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eliminating cable TV - how should I set up my media center?
spkthed: My favorite choice is probably MythTV + Boxee for a nicer front-end/social media application. The Mac stuff is nice, but you're locked into a single hardware piece. MythTV + Boxee let you add/modify your hardware as you see fit, select the OS and all that.
eliminating cable TV - how should I set up my media center?
cmars232: SABnzbd runs on just about anything, it's great.
How do you search for CS results online?
eugenejen: ACM has almost all their journals/conferences digitized already.IEEE has most stuffs since 1991 on line in computer society. I am not familiar with the giant IEEE database.SIAM has all stuffs on line. SIAM put new one in journal format. They put old SIAM journals in digitial library.AAAI has put all their st...
How do you search for CS results online?
mahmud: Don't feed the bastards; IEEE and ACM shall never see a dime from me.Instead of paying them $200, pay ~$100 to your local big university library, and get all the books, papers, and other research materials you can handle. I am a member of George Mason University's library (go Patriots!) and I paid $150 because ...
Startup founders, would you walk us through a day in the life?
sachinag: Work, social life, sleep: choose two.Every day is different if you're the "business guy"; if you're the "tech guy," the mechanics are the same, but the problems are different. How different are they? Depends on how good you are - the faster you deploy, the sooner you get to tackle new problems. The better ...
Startup founders, would you walk us through a day in the life?
dennmart: The book "Founders At Work" is a pretty good read, if you're interested in these questions.http://www.foundersatwork.com/
Startup founders, would you walk us through a day in the life?
amitt: We had 4 engineer founders, 1 of which volunteered to handle most of the marketing/legal/biz stuff to allow the other 3 of us to code without distraction.Some background, the 4 of us lived in a house together and took turns cooking meals to reduce expenditure/downtime from eating out all the time. So commute t...
Startup founders, would you walk us through a day in the life?
SwellJoe: I wake around the crack of noon each day. (This moves around, actually. Sometimes I'm waking at 9-ish, every day, while other times it's later than noon. Right now it is about 11:30.)I stumble into the kitchen and put on the kettle. Dump a cup of food into the dogs bowl. Dump some cereal into my bowl or ...
Startup founders, would you walk us through a day in the life?
dbul: It really depends on what stage you are in.In the beginning we drew up diagrams for database tables, wrote out what made us different from competitors, why people would like us, wrote a version of the site, then scrapped all of it and rewrote everything multiple times over in several months. At this point it was ...
Why would a company with stellar employees pay salaries?
RiderOfGiraffes: How do you measure the achievement of a groups of employees, some of whom have worked on more than one project?Why should they trust you to pay them appropriately from the profits?How do you entice employees to work on less glamorous projects?How do you entice programmers to work on risky projects that...
Why would a company with stellar employees pay salaries?
aristus: Risk has to be proportionate to authority and reward. Responsibility without authority is a recipe for disaster -- any overworked assistant or salesperson can tell you that.So... the greater the risk you ask other people to take, the more reward and authority you must give them. At the extreme you are talking ...
Why would a company with stellar employees pay salaries?
ram1024: anyone really good at doing something will be able to find much better terms to work in other than "we'll pay you what we think you're worth" which carries the negative connotation every time you receive a paycheck that "i'm only worth this much to the company"no one would stay very long unless they are consis...
Why would a company with stellar employees pay salaries?
stonemetal: If I am shouldering 100% of the Risk and getting 100% of the rewards then I am not an employee I am a business owner.If I am shouldering 100% of the Risk and getting less than 100% of the reward then I am a business owner who has been conned out of my fair share.Also what sort of portion does the receptioni...
How do you search for CS results online?
neilc: At the times in the past when I haven't had institutional access, it has only rarely been a problem: the vast majority of the papers I want to read are freely-available online (CiteSeer, Google Scholar, DBLP, etc.). For the rare occasions when I couldn't find a free copy of a paper, I would just ask a friend of ...
Startup founders, would you walk us through a day in the life?
ig0rskee: Get up between 6 and 7am, check email and go for a work out or a long walk while the city is still sleeping. By 8 am figure out what absolutely must be done today by me and what should the team be doing (I am the "businessy" guy). Work until 7PM, take "re-charge break" until 9PM, work until midnight, go to sl...
