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settings11on Ask HN: What did you learn the hard way?

C Programming. Did it on the CLI while there were IDEs.

settings11on Ask HN: Would you reject a job offer on moral grounds?

Will never work for companies like oracle / microsoft. Post matters for companies like Google.

settings11on Ask HN: Are there any languages/compilers that optimize at this level?

OP asked "this level", by the way. It is hard to write macros for every such case.

However, OP may read about superoptimization, which is yet in research stage.

settings11on Good Overview of Modern Visual Application Builders?

NativeScript I haven't used it btw.

settings11on Ask HN: “If that was not open source, I would be screwed”

Obviously. There was a moment an online application form was broken. myself being CS student, inspected the source code and typed `javascript:fnEditApplication` in chrome URL bar, which worked out.

settings11on Ask HN: What are the best textbooks in your field of expertise?

For programming, "Data structures & programming techniques" -- pdf as lecture notes. But very comprehensive one.

For Linux / Unix things, APUE is standard one, and pretty nice.

Am not an expert though.

settings11on Ask HN: Anyone from Google here? The new Gmail UI is painful

I use old HTML UI btw.

settings11on Ask HN: Should big companies be commercializing open source?

Companies like Red Hat are doing it in very good way... They leave lot for the community that develops these software.

But Microsoft is obviously a cancer (It did not give anything really to FOSS ecosystem, just took from that), and Google is a double edged sword.

Google uses open source components which is highly advantageous for technical end users (Eg: I can run Linux utilities even on a non rooted Android). But their vendor lock in is second to none but Apple & MS.

settings11on Ask HN: Best reads about open source movement/philosophy?

"Free for all" is fabulous book...

settings11on Ask HN: What do you think about Safari Books Online?

Rather I have multiple sources;

I don't usually like to use such a service if there is an alternative which can be easily made offline as PDF, HTML or at best, EPUB. And better not require an account..

There are only few good ones on Wikibooks, still they are worth it... Eg: those on C Programming...

You can get some decent sources from university sites... I think I can learn things very quickly from lecture slides + bit of experimentation.

Since almost all things I want to learn are open source, there are always some great resources in form of documentation for me. I often like terse documentation rather than tutorials since it facilitates faster learning if you know how;

settings11on Ask HN: What buzzwords or expressions do you dislike the most?

Sometimes

private cloud

machine learning becomes a buzzword;

Well, even DevOps has become one...

settings11on Guidelines for Brutalist Web Design

White sans-serif with occasional monospace, against black background is the best option, with `<meta viewport="width=device-width">`

settings11on Ask HN: Who are some unsung heroes in open source that need more support?

Fabrice Bellard.. He is already popular a bit... But most don't know about him....

settings11on Ask HN: Medium.com alternative for developers?

Reddit is a social networking site... But is populated with good content...