HN user
pentadactyl add-on for firefox. Allows you to browse like you were using vim and allows you to script anything you do on the web. Vimperator isn't nearly as powerful and all the chrome options aren't even worth mentioning.
recent improvements in all solid state dye-sensitized solar cells show more potential for lowering the cost of solar energy.
That is the question. All of the materials are expensive themselves (gallium, indium) or expensive to process ( silicon) - which means these cells will never scale and replace oil.
Which is why dye-sensitized solar cells are such a promising alternative, despite their lower single module efficiencies of ~15% (20-30% for the expensive semiconductors discussed in OP). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dye-sensitized_solar_cell
especially when you throw in citations for scientific articles. Which often require compilation of the citation database, citation order, and citation insertion. Adding 3 more steps to the process.
I've recently switched to papers to help with this. It seems to have a strong community and supports both MS word, libre office, and vim. Jury's still out though.
I use a similar setup with vim+latex+git for chemistry articles. It works amazing for me. I feel like it is the most powerful presentation setup and most efficient editing setup currently available.
I break sentences by ending with two spaces. (this doesn't matter since Latex is markup) The only issue arises when ideas span across multiple sentences, but I believe there is a flag for controlling the number of lines around a diff. (sorry, I'm new to git) But this sort of proves the point that an easy wrapper for git should be created for scientific writing.
The two main problems I have are: 1. adoption by collaborators (they can't surmount the learning curve) 2. diffing sentences is very different from lines of code
Scientific writers do need branches. When there are 10 authors on one paper all suggesting different paragraphs/figures/equations at different times.
How many of these options penflip, draft, etc are actually open source?
I'm looking for very specific features on the level of Latex libraries that would never make it into a for profit application.
I'm using latex+vim+git for this purpose currently. I put two spaces after a period to signal the end of a sentence in Latex. Which helps me break the document up by sentences with vim.
If you're using markup then encouraging the period-double-space could be a harmless way of easily breaking the document up by sentences
Latex has line comments and since it is compiled into a document you can place line breaks anywhere. It does break the flow of the sentence though.
I've used Latex+vim+git to write scientific papers recently. It is unfortunately much too complicated for my colleagues to adopt. They're holding onto MS Word which is far inferior in terms of markup, citing, and VCS.
I've been converting my Latex documents to ugly word documents for collaborating and editing. The MS Word editing isn't great either. The strikethrough method breaks up flow. I've also had problems deleting side comments in Libre office. And the MS Word experience isn't always the same on Macs.
Scientific writers do write like programmers code. There are as many as ~15 authors on a paper. The scientific paper has intensive markup, often in Latex. And collaborative writing like GoogleDocs doesn't work b/c 3 different authors will make changes to the same sentence and you need to be able to see all three changes next to each other. Not to mention figures, equations, etc...
MS Word and Libre office aren't powerful enough for scientific writing and aren't universally embraced or consistent across operating systems.
Github for writers is desperately needed. Draft doesn't do nearly enough
Source: physical science graduate student
I'm an American born graduate student in Chemistry lab at an R1 school and the funding landscape has been a very hot topic throughout the department. No tenured professors have said they would move, but we probably wouldn't receive that information until they had already made the decision (as was the case with my boss and switching schools).
Once I am done with graduate school I will be considering employment at a university oversees that appreciates it's scientists.
And it wouldn't be as difficult for many of these tenured professors to make the transition. They all collaborate with researchers oversees. They already have all the connections needed. Furthermore, the institutions over there would jump at opportunities to poach them.
Moving across the globe isn't nearly as difficult these days as it would have been in the 1930s.
And if moving across the globe would've fixed Americans' problems during the Great Depression I doubt they would've hesitated.