Startup founders, would you walk us through a day in the life?
pclark: Fun topic.I wake about 0730. That's 3 hours before I used to awaken (before I was co-founder) so I make coffee and whilst it brews grab a shower. After shower, it's coffee/email/Twitter and kiss girlfriend goodbye.I get to work for 0820 (cycle) and by the time I'm sat in my chair with coffee I've worked out wha...
Where do I go from here?
dennykmiu: I was fifteen when I came to this country. I didn't speak English. I eventually graduated from high school but since at the time, Chinese was not taught in school, it was not considered a foreign language and therefore could not be used to satisfy the language requirement for getting into University.Instea...
Where do I go from here?
stonemetal: Last time I checked Georgia Tech wasn't a no name state school, and depending on your CC gpa you could very well transfer(Transfer requirements are usually a lot lower than initial entry requirements.) Second, there is intro to engineering, basic engineering classes that don't have the high math reqs you a...
Startup founders, would you walk us through a day in the life?
quizbiz: I would be interested to hear about what gets everyone in a productive mode.
Where do I go from here?
menloparkbum: What you should really do is make a complete system and put it out there for people to use. A web service, an iPhone application, a desktop application, whatever. There are no educational prerequisites which prevent you from doing this. This will give you something to put on a resume, experience getting s...
Where do I go from here?
rms: >Besides that, will it even do me that much good to have a degree from an unknown state university?It won't make you a successful startup founder, but it will give you a ticket to employment as a member of the professional class. That's enough for a lot of people.What state are you in? Why not go to the flagship s...
Where do I go from here?
mwerty: > when I'll have to fill up an entire semester with just a Trig class, so I can fill up another semester with just Calc 1 so I can get to Calc 2A lot of people 'place out' of these using AP exams - you can take them even now. This should help you move faster.
Where do I go from here?
mynameishere: I am failing to see the problem.No seriously guys. Here's the problem:20 years old. Doesn't know what to do. Options are college or work. And how is this "problem" anything other than universal? And how is the advice anything other than banal? Go to college. Keep working. Whatever.
Where do I go from here?
quizbiz: Good luck in college. Work hard to transfer into Georgia Tech. I'm not a Math person by any means of the imagination so after visiting and trying to convince myself that I would do well at the liberal arts at Georgia Tech, I decided to go to Emory (starting august)But enough about me.It's all about a simple id...
Where do I go from here?
iigs: Hello. A lot of your early years sound very similar to mine: Liked computers, grew up in a place where nobody knew/cared about them, was smart but never worked very hard, got by in school but never excelled. I lucked out and knew a professor that knew someone and when I dropped out of college I left for industry ...
Startup founders, would you walk us through a day in the life?
justinchen: 7 wakeup8 breakfast while going through google reader, email, twitter10 work time12 lunch (away from computer)1 work time, intermittent google reader and HN breaks when my mind wanders or I'm waiting for something to process5/6 try to workout7 dinner8-10 wind down by watching tv, emailing, and workingWork t...
Where do I go from here?
tsally: Get yourself into Georgia Tech, which has an excellent (read: world class) CS department. If you don't have residency in Georgia, get it before you apply. You need a job, a drivers licenses, and a residence for X amount of time. Check the local laws. Figure out which of your courses transfer. Figure out ho...
Startup founders, would you walk us through a day in the life?
scumola: 7:30am Wake up because ideas are running through my head8:00am Kids jump in bed with me and I get out to take a shower9:00am Leave the house - eat breakfast in the car9:30am Arrive at work9:30am - 5:00pm Work, interspersed with remotely working on my project depending on how much 'work' work there is to do.5:0...
Where do I go from here?
TomOfTTB: I hate to be the cynic here but I think you need to really change your attitude if you want to succeed in life. To me your post seems to be "I sort of like computers and my life isn’t working out the way I want so I now want to pursue computers because it looks like my best chance out of the life I’m living...
Where do I go from here?
matthewcford: > I've been working my way through SICP and I've recently learned the basics of Python, but I don't know if I can learn everything I need to know through self-studyThe majority of what you need to know in order to run a startup isn't taught at collage/uni, it's self-taught or learnt through experience
Startup founders, would you walk us through a day in the life?
tsally: I'm attempting to bootstrap something right now, and here's what I've done so far. Note that I'm on summer break from University. I'm working a job to try and fund myself.5:30AM Wake up, shower, eat breakfast, make coffee6:30AM Catch the bus to work4:00PM Finish work4:07PM Catch bus home5:00PM Get home, make ...
