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observr9

45 karma · joined September 25, 2018

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observr9··on In Mexico, cartels are hunting down police at their homes
Will this trend lead to fewer and fewer people joining law enforcement, which would further weaken the government?

Regarding whether this constitutes a "failed state", I'd say it depends on how bad this gets.

Similar to the concept of "peaceful transfer of power", there also needs to be a relatively peaceful maintenance of power.

Politicians, judges and law enforcement are the very people who constitute a functional government. If, going forward, a certain threshold of the "good guys" start to opt out of joining their own governing system (in one of those capacities) for fear of having themselves and their families murdered, then the country becomes a failed state.

How can other countries prevent that from happening to them, especially Mexico's neighbors?

observr9··on Google illegally spied on workers before firing them, US labor board alleges
> Even when pointed out that the company can wipe it when they leave

If someone intends to leave, they can first revoke the company's access to their phone.

observr9··on California to Require All New Vehicles Be Zero-Emission by 2035
I actually thought it was a rhetorical question, with the intent of stating that the law still wouldn't save us from supply chain emissions.
observr9··on On the Use of a Life
Thanks. I was just curious because I don't seem to have the mental focus at night for such endeavors, but that is the only time I have for such things.
observr9··on On the Use of a Life
> I work 9-6 every day ... then sleep for a couple of hours then stay up to 3am doing self study in math and programming.

Could you elaborate? You take two naps at night in lieu of 7+ solid hours? Is this sufficient? Why?

observr9··on iOS 14 is available today
I just want to disable the pointless "message sent" tone in iMessage.
observr9··on iOS 14 is available today
I said "iMessage".
observr9··on iOS 14 is available today
So, you still can't disable the pointless and annoying "message sent" tone in iMessage.
observr9··on Applebot
Absolutely this. Not sure if it's 1-2 seconds but the delay is enough to make it unusable. I've missed turns and exits because of it. Google Maps seems to have some predictive ability that allows it to appear to be "real-time".
observr9··on Ask HN: Am I the longest-serving programmer – 57 years and counting?
For those in the same boat, any tips you can provide to overcome the commonly cited barriers?

For example: maintaining the required mental agility needed to do the job, learning new technologies that come and go, overcoming relevant biases, staying relevant as "less experienced" workers seem sufficient to do the same job, etc.

observr9··on No to Chrome
>> ... highlighting search results in the scroll bar...

This. I find any browser that doesn't do that to be unusable. The alternative, in long documents or source code, is to blindly hit NEXT and visit all locations where a search term is found rather than scrolling quickly to see the different context regions.

I tried a plug-in or two but they were not nearly as functional as the native Chrome experience.

observr9··on McMindfulness: How mindfulness became the new capitalist spirituality
Mindfulness is being commercialized for the purpose of selling books and apps, argues a person in a book that he is trying to sell.
observr9··on Why I’m Worried About Google
If a method is used several times at the top of the page, and you want to find out if it's used elsewhere, without the highlights, you don't know that. You have to hit Next until you make sure it's nowhere else. With the highlights, you immediately see that the block you're looking at is it, and you can move on to a different file.
observr9··on Why I’m Worried About Google
Browsing a large code repository. The scrollbar highlights allow me to "eyeball" the page and go to the general locations quickly rather than hitting Next a thousand times (which feels primitive as hell anyway), especially when a block of code has the same keyword used many times and I need to move on to the next block.

I tried Firefox for a while but I rely on that feature around once or twice a day and I preferred using Chrome for those browsing sessions. So I dumped Firefox and switched back.

observr9··on Why I’m Worried About Google
Firefox doesn't highlight find-in-page search results on the scroll bar. Chrome does.

Am I the only person who relies on that feature daily for their work?

observr9··on What is going on with measures of programming language popularity?
How about available jobs? I suspect a lot of people are trying to determine which language to invest their time in learning.

Another relevant measure would be ALL jobs, not just available. Some people may not care if a million people are using language X if they're not getting paid for it.

observr9··on Ask HN: What things have richly rewarded the time invested in mastering them?
Software Development interview questions. My skills, experience and education don't seem to matter as much in the industry. Those questions were the single factor that got me better jobs and increased my salary several times, the effects of which extend to myself and my family.

I don't even like the questions. They're mostly puzzles, which I'm not good at, in the guise of programming questions.

observr9··on Chrome 69 will keep Google Cookies when you tell it to delete all cookies
Chrome highlights page keyword search result locations on the scroll bar, making the process of going through them very convenient. Firefox doesn't, and I couldn't find an extension that replicates the feature without extra manual effort.

Also, I find Firefox UI sluggish to use, relative to Chrome UI.