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jesperlangon Why are mathematicians so bad at arithmetic? (2017)

Isn't this a little bit like "Why are computer scientists so bad at fixing my router / printer / virus infected windows laptop?" :)

jesperlangon Ask HN: Firefox connection problems after enabling DoH?

Wow thank you! I was bangning my head against the wall, restarting my computer, disabling extensions, etc. This worked like a charm :)

jesperlangon Goldman Sachs invests $250M in compressed air energy storage

There is a great post on compressed air energy storage (CAES) over at Low-Tech Magazine:

https://www.lowtechmagazine.com/2018/05/history-and-future-o...

jesperlangon Ask HN: I suck at math, where to start?

You can click on the timestamp of the comment and then "favorite" to save it :)

jesperlangon Ask HN: I suck at math, where to start?

I'm currently going through "Math for programmers" (Manning Publ.) and I enjoy it immensely! A lot of math books can feel too abstract and dry but this book was perfect for me coming mostly from a programming background. Start learning learning linear algebra and you will soon find yourself in graphics programming and game engines. That's where I am at the moment and I feel I regained my passion for programming after years in webdev..

jesperlangon Ask HN: How to learn about text editor architectures and implementations?

The rope data structure is an interesting concept worth checking out!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rope_(data_structure)

jesperlangon Hit Japanese app Crabhouse forced to change name on iOS

Just to clearify:

ク = Ku

ラ = Ra

ブ = bu

Crab would be Cu-ra-bu (Kurabu)

Club would be Cu-(l/r)a-bu (Kurabu)

jesperlangon Show HN: I wrote a book about using data science to solve “everyday” problems

what are the limitations of the epub version you have noticed so far?

jesperlangon Programming Book Profits (2008)

Kobo Clara HD, has Pocket support!

jesperlangon Programming Book Profits (2008)

Interesting quote!

> No one buys eBooks. You’d have to be pretty… special… in order to not be able to find a free ebook of Pro JavaScript Techniques.

Funny how things changed, today I would prefer the ebook version over physical for reading on an eink display. Actually, these days I hardly do any kind of reading on a regular light emitting display (only coding and video). It's just so much more comfortable to read e-ink despite its short comings. Does wonder with focus as well. I even started reading short form articles on my e-reader after first saving them on Pocket.

jesperlangon Show HN: I wrote a book about using data science to solve “everyday” problems

I'd buy this at the blink of an eye if there was an epub version. Also a Kobo users who'd rather not use PDF or feed the Amazon :)

jesperlangon Practical typewriting: By the all-finger method (1894)

there is an interesting a strategy on page 23 where they suggest shifting the entire hand when typing TGB/YHN rather than stretching. Does anyone do that today?

I just tried a bit of typing where I shift the entire hand for appropiate keys rather than stretching my fingers and although it is a very unusual feeling I must admit it is quite a bit more comfortable. The fingers stay curled rather than being stretched out. Did I just get an epiphany from typewriting tutorial written in 1894??

jesperlangon Falling sperm counts, declining egg quality, and endocrine disruptors

I was eating lots of miso, tofu and soy sauce when I lived in japan without issue. In europe i tried soy milk once and got an instant allergic reaction (itchy soar throat). The difference being soy milk is just soaked, ground up, boiled soy bean..

jesperlangon ReScript 8.4

https://github.com/facebook/reason/issues/2634

This issue is trying asking for some explanation regarding the future of ReasonML. Maybe comment/react/subscribe to stay up to date on this issue!

jesperlangon Is carbon capture a viable solution?

A dangerous thing with this I think is that it risks cementing current unsustainable practices. It gives people and politicians, today, a sense of relief which stops them from doing the absolutely urgent actions that are needed right now (or was needed many years ago)...

jesperlangon Ask HN: What can replace my iPod for podcast listening?

I did this but be vary of poor head phone connectors. My Nokia 130 started panning the sound randomly after a year or so and ultimately gave up altogether after two.