Where do I go from here?
charlesju: Here is what it comes down to. School is a security blanket, as is pretty much everything else society tells you that you "need" to do before doing a startup (VCs, corporate experience, etc.).This is what you need to be able to do to succeed.Hustle.Hustle your brains out and figure out what you want to build...
Where do I go from here?
telegraph: I don't have too much big picture advice given that I'm roughly your age and also somewhat disoriented, but with regards to learning your math: most if not all schools will allow you to take a math placement test to determine where you need to begin in the curriculum. I completely agree with you that taking ...
Which books and open source projects make up the programming "canon"?
albertsun: Programming is too young of a field to have a "canon". And I think any field that does have one that people really care about is probably a bit ossified and dead.
Where do I go from here?
zaidf: Can't you take SAT II and place out of calc 1?I have a hunch that you will be in a lot better position when you join uni and graduate than a lot of my friends who recently graduated and then had the "NOW WHAT?" moment. You are having that moment right now, which is good.Knowing that you like math is a great star...
Where do I go from here?
Elepsis: I graduated from Georgia Tech's CS program in December, so I can hopefully give you a few useful pointers.First of all, while GT is definitely your top (and really only) choice in the state for any of those three departments, you don't necessarily have to start out there. Look up Southern Polytechnic State Uni...
Startup founders, would you walk us through a day in the life?
andrewljohnson: I get up in the late morning, read the news for a few minutes, drink coffee, and start coding. Sometimes I have breakfast, which can be cereal, bacon and eggs, or chicken wings cooked on the grill.I work on the code all day long, except when I'm talking to my co-founders, board, or sales prospects. I al...
Which books and open source projects make up the programming "canon"?
SwellJoe: K&R, SICP, TAoCP. Those aren't debatable.Stevens is possibly only really necessary for UNIX systems developers these days, but I see enough people with fundamental misunderstandings about protocols and networking and memory management and processes, etc. that maybe they should also be considered mandatory. ...
Which books and open source projects make up the programming "canon"?
kailoa: SICP comes to mind... Knuth's TAOCP also.
Where do I go from here?
flatline: Heh, I'm 33 and actually in a similar spot in some ways. I hated school, was sick to death of it, went to college because it was just sort of the thing to do. I was interested in math and science but the classes were hard and I realized I just didn't have the drive at that point to compete. I ended up majo...
Where do I go from here?
apsurd: Hey, just get it done.I understand you are 20, and you still have a lot of sorting out to do, but you know what the answer is?There is no answer; just get it done. There's no real need to write out this essay about why this, how that... its nonsense, either you want to do something and you start trying to do it...
Where do I go from here?
lsc: "Credentialism, like it or not, is still a huge factor when you have no work experience."Uh, yeah. that's what your parents always say. I can't tell you how many people told me I'd be working at gas stations if I didn't get good grades and go to college. By 20, my wages were competitive with my parents.If yo...
Where do I go from here?
abalashov: Cherokee County, eh. We should touch base; I'm in Fulton/Midtown.
Where do I go from here?
eugenejen: In old days, there is another path: To join military. It will shape the view of a person definitely. After services and you can go to school with better financial support and stronger will to achieve things, if you are lucky to get out the service without trauma.But it seems joining military is not really go...
Where do I go from here?
wenbert: I am in my mid-20's. I still have a long way to go and I have lots of plans for the future. The thing I have learned so far is that we should all be responsible for everything we do. Be it your job, your small projects or even those quick scripts.The level of education and facilities in my country are way behi...
Startup founders, would you walk us through a day in the life?
tom: Interesting to actually look at this.6:20am - One year old wakes up. Grudgingly, I do to.6:25am - Change diaper, PJs if they're wet, make a bottle, feed the boy, try to keep eyes open.6:40am - Catch up on email on the iPhone while the boy plays on the family room floor. Can't use the MacBook because he'll want t...
