the each of the subtitle file.

You can use this to co-relate the best subtitle file for your movie file.

A downside of this approach is that you have to seek forward and actually find out when the dialog actually occurs in your movie file.

Searching by video file never worked for me.

So I made these to solve this problem. Now I spend less than a minute to get the perfect subtitle, instead of upto 30 minutes without these.

[1] https://hackage.haskell.org/package/hastily (Haskell)

[2] https://pypi.python.org/pypi/Titley/1.7 (Python3)

>The question is will they reach for a coke or a pepsi?

How about plain old cold water? Is a Cola much better at quenching thirst than plain cold water?

EDIT for clarity: The point is, the first question is not "Will they reach for a coke or pepsi", but "Will they reach for a bottle of cold water or a cola", then only the question of choosing between pepsi or coke comes.

So you first need to convince people that you should drink a cola when you are thirsty. This is where the "evil" part comes from.

I taught myself Haskell and built a tool that searches and download movie subtitles. [1]

Taught myself angular.js and built Ceasium [2]. A tool for freelance programmers that can do minimal project/time management. It also has notifiers for watching HN and Reddit threads. If you run a bundled python script, it can even monitor multiple Reddit inboxes.

It actually helped me find work.

[1] https://hackage.haskell.org/package/hastily

[2] http://z-petal.com/ng-ceasium/ceasium-html5-angularjs-app-fo...

> Haskell is excellently suited for solving extremely complex problems and why it's so desirable for concurrency and parallelism tasks.

What is an example of an extremely complex problem that you have solved that would be vastly more harder to implement in another language.

The most powerful thing that I have noticed is the type system. When you have a complex problem, you end up breaking it up by writing a lot of functions. In case of a language with a less powerful type system, it is hard for you to string them all together to build the complete program.

But with Haskell, if you have cared to actually annotate the types, this becomes a really trivial task. It also detects flaws in your reasoning (because the result of the previous step is incompatible with the input of the current step).

So, doing this would be vastly more difficult in a language like Python or even a language with less powerful type system like C.

Imperative programs work in steps. It will be like, "Do this, then do this, then do this" etc, etc. Functional programming does not have 'steps'. A functional program is a series of definitions like, A IS B, B IS C and C IS D.

Running an imperative program comprise of setting up some initial state of all the variables and executing the steps in it, after which the state of all variables contain the result.

Running a functional program comprise of taking the input value, and following through the definitions and the end, you will have the result.

The difference between the two is that with imperative programs, there is a dependency on the state at every step. This makes it harder to write complex imperative programs. Functional programs does not have any steps, and hence no 'states' and hence eliminates this overhead...

I print out the really important/nice photos and store a hard copy..

Because that value made life, as we know it, possible.

> that will really drive home the importance/benefits of functional programming..

From my experience with Haskell, on a practical level, I think it really comes down to a guarantee that you will not be able to mess the code up beyond a certain extant.

I am not really sure if it should be attributed to the type system or to functional programming in general. A functional programming language require a really good type system, because you need it maintain sanity with you have to chain together functions a lot more than you do in an imperative language. So I think it has to be a mix of both.

>To me, this appears to be the way to go. Javascript + Typescript.

This is exactly how I feel. Typescript is amazing, It feels simple and powerful at the same time. It appears too good to be true, and I will never write plain java script again.

I bought a Cooler master mechanical keyboard for 10000 Rs (nearly $150), For comparison I could have got a wireless keyboard/mouse combo for below 2000 Rs.

One of the reasons I bought it was that it was backlit. But now the LED's of a dozen keys have gone out. (This is after one replacement from the company due to the same issue, and I had to pay the shipping charges from my own pocket).

Also, it has a very delicate usb port on the keyboard (Yes the cord is not permanently attached), so after a while you end up frequently reattaching the cord. I have now tied it to the keyboard body.

If you ever find this keyboard online. Don't buy the backlit version. And don't buy then one with a usb port instead of cord being permanently attached.

Ok. I thought so because you mentioned wireless keyboards transmit less data than a video signal..

>I'm suggesting that the device you linked (along with every other HDMI/wi-fi stick) will not serve your purpose..

Cool. Was not suggesting to use WiFi, Sorry for the misunderstanding. Also, I think you might be confusing latency with throughput.

Is that so? I am not sure why there would be a noticeable latency. Wireless keyboards and mouse works fine from a distance. Besides, I am not suggesting using wifi for this, but a direct radio link.

You see, this already exists [1]. It costs around 2000 Rs, that is like $30, A wireless mouse and keyboard will cost around the same. So for $60 you will have all the component to make this work.

Let me say this again. For 60$ worth of components you can have a remote control that will let you work on your desktop from anywhere in your home.

Will you be interested?

[1] http://www.amazon.in/eShop24x7-Wireless-Display-Miracast-Air...

Yea. Totally same things. Paper and a display that actually emits light.

For a bunch who calls themselves as "nerds" and "geeks", the HN crowd is becoming pretty dumb lately..