preview

The issue is whether a state-by-state single payer system would be universal. It would not be in the US--the Republican states would never enact it. How would Canada's system react if Ontario had single payer but British Columbia did not?

A non-technical boss managing technical employees can lead to problems. It is rare to have a non-technical manager who 1) knows what they know/don't know, and 2) can effectively manage a technical team.

The growth is impressive, but did Whitman cause it to happen, or did she manage it as it was happening? My opinion is that she managed it as it was happening. That may make her a competent manager, but I think HP needs much more than just a competent manager. HP should be about technology leadership, especially if the commodity PC business is sold off.

You make a good point. I started to write what promised to be a lengthy reply, but I realized it came down to a simple characteristic--flexibility. Ultimately, what's needed is flexibility provided to the employee. Provide the means to work from home (VPN, etc.), to arrive/leave the office as needed, etc. Does the employer trust their employees to do what they need to get their work done?

But if that is the main (or only) goal, why spend $3 billion to buy the company when you could license or buy IP for much less?

The FPGA fabric will also have to be configured whenever power is lost. This probably includes the low power states of the Atom since the FPGA wasn't designed to support it. It would make sense for this to be part of the BIOS-level code since the FPGA is useless until configured.

There is a savings in board space, but, otherwise, this solution provides no additional value. You can already connect an Atom processor and FPGA through PCI Express.

The comment on the fabs is not exactly true. If Intel has maxed its fab capacity on higher margin chips, then producing lower margin Atoms is undesirable. If there is fab capacity remaining after producing sufficient quantities of the other chips to meet market demand, then it is advantageous to manufacture the lower margin chips. There is nothing lower margin than an idle fab.

It can be that bad. Such a chart can be gamed (like any table or chart). It can also be a crutch. Do you need the chart to show your differentiation versus the competition? If the perspective customer would otherwise not know how you're different, then you may be better off investing your time work on the message.

You're already seeing domain specific chips, but they're in the form of a FPGA rather than an ASIC. If it can be implementation with traditional gates, a FPGA is the way to go for low to medium volume.

While Lyric may incorporate classic gates in their design, it also sounds like the heart of their technology uses something different from classic gates.

This is a great point. Power usage is growing in importance. I think power management APIs will continue to evolve. In the not too distance future, power will be another axis of optimization.

The prices vendors quote are also, in a sense, pulled out of thin air. There is some floor to the price based on cost to produce and minimum acceptable margin, and volume also plays a role. But, there are many other factors that are subjective. For example, perhaps the part manufacturer is looking to get its first part into Apple, so they knock some more off the price.

While only Apply knows how much an Apple-proprietary processor costs, it is possible to estimate a cost for it based on process technology, die size, pin count, package, etc.

I have lived in SV, and I currently live in Austin. The $1M for a house is not completely out of line, It does depend on how far you're willing to drive and if public school quality is a factor.

I think is $200k for Austin is a little low. It is possible to buy a home in Austin for $200k. Like all things housing, location is very important as is public school quality. If you don't care about the quality of the schools and don't mind a commute, then it is possible.

But, it is possible to be profitable (even have increasing profits) but still have problems at the top. See http://steveblank.com/2010/06/07/when-big-companies-are-dead... for some anecdotal evidence.

Practicing in the form of a game makes practice more fun, and, therefore, makes it more likely that you will practice. Those of us would-be casual musicians may need an additional motivation to practice other than a pure love of the instrument.

Is this really that much different from releasing the hard cover well before the paperback version?

My problem with Vista has always been the lack of a compelling feature that would drive me to upgrade. If Microsoft is claiming that Vista (or 7) is a solution, I'm still left asking "To what problem?" For new hardware, I would stick with 7. It would work well on new systems with the memory to run it (even though I might not be into the new UI). But for my existing systems, I don't see a compelling reason to spend the money to make the change.

> Managers have to force-rank their employees. The more > Machiavellian managers make a point of telling their > employees where they stand.

Haven't other articles (and other research) shown that force ranking is not an effective strategy? And if my manager regaled me with daily "ranking updates," I'd go insane.

http://www.ted.com/talks/dan_pink_on_motivation.html

[Edit: added link to Dan Pink's TED Talk]

Unfortunately, using 75% of the rated capacity may not be enough to handle the inrush. The article discusses this point, "...if you power up both PSUs at the same time, it can draw a large (14 amp) spike of 120V power from the socket." That would mean one pod per 20A circuit. Ugh. In normal operating conditions, a 5.6A max load would allow three pods per circuit.

Addressing this would require a little bit of design, but the problem is relatively simple. If they wanted to get fancy, they could add a chaining feature--pods on the same circuit would be connected together so that they'd power on serially. This would get away from their goal of using off-the-shelf parts. It is, as with many things, an engineering trade-off.

I wonder about the single point of failure posed by the power supplies. One failed box is not a big deal (since I assume the data is replicated over several). But, what if they get a bad batch of supplies and see a relatively high failure rate? I wonder how high a power supply failure rate they can handle.

