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deepaksurtion Ask HN: Do you use feature flags? What's the best tool for the job?

Like me who didn’t know about feature flags it is described here. [1]

[1] https://www.martinfowler.com/articles/feature-toggles.html

deepaksurtion Ask HN: What does performance management look like at your company?

Sorry but what is SAFe? (No pun intended)

deepaksurtion Ask HN: Best Graphics libraries to build CAD solutions?

If open source suits you fine then I would recommend Blender. See [1] and [2] as examples of blender plugins for open foam based simulations.

With Blender you get advantages of open source, game engines and a fairly extensible 3d toolkit.

[1] https://github.com/dmsurti/reynolds-blender

[2] https://github.com/dmsurti/reynolds

Disclaimer. I am the author of [1] and [2].

deepaksurtion Ask HN: What’s best &lt$100 purchase that made your unexpected WFH-life better?

Can you please tell which? Thanks I too am planning to buy new pair.

deepaksurtion Tell HN: I just made my first sale

Awesome. Many of us underestimate but on HN also appreciate how much effort it takes to take to ship something, so keep going at it. Respect!

deepaksurtion What I learned from doing over 60 technical interviews in 30 days

Referrals are the best form of cover letter!

deepaksurtion Ask HN: What is the best enterprise software you use every day?

But emacs is an OS, no? :)

deepaksurtion Ask HN: Great programming language features, other languages should steal?

Common Lisp condition system

[1] https://www.cs.cmu.edu/Groups/AI/html/cltl/clm/node317.html

[2] http://gigamonkeys.com/book/beyond-exception-handling-condit...

deepaksurtion Understanding and writing a JPEG decoder in Python

And have more fun by doing the encoding/decoding on GPU [1]

[1] https://github.com/CESNET/GPUJPEG

deepaksurtion You've only added two lines – why did that take two days?

>> Not if you are on an H1B visa ;-)

But one must also 100% expect themselves to evaluate thoroughly T&C, pros and cons before signing up for anything, including a visa.

deepaksurtion Ex-Googler's startup comes out of stealth with simple, clever robot design

>> Personally, though, I would bet on dedicated, single-purpose robots, working together through wireless communication.

Robonix Philosophy at play here, inspired from Unix philosophy [1]

- Make each robot do one thing well

- Expect the output of every robot to become the input to another

- Design and build robots to be tried early, ideally within weeks

- Use robots in preference to unskilled help to lighten a chore task

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unix_philosophy#Origin

deepaksurtion Ask HN: How did you learn functional programming?

+10 for the chapter on recursion. It is not only a must read but probably the only thing one needs to read to understand Recursion.

I suspect Christopher Nolan read the chapter on recursion before writing Inception :-)

deepaksurtion Reintroducing Dip – My take on a programming language for beginners

This looks great.

It will be super useful for beginners if you integrate Dip in the browser in your Learning path tutorial. You already give that option in the Install options.

deepaksurtion Ask HN: How does one have the mindset to study for coding interviews?

The genius candidate is one with the quick answer but gives a slow answer :-)

deepaksurtion Ask HN: What’s the coolest thing you have built

A library (macOS, iOS) that converts the files supported by Assimp to Scene Kit scenes. [1]

[1] https://github.com/dmsurti/AssimpKit

deepaksurtion Ask HN: What tool does professional software engineers use to draw UML diagrams?

PlantUML [1] if you want to create diagrams with textual descriptions. I find that much easier to modify and maintain in the long run.

[1] https://plantuml.com/

deepaksurtion Apple WWDC Keynote

$500 And must be returned at the end of the program

From press release [1] >> The DTK, which must be returned to Apple at the end of the program ... Developers can apply to the program at developer.apple.com, and the total cost of the program is $500.

[1] https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2020/06/apple-announces-mac-t....

deepaksurtion Ask HN: When to claim you know a programming language?

From a practical standpoint, when you can write idiomatic code in the paradigm that the language supports.

And inversely, when you can confidently do code reviews and your comments are in the idiomatic zone.

deepaksurtion Ask HN: How do you set a goal and stay focused?

This is excellent advise and goes into the `Goals vs Systems` territory. A good sensible and enjoyable read for the same would be Chapter 5 'Goals vs Systems` from [1].