How to stay focused?
makecheck: Use a revision control system, force yourself to commit only changes to one feature at a time. This restriction helps you to avoid wandering into other things, as it would take extra work to manage the unrelated changes."Release" frequently; if you don't have any customers, just pretend that you need to pac...
Where do I go from here?
Tichy: I don't know how the admission systems work, but perhaps you could get into school in another country, like the UK? Although I seem to remember from the UK they also have things like you had to take physcis in school to be allowed to do it at university. But in some countries it does not work that way, for examp...
How to stay focused?
joshu: You have to organize the world so that you get a series of small successes. And be prepared to take any success as a success.Make it easier for yourself to accomplish things. If you can remove parts of your task list (punt for now or remove entirely) it can help -- a long todo list is demoralizing. I find that p...
How to stay focused?
apsurd: 2 things: My natural style of coding is to work on multiple aspects of my project rather than concentrate on one aspect. Maybe this does make me less productive, but what usually happens is I get burnt out constantly thinking about the same problem so much so that I start to avoid working to solve it! Secondly ...
Do you feel vulnerable because your product is not physical?
SwellJoe: It never crossed my mind to worry. But, then again, I've been in situations where my company (a previous one) wasn't making any money for a quite long period of time, and I had to improvise. It all turned out fine, in the sense that I never experienced foreclosure on the house, the power and phone and gas c...
What comes after we hit the 16nm barrier?
Confusion: I think two obvious ways forward are* Increasing the die size (feasable by reducing substrate costs)* Stacking transistors (3D CPU's)
Which books and open source projects make up the programming "canon"?
mbeihoffer: I really liked The Pragmatic Programmer, although some might think it's not a very technically challenging work.I also like most of O'Reilly's Perl books.Also, Jonathan Rockway's book on Catalyst was very helpful for me, although there were some issues with typos in the first edition (which is to be expecte...
basic web design for small projects?
mbeihoffer: If a small demo, as you put it, is important enough that you need to show it for your career, it's important enough to either spend the time learning web design basics to make a decent looking demo, or else to enlist outside help.(This doesn't necessarily mean hiring an expensive web designer or design firm...
What comes after we hit the 16nm barrier?
fauigerzigerk: Massive parallelism. Of course we need parallel algorithms as well and deal with all the concurrency issues. I think there's one or two paradigm shifts in the cards as we transition towards this massive parallelism.
How to stay focused?
carpo: I felt the same when working on my startup, and something that helped me was to re-think what was required for my first release. Often it seems that everything you've spec'd out is required, but if you really think about it, you should be able to leave some things for subsequent releases.Once you've culled some ...
basic web design for small projects?
swombat: Basic design competency can be learned. Sure, you may not be able to learn to be a brilliant designer, but anyone can learn how to use Photoshop and CSS and how to produce a decent design.I'm no designer either, yet I can make some decent designs (e.g. http://danieltenner.com) that, imho, look far from horribl...
How to stay focused?
sandGorgon: pomodoro technique ?http://www.pomodorotechnique.com/
How to stay focused?
csbartus: Rethink your idea. Maybe you are not 100% sure what you want, and jumping left-and-right instead of facing it.Once you clear up and the path is found everything will go smooth.Pragmatically, put yourself one question: What will go into the first release?
basic web design for small projects?
mooders: I think where one's design skills can be considered lacking, as I very much consider my own, simplicity becomes increasingly important and attractive as a design philosphy.Plenty of white space, clear typography, showing only what is needed, and aligning vertical and horizontal edges helps hugely.Two tools tha...
basic web design for small projects?
csbartus: Use "Google Design": as simple as possible, no fancy css / photoshop / effects.If worked for Google it will work for you.
basic web design for small projects?
raffi: This depends on the project. I'm a non-visual person myself. If it's open source or non-commercial then I recommend http://www.oswd.org -- I have to admit your site will look very Web 1.0 but I've had luck outfitting my open source projects from here.I'll second what others are saying: you should learn HTML, C...
What comes after we hit the 16nm barrier?
psyklic: I think this question has already been answered -- Moore's Law has been out of play (for processor speed) for some time now. Microprocessor companies are now banking on massive parallelism.One of the most promising new technologies (imo) relies on probabilistic transistors -- which occurs as they get smaller a...
basic web design for small projects?
rpoca: Photoshop, GIMP, CSS, etc. ara just tools. You should first get some good taste. It can be learnt. And it will pay well in the future (for example, you'll avoid hiring a bad designer).Learn a bit of color theory, as to avoid creating horrible mashups. Don't trust just pre-baked palettes. The proportion you use o...
