matstc

SEEKING WORK — Remote or Luxembourg

I am a freelance web developer & generalist. Happy to work with Ruby/Rails/JavaScript/Python. I would also enjoy pairing on projects if you are a freelancer yourself.

Get in touch for a quick chat: matthieutc.com

I am experimenting with "reading minutes left" as a better indicator of progress on a page. This is similar to what medium.com is doing for their articles, but it could be extended to any web page.

The extension does not work everywhere, but it works on wikipedia and articles from theatlantic.com if you want to try it out.

What do you think? Is this useful to you?

I couldn't disagree with you more. People solving the problems have a choice. If they don't want to look it up, more power to them. Otherwise, leave the decision to the learner.

I always hated it when teachers would hold on to the solutions to the exercises in the textbook.

I agree with you although I wonder what happens in the case of repeated purchases. Wouldn't the store with lower prices and lower profits on these warranties attract more buyers? Or what if it's Christmas time and I'm buying a gift, I would consider the extended warranty much more rationally.

I would expect the market for extended warranties to be competitive. At least as competitive as the market for the product the warranty is slapped on. How can stores make so much profits on warranties but so little on the associated products?

Pairing has helped me and my code a lot but as with most things there is a learning curve. Only an atrocious pair would say something like "Oh... yes, that function... I already thought of that, and here's why it can't work.". When pairing, thinking is talking. If the one not typing at the moment is allowed to get bored, then the pairing is not done correctly.

Also, in my experience, two developers working as a pair will have better work ethics and discipline than any of the two taken separately.

BTW, you're calling the one not typing the 'passive' one? That's the wrong attitude.

More on global warming ranking low: http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/bjorn_lomborg_sets_global_...

Hacker News is among the 5000 most popular sites!

I'm also curious about why companies might want to opt out of the news aggregator.

Although I'm wondering why companies even have a say in it. Isn't the aggregation involved fair use? If I start my own news aggregator do I have to ask publishing companies permission? I feel like I should be able to just aggregate them whether they like it or not.

Except you can press [esc, .] multiple times.

Sorry if this is misleading. I read the article on paper and that was the pull-quote. I decided to use it because the real title 'The upside of a downturn' was not descriptive enough to me.

I strongly disagree with your point #1.

I understand you want to emphasize business value and short-term returns but barring refactoring is taking it too far. Smart refactoring will pay off immediately by giving you faster turnaround for new features. And fast turnaround is a startup's edge.

I don't refactor for refactoring's sake but I do refactor every time I would benefit right away from the change. It also makes programming more interesting. Once lousy code is refactored, I can go back to solving the right problems and stop fighting with it.

> The act of automatically renaming classes or variables, along with all the other code-shoveling refactoring support that IDEs provide is a miniscule subset of what refactoring is really about.

I've heard this argument many times and I can't quite understand it. Even if the few supported operations like rename/pull up/inline/extract are only a subset of all possible refactorings, I still do these things multiple times an hour. I want them to be automated. I hate bloated IDEs just as much as the next guy, but I do miss automated refactorings when in vim or emacs.

Cheekily, I would add:

* Structure your argument to fit the topic. There is very little chance that there are exactly 10 reasons for doing anything.

I thought it was interesting, though most of the answers we already knew. Maybe they should poll for questions beforehand so they would get better ones. Maybe a 5 minute editorial-style spiel at the beginning would help make the Q&A more active.

Good marketing event for sure.

I think I agree with you: as benevolent programmers, we should pick the best tool for the job, without consideration for the platform, or the libraries. This would advance the art of software faster in the long run. Unfortunately, we are forced to make decisions based on the ecosystem of our tools, because of short-term constraints.

> The end result is that the syntax and implementation compromises of your language don't really matter much.

Hm. To me that's pretty much all that matters. I want powerful features and a nice syntax.

> Python doesn't have lexical closures like Perl's

What does that mean? Doesn't Python have lexical closures?

I think you mean HN.

And I am not submitting for the sake of submitting. I read the author's book on macroeconomics and got the link through his blog: this is not a random post. I also thought an article that sums up consensus among economists is relevant to a community of entrepreneurs.

When I was learning complex numbers, the teacher didn't want us to assume sqrt(-1) = i, we had to go like this:

sqrt(-1) = sqrt(e^Pi) = e^(Pi/2) = i

So the new concept was really a 2D plane for numbers, not a new definition for sqrt of negative integers.

> I'm shocked that this doesn't contain keyboard macro recording.

Yes. And maps (e.g. :map <F12> :w<cr> to save with F12). And block mode (Ctrl-V) and text objects (e.g. ci" deletes the inside of parentheses and goes to insert mode) and a slew of others.

I find the idea that there are 100 vim commands every programmer should know a but ludicrous though.

I think you mean "2 + 2 + 2 instead of 0 + 1 + 2"

There's nothing wrong in promoting a social or political agenda either. We are software specialists and we should educate other citizens, including our clients, about the virtues of good software and the right tools to build it. This is no different from any other field. I though the post made Ted look like a pushover.

Let me add two more:

<Alt> <.> brings out the last argument of the last command, and can be pressed multiple times.

<Alt> </> prints the contents of the cwd, or the directory from the path you're typing.

I agree with you but I wouldn't be so stark. My email address book is still the one thing that I maintain and keep up to date. As social networks come and go, that address book remains current. That's why a lot of social networks will offer to import my contacts when I sign up to a new service. Email is the reference and is constantly being leveraged.

Also, as the article says, the initial impetus of connecting with friends of friends and old acquaintances from high school quickly wears off. Once that fun is gone, what is left is a broken and boring network that might not be so valuable to a business.

I agree with you that a battle system could be more addictive. I'm just not sure how that would work with something like movies or artists, where the user already has an opinion on the two options, which might not be that comparable (eg a comedy vs. a drama). For puppies, kittens, or people, it's always possible to make up an opinion on the spot.

Whatever openDNS is doing, it doesn't make Google and Dell right. Users should not have to live with built-in advertisement in their laptop. I don't think it matters how easy it is to uninstall, it's still wrong. I would even get rid of logos on monitors and lids: this is a computer, not a t-shirt.

I'm surprised no one mentioned SICP.

I would also add:

  - The Little Schemer
  - Linux in a Nutshell 
  - Unix power tools

No. Looks like a startup from Seattle:

http://www.picnik.com/app#/home/aboutus

This website has the prettiest interface I've ever used online.

The IAB report with a nice graphic: http://www.iab.net/about_the_iab/recent_press_releases/press...