Hacker News Reader

ColinCochraneon CRTC considering banning Fox News from Canadian cable packages

"Considering" might be a bit strong. All that's really happening is the CRTC is opening a public consultation in response to a formal complaint. A cursory look at the CRTC's website shows quite a few public proceedings that are open to comment [0], including the one from the featured article.

I'm inclined to believe this is an example of the system working as intended. A complaint was filed and now the public has their opportunity to voice their opinions in response.

[0] https://applications.crtc.gc.ca/instances-proceedings/Defaul...

ColinCochraneon Giving the finger is a ‘God-given right’, Canadian judge rules

That was a very entertaining read. Pulling no punches in the conclusion:

> 'In the modern-day vernacular, people often refer to a criminal case “being thrown out”. Obviously, this is little more than a figurative expression. Cases aren’t actually thrown out, in the literal or physical sense. Nevertheless, in the specific circumstances of this case, the Court is inclined to actually take the file and throw it out the window, which is the only way to adequately express my bewilderment with the fact that Mr. Epstein was subjected to an arrest and a fulsome criminal prosecution. Alas, the courtrooms of the Montreal courthouse do not have windows.'

ColinCochraneon Go makes it easier to write correct, clear and efficient code

Code formatting is difficult to read on mobile because the text doesn't wrap properly. You end up having to scroll horizontally to read it all.

ColinCochraneon Let me introduce: __slots__

I ran a performance audit from the Chrome dev tools:

  First meaningful paint: 8,820 ms
  First Interactive : 11,420 ms

Those are brutal numbers for just about anything, let alone a simple blog post.

ColinCochraneon New York eyes a 'breathlyzer' for texting while driving

It seems like there are a couple big issues with this.

1) What if your passenger was using your phone?

2) What if you using voice-commands to send a text (especially if via CarPlay, etc...)?

ColinCochraneon Running a business with boobs: the things I never say (NSFW)

Here’s an example: while interviewing a man for a comptroller position, he asked me if I was familiar with financial statements, like a balance sheet. This person knew I had been an entrepreneur for years. When I simply replied yes, because I found the question so mystifying, I was met with laughter and a five minute lecture on why balance sheets matter. A lecture that would have been more fitting for a high school level finance class than an interview with a CEO who carved out a precious 30 minute slot to speak with a candidate.

That is brutal. I don't understand how someone could be so tone-deaf, especially in a job interview.

ColinCochraneon Did Pixar accidentally delete Toy Story 2 during production? (2012)

This is true, but I think the point the parent comment was getting at is that an investigation tends to take a more holistic look at the incident rather than simply assigning blame directly to a single factor. Even pilot error, especially in the context of commercial aviation, is often found to be the result of training deficiencies or cultural issues on the part of the airline.

ColinCochraneon The Fallacy of Chesterton’s Fence (2014)

I'm not sure why the article refers to Chesterton's fence as a fallacy when it basically agrees with the principle that you shouldn't blindly push reforms without understanding the reasoning behind the existing state of things.

That's not to say I disagree with the content of the article. I think it presents a good approach to promoting improvements to processes, the key takeaways being:

1) Observe the process and try to understand all aspects of it (not just that which affects you).

2) If you still feel that it can be improved, come up with a plan to improve and implement the process in a limited scope over which you have control.

3) If successful, break down why it was successful, and evaluate whether it is suitable to be expanded to the general case.

4) Find the owner of the existing process to discuss it with them, and present your proposed improvements.

I think there's an argument to be made that you should talk to the owner of the process before you start coming up with improvements, which could save some time on understanding it. But I suppose that depends on the situation.

ColinCochraneon Ask HN: What are examples of open source projects with excellent tests?

SQLite is one of the best examples I can think of.

https://www.sqlite.org/testing.html

ColinCochraneon Don’t let your anger persist

To be fair, the article is up front about that.

But that's the point of this whole post: If you can't justify being nice for the sake of others, at least be nice for the sake of yourself.

ColinCochraneon A Model Railway Journey

In 2013, the Wunderland donated one square meter to each of the six major political parties in Germany, asking them to envision what the nation would look like if their party were in power. Top politicians and their advisors visited the Wunderland to participate in this special “Utopia” exhibition. They fretted for weeks over the small details, which each took on the symbolic importance of a plank in a political platform. They had to decide what to include, what to emphasize, and which scenarios would convey their policies most precisely; essentially, what kind of world they wanted to imagine into existence.

I really like that idea. It's almost like an elevator pitch for each party's platform.

ColinCochraneon What’s really going on in PTSD brains?

