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CoreDumpling | 14 years ago | on: HTML5 Map of the the World Migrations using SVG, Raphael.js and offline storage

It's understandable that several places don't have data (NaN), but I found it curious that Burma/Myanmar is missing from the map [1], much like the "Poland Sea" in a Microsoft Date/Time screen from yesteryear [2].

Did you create this map data or get it from somewhere else? Is this some kind of joke?

[1] http://i.imgur.com/m8Wce.png

[2] https://blogs.msdn.com/b/oldnewthing/archive/2006/10/27/8804...

CoreDumpling | 14 years ago | on: The Best Science Fiction Books (According to Reddit)

I was actually surprised that A Deepness in the Sky didn't make it to the list when A Fire Upon the Deep did. Deepness had a lot of themes that satisfy hacker tastes (not just in terms of the technology but also the socio-political ramifications of it).

I had first heard of it when DanielBMarkham highly praised it (http://www.hn-books.com/Books/A-Deepness-In-The-Sky.htm, HN discussion here at http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2170579) and it's definitely one of the best sci-fi books I've read in years.

CoreDumpling | 15 years ago | on: Aldous Huxley: The Most Beautiful Death

It was a cruel twist of fate to claim the life of a visionary such as Huxley on the same day as JFK and C.S. Lewis. Much like Sergei Prokofiev, who had the misfortune of passing on the same day as Stalin, this event flew completely under the radar.

It's comforting to hear the back story to this, of the strength of the bond between Aldous and Laura. In a world that was steadily moving toward the dystopia he feared in Brave New World, at last he found the courage to face death and go peacefully.

What a pity his message is now so misunderstood (cf. http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1919530)!

CoreDumpling | 15 years ago | on: The Shadow Scholar

While the deficient student will generally not know how to ask for what he wants until he doesn't get it, the lazy rich student will know exactly what he wants. He is poised for a life of paying others and telling them what to do. Indeed, he is acquiring all the skills he needs to stay on top.

What's scary is how far the lazy rich kid will be able to go with this, with a promising career in management. I wouldn't want to work for someone like this, but it is easy to imagine him being very effective. (For all I know I could have worked under one of these before, and not even hated it.)

CoreDumpling | 15 years ago | on: I'm Tired of Creating Your Content

On the other hand, the value of the reviews on these sites goes down the older they get.

On Amazon it seems like the opposite is true. Because of their meta-review process, where users can flag reviews as helpful or not, it seems like old and classic reviews tend to float to the top, while recent ones have a significant hurdle to overcome before they make it to the front page. See for example here: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0262011530

(Admittedly, users can also be fickle and support other kinds of reviews for different reasons, cf. http://www.amazon.com/Tuscan-Whole-Milk-Gallon-128/dp/B00032...)

CoreDumpling | 15 years ago | on: Are Canadian Universities 'Too Asian'?

I think I share a similar sentiment. I was born in mainland China but moved to the US at an early age, and I'm a fluent Chinese speaker. But I found that I fit well with neither the Chinese student associations (mostly recent immigrants) nor the Chinese-American student associations (mostly ABCs, American-born Chinese).

Ultimately I rejected the groups that were based on ethnicity and instead participated in ones centered around an activity. Whether it was programming, board games, or quiz bowl, there was always a healthy multicultural mix of people. A shared heritage provides some basic level of camaraderie, which tends to be very consistent and reliable, but common interests certainly are better at holding one's attention.

CoreDumpling | 15 years ago | on: The 3 Programming Languages you need to Know

I strongly suspect that these three are not intended to be mutually exclusive.

For me, Python has at some point or another been in each category, though at most two simultaneously.

And for those of us who do web development, "bread and butter" can easily include a half dozen languages or more. After leaving a project where I personally (no joke) used AS3, Awk, C, C++, C#, Java, JavaScript, Perl, PHP, Python, and SQL (sqlite, MySQL, and Postgres!) [1], my current position is just a trivially "polyglot" mix of C++ and Java desktop apps. Before that, I was constantly afraid that I'd forever be doomed to be a jack of all trades, master of none, but now the majority of my time is gobbled up by languages I don't like very much. Can't have it both ways...

