HN user
I'm not aware of anything really in-depth.
There is one paper I like about operational issues in general: https://www.usenix.org/legacy/event/lisa07/tech/full_papers/... . It lists a lot of criteria that must be met for a system to be highly automated.
Similar to what Steve Yegge said in his unintentionally published platforms rant:
- monitoring and QA are the same thing. You'd never think so until you try doing a big SOA. But when your service says "oh yes, I'm fine", it may well be the case that the only thing still functioning in the server is the little component that knows how to say "I'm fine, roger roger, over and out" in a cheery droid voice. In order to tell whether the service is actually responding, you have to make individual calls. The problem continues recursively until your monitoring is doing comprehensive semantics checking of your entire range of services and data, at which point it's indistinguishable from automated QA. So they're a continuum.
1. If I'm going to be spending 2000+ plus hours a year in a single physical location it needs to have some privacy and comfort, at an absolute minimum.
2. I'm not willing to be scrutinized by others for exactly how I spend my time. Or how I appear to be spending my time. Goofing off, at least I'm only distracting myself, instead of wandering around distracting others. "Following orders" leads to intellectual heat-death. In the software profession this kills earning power.
3. Many people fail to realize that whatever minor thing they are currently locked on to psychologically is totally inconsequential. I can't have them hovering over me and yammering about it and trying to get me to click/type/open/smell whichever program/website/document/foodstuff has gotten them whipped up in a frenzy. People aren't conscious of boundaries when they're excited and this needs to be defended against physically with doors, desks, and body position.
4. Maybe it helps individual productivity to the detriment of group productivity. When I get a big raise based on group productivity, I'll start to care about it.
yeah, this machine seems to be able to do it: http://www.ebay.ca/itm/GoldXpert-SDD-Portable-Countertop-XRF...
Yeah this looks viable. This would make the best fake bar. I don't think the metal even need to be alloyed, you can just pour in one first, then the other.
At least one of the metals in the alloy would need to be higher density than gold. There are a few but I don't think any of them are easy to get: http://www.wolframalpha.com/share/clip?f=d41d8cd98f00b204e98...
EDIT: tungsten + platinum looks viable as sibling comment mentioned.
Gold density is 19.30 g/cm3, Tungsten is 19.25.
Given two gold bars, one adulterated with Tungsten, and one not, either the weight will differ or the volume will differ. So, given equal weights (i.e. standard 400oz bars), you can check the displacement to establish purity.
If you use a container that is filled up to a spout, and you measure the displaced water by collecting it in a measuring cup, you can just directly calculate density, and then compare it to gold.
My guess is that they are using human operators, and they probably have a retrieval squad on standby in case they lose contact. The regulatory issues I couldn't begin to guess.
The goal at this stage would be to validate the business model and to collect flight data and get a sense of the operational requirements. If it works and they want to develop an autopilot, they will then have all the flight data, landing zone choices and issues, and trained operators to consult.
I really liked all of them, but episode 2 was probably my favourite of season 1. It is over the top compared to other parts of the series, but not compared to other experimental far future or alternate universe scifi. For example: Dark City, Idiocracy, Cube, Moon, Battle Royale, Maze Runner.
It isn't all that crazy, it has already been done to printers:
http://www.pcworld.com/article/229647/counterfeit_money_on_c...
You won't know in advance who is going to rob you, in this case it was the FBI but for this attack it could be anyone, even a reasonably organized group of 13 year olds could probably pull this off. For example the situation could be the same but DPR is a tech CEO working in a coffeeshop in Asia, and someone has just ran off with a copy of his email and financials. He chases them out of the door, gets hit in the face with a bike chain, and wakes up in the hospital, not even knowing if they were just aggressive petty thieves, or if he was targeted and someone knows all this plans.
I think that "lock and wipe" might be too much though, and locking only would be more practical, wouldn't constitute destruction of evidence (as far as they know), wouldn't punish mistakes so much. Right now, off the shelf, a computer will lock up on screensaver, or sleep/poweroff. For a high paranoia user, you could add headphone unplug, power cord in/out, any usb in/out, even monitor the mic for certain codewords to trigger the lock. And if it happens it isn't such a big deal, just re-authenticate.
Not at all.
Up to now I had never considered the need for protection against a mid-keystroke attack. Ideally it would have to involve no unusual hardware or software, or you might as well just slap a "I'm a criminal" sticker on your forehead.