Doesn't directly corroborate the story, but does back up that they worked together.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/09/us/09manning.html

https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/magazine/who-is-wik...

ColinCochraneon Zuckerberg and Chan aim to tackle all disease by 2100

Beware to anyone who follows that link directly (jwz isn't a big fan of HN referrals, for those who don't know).

ColinCochraneon Why Do Some Sports Vanish and Some Sports Survive?

MLS has been doing rather well. Attendance has been increasing steadily for the past decade[1].

The NHL, while certainly not as popular as the NFL or MLB, is pretty consistent as far as attendance numbers go, comparable to the NBA [2]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Major_League_Soccer_attendance...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Major_League_Soccer_attendance...

ColinCochraneon How to Keep a Journal

You can encrypt org files pretty easily. http://orgmode.org/worg/org-tutorials/encrypting-files.html

ColinCochraneon My Venezuela Nightmare: A 30-Day Hunt for Food in a Starving Land

One of the captions says:

Store shelves that are well-stocked, like those in this bakery near Zerpa’s house, are typically full of non-essential items set at sky-high prices

ColinCochraneon Ask HN: How should the CLI be designed today?

Select-String is the PowerShell equivalent of grep. https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh849903.aspx

ColinCochraneon Ask HN: What non-technical skills make a senior dev and how to develop them?

I've found that https://www.amazon.com/Software-Estimation-Demystifying-Deve... is a fantastic resource for improving estimation.

ColinCochraneon Argentine government favors farmers in dispute with Monsanto

For what it's worth.

Monsanto have now agreed to provide royalty-free licenses for its technologies to help fast-track the further development and distribution of the rice.

Source: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2560613/pdf/1110...

ColinCochraneon A Visionary Project Aims for Alpha Centauri, a Star 4.37 Light-Years Away

This is quite an interesting proposal, although there are some major technological challenges to address:

To achieve that energy would require an array about a mile across combining thousands of lasers firing in perfect unison.

ColinCochraneon Frinkiac: Simpsons quote search engine

Great work! Tried out some of my favourites and it worked like a charm.

https://frinkiac.com/?p=search&q=that%27s+a+paddlin

https://frinkiac.com/?p=search&q=thrillho

https://frinkiac.com/?p=search&q=now+where%27s+me+toothpick

ColinCochraneon Do drivers who keep gaps in stop-and-go traffic worsen it? (2012)

Here's some evidence that creating those wide gaps does help.

http://www.slate.com/articles/life/transport/2011/10/rolling...

ColinCochraneon NASA Memo: Thoughts on the Space Alien Race Question (1963)

There likely is nothing to be done at the moment to prepare for these possibilities (the only body of writing on the subject available in an emergency is science fiction), because no one of consequence is going to take this rubbish seriously unless it happens. At that point, our policy will be determined in the traditional manner of grand panic.

An entertaining conclusion.

ColinCochraneon Amazon Spars With The Times Over Investigative Article

Not that I necessarily disagree, but how did you arrive at $3 million per year?

ColinCochraneon Peeple sites 'disappear' from web after backlash over app

Also see http://www.ourladyofperpetualexemption.com/

ColinCochraneon How Google's new Logo is just 305 bytes

It's quite interesting to see how the new logo can be deconstructed to simple shapes.

That said, shouldn't the link be directly to the article instead of through a URL shortener?

ColinCochraneon Why we're all-in on virtual reality

Augmented reality, I assume.

ColinCochraneon CVS Health Quits U.S. Chamber Over Stance on Smoking

Agreed. It's like wearing shoes that are too small so you can have the "pleasure" of taking them off.

ColinCochraneon The strange expertise of burglars

There were a couple of useful points in there.

Instead, Nee says one trick could be to find something unexpected that doesn’t fit the usual script of a crime, breaking the burglar out of the automatic, below-conscious processing. “That’s likely to make them abandon the crime,” Nee suggests. Playing a recording of someone’s footsteps, or even something as simple as gentle white noise, might be distracting enough to perturb the burglar. Equally, you could lay out your house in a distinct way – anything that confuses their automatic mental maps. “The thing is, you have to be innovative over time because burglars will get used to whatever you do,” she says.

and

For the time being, there are some easy measures that we could all take. Besides the obvious (remembering to close windows and lock doors) Nee thinks one of the best strategies is to pretend that someone is always in the house; almost all the burglars she has interviewed report that they will do anything to avoid a face-to-face encounter

ColinCochraneon Why Does the International Space Station Have That Shape?

I had the same issue with the flat-screens on a 777-300ER. It was especially annoying because my wife and I were flying with our two young children and it kept waking them up.