Hacker News Reader

joelbermanon 12-minute Mandelbrot: fractals on a 50 year old IBM 1401 mainframe

I entered the Navy in 1967 and went to IBM 029 school in San Jose sometime in 1968. And I also took a 1401 SPS/Autocoder course at UC Davis that year. A few years later I learned BAL on a 360 and they still had 026 keypunch machines. I assume they were leased machines, so the lease price came down fast towards EOL. Then they got spray painted and leased in Africa and So. America.

joelbermanon Fired

You are assuming the company knows who the dead weight is. I have seen more than a few times that someone is laid off, and only after he or she is gone do their managers figure out exactly what they did. Usually to their chagrin that there is no one else who can do it.

joelbermanon The Next Chapter

Use these synonyms if you do not like engineer. synonyms: originator, deviser, designer, architect, inventor, developer, creator; mastermind "the prime engineer of the approach"

If you do not think that engineers can be creative then we disagree. And if you think that every writer, actor, director is creative, then we also disagree.

joelbermanon The Next Chapter

Isn't the content paid for by advertisers in exchange for your eyeballs? Wouldn't Aero increase the eyeballs? Wouldn't the advertisers be happy about more eyeballs?

First the engineers run the company, then the marketers, then the finance people, then the lawyers. TV is being run by lawyers.

joelbermanon iCloud Uploads Local Data Outside of iCloud Drive

For continuity to work, it should be obvious that what you are working on must be stored somewhere other than the machine you have turned off. The obvious place is on iCloud. Just do not enable continuity if you do not want to enjoy is features.

joelbermanon Uselessd

I do not want to spend the time to learn new things unless they are directly related to my work. So systemd was a PITA for me, but now I am fine with it (BTW, I have used UNIX since the late 60's so have seen a lot). This project looks great, but I do not have the energy to care, I will just deal with whatever comes with my distro. By the way, pick a better name. I suspect many OSS and home grown projects fail for the simple reason that the name, while clever, makes people either think the project is a joke, or some geeky thing, or unprofessional. Either pick an obvious descriptive name, or be prepared to spend a boatload of money building name recognition.

joelbermanon Finding a Video Poker Bug Made These Guys Rich

It is highly likely that software-driven games could have a bug. Therefore the casino could have decided that electronic machines are too risky. Or they could have paid for some kind of insurance. I think the casino, just like many banks and retail stores, are using technology that they do not understand and are unwilling to pay or learn. They want more profit. Let the seller beware.

joelbermanon Meet the Apple Watch

You should not define a market by a product. THe value of this is so that you do not have to pull bigger and bigger phones out of your pocket. It is not a watch, it is an easily seen notification device and simple input device. I think that people who are always looking at their phone need something like this. People that do not spend much time looking at texts, and screening calls will not need this.

joelbermanon Why doctors are sick of their profession

I love my primary care doctor who is also my cardiologist. He is amazing. Explains everything, and is never rushed. The only negative is sometimes he is off schedule. I just had open heart surgery and that was also wonderful. The techs, nurses, PAs, and doctors were great. In simple terms, I am thrilled with the care I got and except for one nurse from hell, I have no complaints about care and I have the utmost respect for those who helped me.

Now the dark side. I cannot imagine how many people are preparing bills, sending them to Medicare and then to my supplemental insurance. And how many questions I have about billing and how many phone calls I have to make. I am sure that the cost of administering payments is much higher than the cost of care. And yet none of that administrative work prevents disease or cures me. We need a single payer system and need to reduce the non-care-related paperwork. And let the healers heal.

joelbermanon Why Do We Say “Big Red Barn,” But “Red Big Barn” Sounds Wrong?

Not the same, but in the same vein this blog caught my attention. http://borealexpat.blogspot.com/2014/08/deconstructing-finni...

Complex rules that just seem natural.

joelbermanon Quantum Random Number Generator Created Using A Smartphone Camera

Two uses of quantum effects are 1. Generating random numbers, 2. Entangling bits to detect "man in the middle".

The point of this discovery is to decide whether it improves the security of smartphone communications. If yes, it will upset governments, if no, it is an interesting observation.

joelbermanon Email, an idea so old that it's new

I usually wake around 6:00 and check my mail. For me the best is a short summary of stories on email, say the first 4-5 lines of each item, and clickable. If a web page was customizable, that would be fine too, but as the OP says, if you are already in email it is easiest to stay in email.

joelbermanon I reckon your message broker might be a bad idea

These reckons you mention. Over the years I have come across people suggesting the same approach to a problem. It makes sense in theory and it should work. Yet it doesn't. And I cannot explain why it does not work. Queueing/throttling/steering/pub-sub, caching, and synchronization seem to be three areas that spawn unintended consequences like crazy. If some young'un suggests something you have learned will fail, let them try it if you have the time. And then ask them to explain why it did not work. It's fun watching people learn.

joelbermanon Top Tech Skills of 2013

It is a data point. Look at skills needed in dice or monster, look at tiobe.com look at languages on github and you get a picture of the fashion of the season. Most larger companies use keyword analysis to pick which resumes to look at. So if you use those keywords you have a better chance of finding a job. If you rather start your own company, of course it is meaningless.

joelbermanon Bitcoin vs. Ben Bernanke

Every article I read about Bitcoin has a picture of a metal bitcoin in it. I guess that is to make sure very few people get the point of what bitcoin is.

joelbermanon Why it is important not to have children

If you accept natural selection as a theory, the answer is obvious.

joelbermanon Google Reader: A Product vs. A Symbol

You may be correct but I like to follow the money. Since it is not a product that is sold, the value must have been in Google learning what we like to read. Google did not learn anything new about our interests from Reader and therefore it had no value.

joelbermanon Mobile Operators Announce Commitment to Firefox OS

How many phone OS do we need? I think the reason we have so many is the same reason we have so many different power connectors and screw heads. Because too many A$$hats are alive.

joelbermanon Free transportation for life

http://www.betterplace.com/

Buy the car, rent the battery, turn in a spent one for a charged one in a few minutes.

joelbermanon Petition the Whitehouse to make unlocking cell phones legal

Here is a better approach. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_disobedience

joelbermanon America's CEOs Want You to Work Until You're 70

I'm 66. I first retired at age 59 from a tech job with great benefits and healthcare for life. Got bored out of my mind, and went back to work at another tech company. Retired last July. By October I was again ready to work and am now working in yet another tech company.

I have no idea how long I will live, and I do intend to retire when my wife reaches 65.

Some of you make it sound terrible that someone is working at age 66. I am really happy working.

(I could get by without working, but it is very nice to have an income stream)

joelbermanon Laconic History of the World

The comments seem to prove why the map is useful. What would you like your countries word to be? Work to that end. Or find a word you like and emigrate.

joelbermanon Let's Build Better Election Visualizations

If you overlay the Congressional districts I bet you can see the impact of Gerrymandering on some of these maps. When a party can receive well less than 50% of the votes and attain well more than 50% of the house seats you must congratulate them on trampling the intent of representative Democracy.

joelbermanon Why I'm returning my Microsoft Surface RT

Goggles, statements like "Macs and IOS have very dumbed down interfaces. That works well for many people who want to check their email and surf the web without having to learn anything at all." stop me from reading the rest of your post. I don't want to learn how to use my tools, I want to learn the things my tools help me with.

joelbermanon The CEO of my company is a micro manager - how to make it stop?

Sometimes it is necessary to have that to get things going. But of course it does not scale. 30 people are not too many for one manager. When you go international and the number of employees is in the middle hundreds he will need to delegate or growth will stop.