waivej

I was chatting with my dad about this today. (He teaches classes that use graphing calculators.). It's cheap to buy a calculator emulator app so they must allow it soon. Though students sometimes use the camera and email to cheat.

Keep in mind that it's a 10-12% difference in mpg. It's like saying the 30mpg car is "inefficient" compared to the 33mpg one.

Had trouble in US (near Sandy damage) until I dumped my DNS cache and reopened browsers.

I am pleasantly surprised by how much I agree with this article and it applies to other technology like cars, tools, etc. A good corollary is a proficient user is well served by spares.

Ex: our router is acting up so I'll swap it with one sitting on a shelf. Or, it's easier to fix your computer or car if you have another one to download patches or give you a few days to get the job done.

One of these crawled out of our compost bucket through the foam filter and onto the ground. It took about three days and the slime trail would dry over time so it really moved. I was fascinated and a little unnerved by it. It looked intelligent yet able to separate and reform.

I saw a load of about 200-250 simultaneous visitors when one of my sites got posted from ycombinator to the reddit. After 12 hours it tapered off.

That is downright awesome! I love that it created a page for me right away so I didn't have to register.

That's a great article! I learned to really program on Turbo Pascal, and if I remember correctly, the small executable made it easier to store programs on the "program disk". Though by the time I built my own computer, it had dual floppies so it wasn't as big of a deal.

How about one for Photoshop users looking to switch?

I got into the science of brewing pretty seriously for a year and then stopped drinking entirely. It was a great experience.

I am with you on this one. Late summer until now has been particularly busy...to the level of increasing my blood pressure and making it tough to sleep.

Two things have made a difference so far. Identifying exactly what I am stressed about and doing my best to solve those problems and then let go until the following day. In part it helps to imagine that coming back rested IS the best thing I can do.

The second thing is dealing with a large number of small issues that have been over my head. In my life, these are things that I have "promised" but feel like I am failing on. I have just had to slog through and get clear of lots of them and weight seems to be lifting.

Also, a big change happened when I started waking up super early (ie: office by 7:00) and leaving in the early afternoon to do an hour of run/yoga/meditation. Perhaps it just works for me, but some of my stress was feeling like I was hurting my health.

Electric sports car

Absolutely, when I had my Fiat, I drove all year round and almost never with the top up. Winter is so much fun with sun and warm heater on your face. A thick hat and blanket keeps it cozy.

You reminded me of a developer complaining about the XML bloat in our product. He said "Do you know how much overhead XML adds to your page loads?". I responded "Yes, roughly 60ms on uncached page loads.". Later he proudly explained that he didn't know how to write html tables because he only uses CSS.

RPI is actually in Troy, but the distance is correct.

This is so cool, and I'm wondering if I can do something similar. It reminds me of "bug seeding" where you purposely insert bugs into your product and count how many are found through testing. (Of course, you track them so you can take them out later.)

Use a javascript function to poll the server for something.

It seems like an excellent project to work on.

Hybrids do well on gasoline because they have efficient undersized engines combined with light weight and excellent aerodynamics. This retrofit wouldn't change any of those things so I doubt it would have the claimed mpg benefit on a long drive. With a big battery pack, I could see it boosting MPG in city driving but it doesn't have gearing to use the motors at high speeds like highway driving. The big battery pack hurts city driving because you need to accelerate and decelerate that added mass.

It reminds me of similar retrofits that might be comparable and easier:

1) Replace the alternator (or AC) with a small 6-10hp motor. This is like a DIY version of the Honda IMA. I think GM was promoting something like this. You're limited by the power a belt can transmit, but it does go through the transmission and allows easy stop/start of the engine (ex: at a traffic light).

2) Remove the rear drive-shaft from a 4WD like a truck and attach a motor to the differential. This is also somewhat easy and a truck is better equipped for carrying batteries. There was a Jeep design that did this. Stay in "4wd" without applying power to the motor and it's like a front wheel drive. The downside is that the motor isn't geared so it's only good for one speed range (perhaps low end torque).

Unfortunately, both designs are just mild hybrids. To really go far enough with the motor you need lots of batteries. For example, the 80lb NiMH pack in my Insight can barely go a few miles. Regen makes sense but you lose a surprising amount of energy charging/discharging. I get the best gas mileage trying not to use the hybrid systems (even in city driving).

I would read about Buckminster Fuller. He had the same goal. For example, "Critical Path" is a good start.

Another book to consider is "How to Get Control of Your Time and Your Life" by Alan Lankin.

Invest time to understand yourself. This could be learning about Zen/Buddhism or just taking time out to journal, take walks, etc.

As a member of Hacker News, you might want to look for "worthwhile problems" to throw your energy at. Good problems need to be hard enough to be interesting and help enough people but still be attainable.

After learning several instruments, I am using this approach to learn piano:

-play 10+ minutes daily

-work through a book that interests me (boogie woogie)

-get the fingering right early - there are numbers in the book, hard to unlearn mistakes.