How to stay focused?
raffi: Try tracking how you use your time. Go make a grid with hours between 7am and 1am for Sunday - Saturday. Print this. Then write down what you do. I do this to hold myself accountable (I do not use it for planning). I find doing this keeps me on track and lets the little successes build on each other.
What comes after we hit the 16nm barrier?
kristianp: According to wikipedia, 16nm will be succeeded by 11 nanometer. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/11_nanometer
basic web design for small projects?
ahlatimer: Most color wheels will help you pick three colors, but this isn't really necessary in basic sites. One of the things I've used to overcome this is to just use two colors. Even better is to just stick to the grey scale.From there, learn a bit about typography. Typography can make a huge difference on whether ...
What comes after we hit the 16nm barrier?
kenver: It's already difficult for hardware designers to keep up with the underlying technology. It's incredibly difficult to manage the complexity of design, hence the massive growth in EDA tools over the last 10 years.The productivity gap between the underlying hardware and the capabilities of the designers is proba...
Where do I go from here?
robfitz: Credentials don't so much matter if you're doing startups -- you need to know some co-founders and you need to all trust each other to be able to make things.But college helps a lot of other things. So:If you end up at GT, I'd recommend looking into their Computational Media program. It's a lighter version of ...
basic web design for small projects?
alexk: You should learn basic design principles first. Start reading this book:Non-Designer's Design Bookhttp://www.amazon.com/Non-Designers-Design-Book-3rd-Designer...
are there any concise IT books out there?
yan: Not exactly IT, but K&R's "The C Programming Language" is beautifully concise and contains the perfect blend of examples, explanations and reference. One of my favorite technical books and was at one point, most used, as shown by its highly-worn cover.
are there any concise IT books out there?
resdirector: Woops, I meant:Are there any publishers of highly compressed books for web development?
basic web design for small projects?
dc2k08: If the template didn't work for you - perhaps you do just need to look around a bit - there are tons of good solid templates out there. here is 100 for starters: http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2008/12/01/100-free-high-qua...Learn illustrator for the web or fireworks before photoshop if you want to do it yourse...
How to stay focused?
edb: I had this very problem and what I did was use the Emergent Task Timer. Now, I know this sounds like lifehacker fluff, but it really worked for me. I used this:http://davidseah.com/tools/ett/alpha/Save it to your desktop and what you do is this, write 4-5 tasks you want to complete, and make sure you can hear the ...
basic web design for small projects?
Edinburger: The advice above is great if you have a real passion and talent for design or if you really need to save the $$$. However, as a counterpoint I'll share some compelling reasons to hire/borrow a real designer, even if that means paying some $$$ for a short-term contract: (1) It takes time to learn design ski...
What comes after we hit the 16nm barrier?
mnemonicsloth: Moore's Law isn't going to die. It's going to be extended, (or supplanted) by further developments, like Einstein's gravitation extended Newton's.There are many, many successor technologies to CMOS out there: nanotubes, nanowires, magnetic switching, molecular switching, photonic switching. I'm sure m...
Search for Hacker News on Bing
prakash: Here's the interesting bit. Under the first link, which is for Hacker News, there are other links for: "Hacker News", "Feature Requests", "New" and then HN user names, among other names, my name shows up.Do HN users see other usernames? Does this change depending on geography? Can you list the other links you ...
basic web design for small projects?
chaosmachine: Minimalism can get you pretty far. Good examples: Cutline by Chris Pearson, Daring Fireball blog, Google.
How to stay focused?
eintnohick: One word: ADDERRALL
How to stay focused?
vivekamn: Go full time on your idea. Or at least make some commitment so that there is a monthly burn(say a hosted server or a github account at the minimum). Nothing like pressure to keep one focused. This is from my own experience.
I'm Tired of Hacking. What Do I Do? Please Advise.
taelor: Well I personally like to bartend when I'm not hacking. I find it really helps me reload. It's great, I get to be super social and make money. Its not even really like work.And its great when your talking to girls cause you can make yourself sound like a super hero, "Yah, I'm a hacker by day, bartender by night...