[1] mostly by accident, as the powers that be could never make up their minds about what they actually wanted

CoreDumpling | 15 years ago | on: Latest TIOBE index - Python overtakes VB for the first time ever

I've always been somewhat skeptical of TIOBE numbers, but this time I'm utterly confused. VB is listed as "(Visual) Basic" and under the "Very Long Term History" chart it is ranked #4 in 1985. Is this referring to plain old BASIC?

Additionally, there's another entry further down for VB.NET at 0.323% -- if it is added to the VB percentage, it would bump it above Python and C#.

CoreDumpling | 15 years ago | on: Exercise More to Hack Better

My problem with deliberate exercise is that it doesn't feel purposeful (vague notions of improved health notwithstanding). Picking up a chunk of iron just to put it back down again or stomping on a moving platform just to remain in the same place feels about as useful as typing out a bunch of boilerplate code just to delete it shortly afterwards. I might change this attitude should I find more interesting activities.

Instead, I choose to integrate exercise into my lifestyle rather than go out of my way to do it. Serious gym rats will scoff at me, but it's far more satisfying to carry a 10-kg watermelon home from the supermarket 3 km away.

It's also a lot easier when the exercise is compulsory. Twice a day I pass through 1.5 km of hilly terrain to reach my bus stop, and the panoramic view of the city along the way is certainly a nice bonus.

CoreDumpling | 15 years ago | on: Ask HN: Palantir or Facebook?

My dream is to one day create my own startup (possibly right out of college)

Be careful with who you say this to. Although this probably won't be a problem with an internship, an employer may be reluctant to consider someone who demonstrates a lack of commitment.

I was told of a student who said to one of his interviewers at Electronic Arts that he "wanted to be the next Jenova Chen." (Jenova Chen left EA to found thatgamecompany.) Needless to say, the interviewer was not amused.

CoreDumpling | 15 years ago | on: The Great Unwashed

In fact, Ms. Palmer, the chief executive of Osea, an organic skin-care line, often travels to meet business contacts at the five-star luxury hotels where her line is sold. They might be surprised to read that Ms. Palmer, a petite, put-together brunette, showers “no more than three times a week,” she said, and less if she hasn’t been “working out vigorously.”

She contends that a soapy washcloth under her arms, between her legs and under her feet is all she needs to get “really clean.” On the go, underarm odor is wiped away with a sliced lemon.

Some of us ought to note that it's not necessary to be the model customer in order to build a successful business.

Personally, I'd have a hard time getting over the cognitive dissonance, though.

CoreDumpling | 15 years ago | on: Is Mark Twain's 100-year-old+ autobiography covered by copyright?

It might also be worth noting that works published prior to 1923 are in the public domain only in the United States. In Europe, the "life + 70" rule makes no such exemption.

Given this situation, the famous Prelude in C♯ minor by Sergei Rachmaninoff (1873-1943) dates from 1892 and technically is still copyrighted in Europe until 2013. At the same time, there is a public domain recording made in 1919 (by the composer himself!) that is available on Wikipedia, where it is presumably legitimate under US copyright law [1].

Meanwhile, various machinations by parties without the best of intentions, coupled with a special case in French law to extend copyright because of the world wars, make it such that Boléro (1928) by Maurice Ravel (1875-1937) still won't enter the public domain until 2015, with royalties sucked up by a "management agency" while the composer's own home falls into disrepair [2].

On the other hand, it looks like Ottorino Respighi's Ancient Airs and Dances No. 3 (1932) would be public domain in Europe while not in the US because of the automatic copyright.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Sergei_Rachmaninoff_perfor...

[2] http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2001/apr/25/arts.highere...

EDIT: Argh, it took me a half dozen tries to get the first URL right. Apostrophes seem to get dropped from URLs HN comments, rather than encoded with %27.

CoreDumpling | 15 years ago | on: Greetings from Santa Kurara, Kariforunia

Neat experiment, but it looks like they have a way to go. In order for this to be really effective, they will need to identify what needs to be transliterated within the context, and do a combination of transliteration and translation.

For instance, the first image has the Filyovsky Park metro station (Филёвский парк -- not too hard for you to recognize if you know a few Greek letters). Transliterated into Chinese, it became 菲列夫斯基帕尔克 -- "fei-lie-fu-si-ji-pa-er-ke" (apparently they transliterated the word "park").

It'll be interesting to see what happens when the Google Translate team starts to work with this.

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