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mgallivan

95 karma · joined February 1, 2012

gallivan.matt at gmail.com
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mgallivan··on Haskell Talks
I accidentally entered https, the link should be:

http://www.thesoftwaredevelopmentlifecycle.com/?p=401

mgallivan··on Dear HN: Please don't start a response with the word "wrong."
We should shut down other people who are being needlessly facetious.

But to suggest that rejection should be our default behavior is absurd. Discussion should be encouraged because, more often than not, neither side is 100% correct. The way we further ourselves is by talking to those people with dissimilar views.

mgallivan··on Show HN: a lexer, parser, interpreter and web runtime (np, a 5-weekend project)
Could you post any helpful resources you used? Also, what was your experience with language design before going into this project?
mgallivan··on Show HN: a lexer, parser, interpreter and web runtime (np, a 5-weekend project)
I've seen this response to others working on new languages. How do people expect languages to improve without hobbyists honing their skills? A lot of _good_ languages start out in one person's head so please keep at it!
mgallivan··on Ask HN: Which open source needs contributors badly? I am a beginner
I tried to sign up (because it's a fantastic idea) but I got:

"We're sorry, but something went wrong."

when I tried to authorize the application in GitHub. If this is your project I'd love to try it out if there's another way for me to sign up (or another date I can try).

mgallivan··on MIDI.js - Sequencing in Javascript
Thanks - chords in Chrome has been an issue a few people are having. I'm still looking for an answer. :D
mgallivan··on MIDI.js - Sequencing in Javascript
I've recently used this library to make an ear trainer app (http://www.earbuilder.com). It's pretty easy to use and the creator responds really quickly - the only issue I have at the moment is playing sounds simultaneously within Chrome.
mgallivan··on Show HN: My first web app trains your ears
That's awesome feedback and something I wouldn't have come up with - so thank a lot! I'm going to release a newer version with more "Settings" options so that people can customize a bit more.
mgallivan··on Show HN: My first web app trains your ears
I don't quite understand what you mean by preview the sounds? Do you mean like previewing the intervals? I can add small buttons next to each to give you a glimpse - thanks for the suggestion!

I was mostly going off the assumption that people would select one or two intervals at a time, learn them through error, and then select a few more but this is an easy change for more clarification.

mgallivan··on Show HN: My first web app trains your ears
Thanks for the reply,

- That's not a feature yet but I'll definitely add it to the todo list since people train in both ways.

- Whenever you answer, the sound plays again: if you get it wrong it repeats, if you get it correct then it plays a new interval. But I can see how that isn't clear so I'll change the wording / possibly animations.

Thanks again!

mgallivan··on Show HN: My first web app trains your ears
(I suck at HN. I thought I could post text AND a link... anyway, here's what I wrote.)

Hi HN,

I've been taking guitar lessons and one thing that is recommended to most musicians is ear training - where two different notes are played and you must identify the number of steps between the notes. My app, Earbuilder, should help with that process.

You can find it here: http://www.earbuilder.com/

It's my first web app, and my first real foray into JavaScript. You can take a look at the source and you'll see that it's pretty poorly structured, but I've picked up a book and hopefully things will improve with my second web application.

Please let me know if you have any comments, suggestions, or hate because I'm looking to improve this over the coming weeks!

mgallivan··on Graph Coloring, or Proof by Crayon
Thanks!
mgallivan··on Graph Coloring, or Proof by Crayon
Is there any way to translate between this rather visual proof and the degrees of 8's neighbouring vertices?

I tried to find if there was some theory behind it but all I could really find was "saturation degree".

mgallivan··on How to Use Philosophy as a Personal Operating System: From Seneca to Musashi
I think it's more of a comment on when/where the book was written rather than what it is about. It is a journal he kept while on campaign.
mgallivan··on Show HN: Interactive Visualization of Influence in Programming Languages
What does the size of each vertex represent? Also, how do you lay out the graphs?
mgallivan··on Ask HN: Module Oriented Programming
It seems like your suggestion wouldn't allow for subtyping: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liskov_substitution_principle
mgallivan··on Ask HN: If you had 3 month to program for fun, what would you learn?
If you want to go a bit lower level you can always try to write a debugger.
mgallivan··on Ask HN: If you could hack job search, then how would you do it?
I believe LinkedIn and Glassdoor already do this.
mgallivan··on What to read?
I wasn't a huge fan of "Ghost in the Wires"... The book was a decent read but Mitnick comes off as uncaring and short-sighted.
mgallivan··on Do you read at or away from the computer?
This may be a bit off-topic.

I had to code a project in C once - nothing big, maybe 200-300 lines of actual C code. Instead of going straight to the computer, though, I sat down with a coffee for 2 hours and wrote the entire thing on paper.

Have you ever sat down at a computer and not known exactly where to start on a project? Usually this is because you've started too early. There's not enough content in your head to form a mental model of your problem.

Sitting away from the computer introduces a barrier and forces you to reconsider whether you have assimilated enough material before sitting down to program.

mgallivan··on Not all programmers are alike (a rant on Clojure).
Ron Jeffries did the Sudoku Solver.
mgallivan··on Ask HN: You're in an empty room. How do you generate a random number?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laplace%27s_demon
mgallivan··on Yeoman at your service - A getting started guide
What do you prefer?
mgallivan··on A Lesson In Timing Attacks
What happens if, on inequality, you have a 50% chance of doing one more comparison operation?

The way I figure, which may be incorrect, is the following:

You have x options (here it is 16). x^2 gives us 256 different options for this example. However, if it's only correct correct half of the time then we have to repeatedly cut down our search which results in series:

sum (x^2)/(2n), n=1 to m

which is

(x^2 H_m) / 2

Is this correct? Could someone explain how many random extra comparisons would be needed to thwart a timing attack?

mgallivan··on Ask HN: Digitalizing board games?
I can appreciate that. The question wasn't intended to be, "What game can I rip onto Android?" as much as it was, "If I make a game, how certain do I have to be that the mechanics don't exist already?"

Obviously, if I use a different name, artwork, and rule set there isn't really a problem.

mgallivan··on Status Chart: Your Personal Status Dashboard
I understand (and my budget may vary differently from yours). But the original poster's point was that if you have a number of these services (similar to Mint), then it sort of sucks having to check x different sites for a general overview of your "status".

EDIT: I saw your above comment and you make a good point about different check-in times.

mgallivan··on Ask HN: Pitch Here Your Most Recent Ideas
Why can't you store the social content as JSON?
mgallivan··on Status Chart: Your Personal Status Dashboard
This is coming from a person who probably hasn't seen a benefit from using services like Mint.com. Since I've started using it I have been drastically more aware of my finances.

The stuff that you are able to put into neat little folders _should_ go into neat little folders.

mgallivan··on Task tracking for nerds
Technically, it is - however, I already acknowledged that I can see why this would be easier to collaborate.
mgallivan··on Task tracking for nerds
It does have a few export options but I can understand your point.
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