Search for Hacker News on Bing
tokenadult: I get * Hacker News * New * Freaky * Paraschopra * Johng * Feature Requests * Ph0rque * Prakash as sublinks.
are there any concise IT books out there?
ajm: I suspect that you represent a small (significant?) market segment as I have not seen many IT book titles or series that meet your requirements. O'Reilly have a series, "Essentials" that appear to have started off with this intention but later titles are bloated.
What comes after we hit the 16nm barrier?
Hexstream: Personally I don't care that much. Current processors are plenty fast as it is. I mean, it's always nice to have faster ones and I don't think there will ever be a point where everyone is satisfied and we stop improving them, but I'm just not CRAVING for more speed so much.However, what I'd LOVE to have is u...
How to stay focused?
paulsingh: I can sort of relate since I'm in the same boat with my startup. The key for me was to set some goals for each week, tell my friends about them (to help keep me honest) and then to simply get cracking. Beyond that, I'd suggest that keeping focused can be as simple as calling yourself out for BS'ing. :)As for...
How to stay focused?
pwim: Find a partner. For me at least, having someone else to work with is quite motivating.
basic web design for small projects?
noelchurchill: It sounds like you'd like to hire a designer, but the size of the project doesn't warrant paying for one. In this case, I'd recommend 99designs.com. Have a simple custom design created for a very reasonable price. Best of both worlds!
What comes after we hit the 16nm barrier?
physcab: Optical computing would be pretty cool.
Search for Hacker News on Bing
pclark: Its interesting that the Bing cache is from the 25th May, and the Google cache was this morning. Eg: Google crawls this site way more.
basic web design for small projects?
marcusbooster: Design is a subject to be learned like any other - there's whole books and schools dedicated to it. Go to the library, look through some art and design books, if you see a style you like then write it down and emulate it (don't copy it outright, just use it as a framework or guidance). If you're into wha...
basic web design for small projects?
jaddison: http://blueprintcss.org/ is much like 960.gs - a clear concise framework designed to give you nice typography with easy layout - look into it. It will save you serious time.Get someone else to do graphics if that's not your thing.Make sure any content (phrasing, wording, etc.) is TARGETED towards your users....
What comes after we hit the 16nm barrier?
torr: We've been living with Moore's law so long that young people seem to think it's similar to an actual law like gravity.Fact is, computing has benefitted from some core technologies (ex. lithography) that have lended themselves to order-of-magnitude increases in things like number of transistors per square cm. It's...
What comes after we hit the 16nm barrier?
sown: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/11_nanometerIt goes to 11.My personal belief is that non-semiconductor technologies will come around, at least for specialized tasks. I imagine I'll be using similar technologies we have now for some time longer when it comes to day-to-day operations.
basic web design for small projects?
wenbert: If you are in a hurry and do not have the patience, then you will only get frustrated if you try to learn from scratch. I suggest you go with ready-made stuff - like for CSS, take a look at BlueprintCSS (it makes CSS a hell a lot easier) -- go for minimalism with nice typography. Then get a good photo and in s...
In which modern language/environment/framework is programming a joy?
PaulMorgan: Why pick one or two? All of them are a joy. I get paid to play with software and computers.
your favorite obscure Firefox extensions?
Raja_Selvaraj: Surprised that Vimperator (https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/4891) has not been mentioned yet. Vim for the web !
Where do I go from here?
juliusmcfly: Thanks for all the comments. I've actually followed through on a couple pieces of advice.I scheduled an interview with an admissions officer at Southern Poly, and I spent all night last night working through the Django Book, so I can try to put together my first webapp idea. I've always learned best by act...
On Being Attacked
noodle: what "can" you do? any of those.what "should" you do? kind of depends on the situation, but a kind response and an apology or explanation if necessary goes a long way. especially if you're speaking on behalf of a company/brand/whatever.for example, that whole fiasco with getsatisfaction. they handled it fai...
On Being Attacked
pg: What are you talking about? Are you talking about something that happened on HN? If so, could you link to examples? Without context this is incomprehensible.
Good web-based icon editor?
oneplusone: You may find http://aviary.com or http://www.pixlr.com/editor/ a good fit.