From personal experience, opting for the systems approach has helped me:

- Focus on multiple activities (max 4) with time bucketing and ensuring the time bucket has a task that can be done, like the actionable gym example above

- You are not worried about reaching the goal, instead you consistently put in the effort and don't feel the void when and if any goal is completed

- Systems help a ton in tackling complex or difficult subjects.

YMMV and mind you, earlier I was goal focussed and IMHO, got lesser done.

[1] https://www.amazon.com/How-Fail-Almost-Everything-Still-eboo...

edit: added the ref [1]

deepaksurtion Tell HN: Interviewed with Triplebyte? Your profile is about to become public

And you need to have logged in already for the delete to work, after which you get an email to approve the request which ends up with this notice of requiring government id as well. Govt Id, really, what are they thinking here?

```

We're processing your request and should be done within 30 days.

We will verify your request using the information associated with your account. Government identification may be required and we may ask you for more information in order to verify your identify.

```

Triplebyte has definitely been the worst experience I have ever had, in fact they are so bad, i would rate them below the other unprofessional recruiters we all come across!

deepaksurtion The Miracle Sudoku [video]

Using my CL based sudoku solver [1], I got the following solution. The solution is valid but different from what is shown in the video. IIRC, a sudoku board can have multiple solutions but anyone out here can explain why so? I am no sudoku expert or enjoying solving sudokus anyways!

[1] https://github.com/dmsurti/sudoku

```

(setf board

      #(0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

        0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

        0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

        0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

        0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0

        0 0 0 0 0 0 2 0 0

        0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

        0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

        0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0))

```

* (sudoku:print-board (sudoku:solve board))

1 2 5 | 6 4 7 | 8 9 3

8 3 4 | 5 9 1 | 6 7 2

9 7 6 | 3 2 8 | 4 5 1

- - - - - - - - - - -

5 8 9 | 2 3 4 | 1 6 7

2 6 1 | 7 8 9 | 3 4 5

3 4 7 | 1 5 6 | 2 8 9

- - - - - - - - - - -

4 9 2 | 8 1 5 | 7 3 6

6 1 8 | 9 7 3 | 5 2 4

7 5 3 | 4 6 2 | 9 1 8

```

edit: formatting

deepaksurtion Ask HN: I just started my first real workday, any tips?

"your job is not your job; your job is to find a better job."

Adams, Scott. How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big: Kind of the Story of My Life (p. 31).

deepaksurtion Ask HN: People who rejected a FAANG offer. Why?

Yes, the GP username is also a hint!

deepaksurtion Modern C++ gamedev: thoughts and misconceptions

> Not always, though. See every bug and exploit with C arrays ...

That can also be perceived as a a flaw of the language design in that it does not allow one to write dumb, safe and fast code. Which are such languages in existence today?

edit: fixed typos

deepaksurtion Coronavirus and Credibility

>> Instead they just continued to use their ordinary m.o.,

m.o. = modus operandi

deepaksurtion H5N1 (2013)

>> a virus that spreads extremely easily, has greater than 50% mortality, and has an incubation period of several weeks? ... without the world having time to prepare, could wipe out more than half the population in a matter of months.

I am not sure if Sam or anyone would have expected this to happen in the near future?

deepaksurtion After Considering $1B for Ventilators, White House Has Second Thoughts

Thanks for sharing this extension info, works for me as well.

deepaksurtion Getting started with bare-metal assembly

GBA = Game Boy Advanced

deepaksurtion What's your favorite technical book to read during this time of home quarantine?

The amazon link is not working. One that works. [1]

[1] https://www.amazon.com/Making-Atomic-Richard-Rhodes-1987-02-...

deepaksurtion New MacBook Air released, pricing now starts at $999, features Magic Keyboard

The MacMini has also been updated, from the MacBook Air newsroom article, at the bottom of the page:

``` Mac mini Also Updated Today

Whether they are using it as a desktop computer, a music and movie storage hub for the family, or as a code compile server for Xcode, customers love Mac mini. The standard configurations of Mac mini now come with double the storage capacity. The $799 configuration now comes standard with 256GB, while the $1,099 configuration features 512GB of storage, and every Mac mini is made from 100 percent recycled aluminum. ```