Usually these oldschool phones do play music and you can manage songs quite ok with files/folders on a micro sd card. What can be annoying though is a terrible UI for playing your music, don't expect things browsing tracks by artist for example...

jesperlangon Arctic Sea Ice not freezing In October – first time since measurements began

Daily overview of a broad range of data. Just look at that hot blob over the arctic and switch to sea ice view..:

https://climatereanalyzer.org/wx/DailySummary/#t2anom

For daily arctic sea ice updates (where you can clearly see that the regrowth is very slow for october):

https://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/

jesperlangon What can a pipe wrench teach us about software engineering?

I've seen this way of state modelling pop up more and more recent year in me feeds. Make impossible states impossible. It's a great way to keep you sane!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IcgmSRJHu_8 (Elm)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uGMm3StjqLI (Kotlin)

jesperlangon Why Facebook Can’t Fix Itself

> In retrospect, it seems that the company’s strategy has never been to manage the problem of dangerous content, but rather to manage the public’s perception of the problem.

I think this is key. And not just managing the public's perception but also the employees' perception through these convoluted stories like "connecting people"

jesperlangon Why Are There So Many Programming Languages? (2015)

Developing languages is also fun, a hobby, and some of them accidentally grow bigger than initially intended!

jesperlangon Ask HN: How to do cross platform GUI?

I just recently discovered https://github.com/tauri-apps/tauri

It looks like a good alternative to Electron but haven't tried. Anyone?

jesperlangon How Facebook Avoids Ad Blockers

The main news feed is such a toxic space anyway so I just blocked it in general with this uBlock filter:

www.facebook.com##div[id^="feed_stream_"] > div

jesperlangon Cut global emissions by 7.6% per year for next decade to meet 1.5°C Paris target

Isn't this ultimately going to end up being a rationing issue? OK, rationing it's a forbidden word today but maybe we could have carbon credits divided by person and they are free to use them however they want. Even trade them to others. I know this is _super_ simplified but perhaps we need to start thinking in those terms sooner or later?

jesperlangon Arctic sea ice reaches second lowest minimum in satellite record

What's even more worrying is that almost all "old" ice is gone. Extent only measures ocean area with at least 15% ice.

https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/4750

Scary times ahead!

jesperlangon Spotifree – Free OS X App for Muting Spotify Ads

So how does it work?

> Spotifree is polling Spotify every .3 seconds to see whether the current track number is 0 (as in all ads). If it is, Spotify is muted for a duration of an ad. When an ad is over, the volume is set to the way it was before.

jesperlangon Pedal powered farms and factories: forgotten future of stationary bicycle (2011)

As a high-tech (electrical tech?) geek, i love low-tech magazine. One thing that this article (and many of their other ones) does is to highlight how incredibly wasteful our lifestyle is energy wise. Sure we can be impressed by 95% efficiency motors of new electric cars, it is still +150'000 watt used to transport 70 kg of human flesh. Compare that to 75 watt of pedal powering your transport. Not saying we are going to replace cars with bikes, but it's good to remind ourselves how much energy we actually use in real numbers.

It's like we all have our own army of personal slaves by the thousands that run on ancient sun light to power our excessive needs..

jesperlangon Fasting Affects the Brain

Some interesting story surrounding that!

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2016/nov/28/breakfa...

jesperlangon People love Facebook so much they wouldn’t quit unless we paid them a lot

Love? Isn't it more about dependence?

jesperlangon Is screen time good or bad? It’s not that simple

Not sure this analogy works but here goes...

Could you see it as what the car industry did for transportation, the tech industry is doing for our mental infrastructure? Setting up a private car infrastructure was a gigantic experiment with unforeseen (or were they really?) consequences to pollution, noise, the way cities were built/grew and so on. The initial idea was not much criticized, we have only been fine tuning the technology (safer cars, electric cars, better roads, etc). And today we are doing the same experiment but with our minds. And it's not going to change, we're just going to fine tune it. When your products are infrastructure you are safe. So screen/software makers don't really care about the debate of screen time. It's a debate about how much time and what you do on your screen and not so much how we should live our lives (we are already living a lot of our lives through screens!).

jesperlangon Social networks are no longer social

yeah, the public/private thing is a biggie for me I think. But maybe it's also the speed / "dynamic-ness"? I imagine an open panel discussion can be quite an intense, immersive and interesting social experience :)