The need to stagger the power on of the two supplies poses a problem. What if power to a data center is lost? When power is restored, all box will try to start, blowing all fuses. Granted, this is a catastrophic event, so its frequency should be very low. But, this also seems like an area that could be automated.

Item 6 (goodbye custom chips) is not a new trend. It's been happening over the last several years. Programmable logic has progressed and encroached on all but the high volume ASICs. If the volume is there, an ASIC makes sense. Otherwise, there's a wonderful world of FPGAs just waiting for you to explore.

Item 8 (no more chip startups) may be technically true, but I think it's just an evolution of the business model. Rather than planning for an ASIC immediately, you would begin by implementing the IP in an FPGA. This allows you to prove the design and the market. If the market is sufficiently large, you may choose to create an ASIC.

Item 10 (brain drain continues) seems obvious. Of course the capability of engineers in India and China would improve and catch up to the U.S. With the improved skill there's also an increase in cost as those with the skills commands better pay. Equilibrium will follow.

That limits the allowed solutions to those that are purely software. What about a hardware/software hybrid or hardware-only solution (e.g. PCI Express card with one or more FPGAs)?

Do FPGAs count as cheaper electronic circuits?

One book that I've seen recommend is A Verilog HDL Primer, Third Edition by J. Bhasker. Some books focus their attention on coding for simulation without giving synthesis its due. I have been told that this book does not make that mistake.

FTA: So I would argue further that the “innovation probability” of a high I.Q. individual whose family has been in the U.S. for many generations is less than that of someone who’s new to our nation and has a comparable intellect, but far more desire.

It sounds to me like the author stating an obvious, and often repeated, point. Perseverance/hard work is a much better predictor of success than raw intelligence. Immigrants, for a couple of generations at least, have the work ethic. Based on other posts to this discussion, this fizzles our by the fourth generation, so you're stuck on a tread mill of bringing in new hard workers to fuel the engine. Is that really the only way to handle this? It doesn't seem to address the root cause.

As far as the requirement to post a job to prove no American worker could fill the role, I think it's common knowledge that this aspect of the system is heavily (and easily) gamed.

The H1-B program does need to be reworked. It seems like the H1-B visa should provide more freedom to the individual to innovate--start their own company and not be so beholden to their sponsor. I am making an assumption that the hard working, hungry H1-B holder is more likely to start their own company. This is where innovation creation thrives and, therefore, where there is great potential value in H1-B visa reform.

In the article, Zed says, "it’s just that nobody learns about state machines unless they take an obscure compiler design class. Very few universities teach state machines as a method of specifying the logic for a program."

My background is as a EE, and I work in hardware. I can't imagine not knowing about state machine design. Is Zed's statement accurate for those with a pure software focus?

I'm surprised at the university representatives who were disturbed by Clemson's gaming of the system. Shouldn't this make those people (and US News) question the validity of the ranking? Instead of making a display of outrage, why not find a better methodology?

The most troubling aspect of this is that good schools feel the need to become arbitrarily more selective in order to boost their ranking.

For reading PDFs, the key differentiator is battery life. Also, the aspect ratio of the display on the Kindle is better for reading a document. If the laptop is always plugged in, then the battery life argument goes away. But, reading a document formatted for 8.5 x 11 on a wide screen display is not the ideal experience.

I would also dispute the effectiveness of taking notes on a laptop. As soon as you want to write anything other than text (e.g. diagram or equation), you'll slow to a crawl. (At least, I would slow to a crawl.)

I agree that $500 is a steep up front investment given the similarity in price point to a low end laptop.

I disagree. The lesson from the dot.com bubble was that anything put on the Internet could be monetized and would become profitable. That was (and is) silly.

The "Web 2.0" mindset, at least the mindset I've seen most often on HN, is build it fast and get it out there to see if it has value. I also think there is some thought to how the solution can be monetized, but plans change in response to changing environments.

"Nobody has ever made a compelling argument for how having unionized teachers helps students. Nor has anyone ever made a compelling argument for how having tenured teachers helps student performance."

I agree with these statements. However, there are many public school systems in the USA that are successful. Why? That is the right question to ask.

The education problem is much more complicated than simply giving parents and students the choice of school to attend. The "good" schools would then be overrun with perspective students, requiring a selection procedure to determine who to accept. And so, the rest of your life will be determined at earlier ages by some standardized test. The top few percent get the good education while the rest scramble to get what they can. That is not a better solution and does not fix the problem.

This is an interesting perspective, but it seems to be (potentially) true of one class of startup, but there are many others, requiring much large amounts of money to start, that will still rely on VC funding.

Software startups, specifically web startups, have been a favorite of VCs (for good reasons). If those startups no longer seek VC funding, will it trigger a renaissance in funding for other startup classes (e.g. semiconductors or hardware)?