-use a metronome to find the weak areas and work until they are strong/fast/easy

-intentionally build muscle memory for arm/shoulder

-use uneven timing of notes to strengthen the weak spots

-play 30-40% by ear (ex: pandora, play along to each song.)

-occasionally play with a teacher to correct mistakes.

Try this for the video: http://vimeo.com/45485034

Me too. Though the author has a picture of coconuts on his "what I eat" page.

Summary: bad science led to low fat diet craze. Reduce carbohydrates instead.

Cool! That's how I spent the past 20 years...

Try to take classes, but just launch full speed into new goals. For example, to learn photography I bought a nice camera and darkroom and $1000 worth of film. To learn car repair, I bought a cheap Italian convertible and rebuilt it as a member of an online community (engine modifications, transmission swap, etc.)

You can speed up learning by setting daily structure, ex: Pick 7 things to work on each week (based on your weaknesses) and devote one per day of the week. Perhaps set month goals such as reading a book per month, competing in an event, etc. Set year goals, etc.

World study (travel, language study, history) Physique (martial art, endurance sport, yoga) Music (history, instrument, theory, singing, etc.) Art (photography, architecture, graphic design, painting, drawing, creativity, etc.) Mechanical (get a cool old car and learn to rebuild it, 4 wheeling, convertible, welding) Construction (improve a house, wood working, furniture, etc.) Acting (role in a play, improv, standup jokes) Psychology/Religion (explore meditation, church service, personal development.) Mathematics (history, chess, classic texts)

Business? Computer Engineering?

"Vast insights" was a joke because I caught my ego looking for a chance to prove how smart it is.

When I started meditating (10 years ago?), I wanted to make a wildly successful business to show how smart and precocious I was. Though things don't quite work that way, and even if I achieved big success, I don't think I would have understood my motivations. Now I want to create a productive creative life. It's the same goal, but focussed the opposite direction.

I read the original study and came away thinking that it was skewed strongly to errors that an OS could detect. For example, CPU errors were far worse than DRAM errors, and both were much worse than hard drive errors.

Regardless, in my life, "white box" computers have lived twice as long and undergone twice as many upgrades as any of the others. Eventually they got retired when they started crashing. Laptops might get extra ram or drive space but they got retired when they were too slow or too heavy. It doesn't mean the laptops were more reliable. It's like comparing a truck that drives 350,000 miles and a car that covers 120,000 miles. I'd say the truck was more reliable since it fulfilled its job three times as long.

I also kept old "white box" machines running much longer because the old 3-4Ghz Pentium-IVs were fast compared to the Core 2 Duo laptops that replaced them. Those machines kept running from the 500MB RAM days to the 4GB RAM/SSD days.

"Meditation For Dummies" is actually a good starting point.

I am not sure what you mean about a scientific point of view. Though, I come at it from a non-dogmatic point of view and am methodical about many things. I don't read scientific studies to tell me how to meditate. I mostly just meditate in the mornings before breakfast and read the occasional book on Buddhism/Zen/Etc.

For a simple start, I would buy a box of birthday candles and find something to hold them. They take 20 minutes to burn and are rewarding and attainable from the start. I use a scrap of wooden floor tile and cheap candles except dark blue ones that didn't work well. Melt the bottom of a candle and watch it burn to nothing. Don't leave it unattended. I sit cross legged on the floor but find something that works for you.

As the candle burns, count inhales from 1-10 without thinking about other things. This strengthens your ability to direct your thoughts. When you have had enough "exercise", turn inward and just ask "what am I feeling right now?". What's going on in your life and how do you feel about it? You can almost hear the vibrations in your breathing and heart beats and feel tension in your muscles. There may be things you don't admit to yourself normally. Over time, you being untangling these "balls of emotion" and find your understanding and honesty with yourself increases and maybe starts changing your approach to the world.

Anyway, Thich Nhat Hanh's "The Heart of Buddha's Teachings" is a tough but rewarding book. I also like reading Zen Koans daily from iPhone apps.

Interesting article. I approached it wanting to share the vast insights I've gained after meditating for years. Though I left with a new perspective. Thank you.

I remember Microsoft being called a "perception engine" by my boss around 1998.

-Sometimes books clutter lessons with too many words. I look for concise books that cover what I need. -It's like laptops...make it big enough to be useful but small enough to carry in your computer bag.

-Make examples as small and concise as possible. I hate paging through example code in a book. -Consider the book a complement to people working through code samples you provide on their computer. -Make a single place to download all of the examples easily.

-Build a good outline and refine it carefully. -Build a way to track your progress through the book. Ex: a jar of candies counted out for each chapter or milestone.

-Write with as much maturity and wisdom as you can muster as that will make an exceptional book. -Plan how to handle every distraction that will come up.

-Smile when you write.