Second, I can't see it working properly if you need to do something specific when you're being struck.
Closest thing I can think of:
- headphones must be plugged in to launch a certain program
- if headphones are unplugged before program is closed, lock and begin wipe
- don't, under any circumstances, let go of the headphones
At this level of paranoia you probably also need interrogation training. Ideally you'd also have your sensitive stuff on a machine that is both hidden and protected, and only access it remotely. You want to be able to deny its existence to have any chance of withstanding a torture attack.
Edit: iphone earbuds have a switch that you might be able to use in your hand/mouth as a deadman switch, but I can't see that being workable for more than a few seconds.
Also, if you're in public, they could film your monitor... so that would need to be sanitized somehow as well.
I've been considering running all my mobile data through a VPN for better security, and saving all of it so I can analyze anything after the fact. Anyone doing anything like this?
On letting the user switch between register and login at any time, there is one small thing that tumblr does that I like.
If you go to tumblr.com it displays the registration page with email/password/username. If you just type in email+password on this page, it still works. So an incomplete registration form can be used to login.
A lot of companies are giant faceless MBAocracies, and all their front line staff are designed to be minimum cost minimum fuss drones, which selects for checked out losers. The purpose of tipping is to bypass institutional apathy so you can deal with someone who will treat you as human for the right price
Cameras are cheap, networking is cheap and processing is cheap. The government is just the first mover, but there are many other parties that have the ability to build this kind of thing even just based on current technology.
Imagine if UPS placed cameras giving a 360 degree view on all of their vehicles, ran it through license place recognition to give a database of observations each having plate number, time, and location, and then allowed lookups or algorithms to be run for a price or subscription fee.
Any company with a large network of vehicles could do this, or it could be done less effectively but more cheaply with cameras on property. It would be easy to pool the data or sell it to anyone. In some ways it is similar to doing large scale face recognition, except it is much easier with current technology.
Price
For an example of this, ask yourself: What is the world population?
The longer it has been since you checked, the further off the number will be.
"/exit"
There is also a way to force your ssh client to disconnect: http://askubuntu.com/questions/29942/how-can-i-break-out-of-...
Edit, although now I can't seem to reconnect.
Is 90% efficiency really feasible for electrical -> mechanical -> electrical?
Here are the last few words of the 1934 Securities Analysis:
More satisfactory results are to be obtained, in our opinion, by confining the positive conclusions of the analyst to the following fields of endeavor:
1. The selection of standard senior issues which meet exacting tests of safety.
2. The discovery of senior issues which merit an investment rating but which also have opportunities of an appreciable enhancement in value.
3. The discovery of common stocks, or speculative senior issues, which appear to be selling at far less than their intrinsic value.
4. The determination of definite price discrepancies existing between related securities, which situation may justify making exchanges or initiating hedging or arbitrage operations.
That makes sense to me, interview problems are highly synthetic and most people will probably need to prep specifically for the common tech interview process. If you don't have access to people who are interviewing regularly then it would be easy not to fully grasp how important this type of thing is to your earning power, given the lack of importance to your job performance.
Seems like the Kindle link on that page is to a different version, this looks to me like the correct Kindle version: http://www.amazon.com/Meditations-New-Translation-Modern-Lib...
Gigabyte makes a mini system with i7-4770R, which is 4 core, Iris pro 5200 graphics, similar size to the mac mini: http://www.gigabyte.com/products/product-page.aspx?pid=4888#...
It is a bit noisy thought, I'm not sure the design of the mac mini could dissipate this much heat.
I've heard this (or similar tests) also referred to as "fire drills".
The first one I like to do is to restore the entire infrastructure from the off-site backup. When I know this is good I can sleep soundly.
The enthusiastic and energetic manipulation of the stock market is well documented and is the reason for the formation of the SEC in 1933. One difference between pre-SEC stock manipulation and bitcoin is that the "controllers" of bitcoin can't arbitrarily issue more bitcoin. Controlling a company you can issue new stock and debt at will which opens up a lot more possibilities for market manipulation.
My personal opinion on bitcoin (the specific blockchain, not the tech), is that it is either a good currency or a good investment, it can't be both. Since people are calling it a currency and treating it like an investment, I've only bought/sold it before/after transactions.
With a pump-and-dump scheme, you have a small number of people who are insincere (the dumpers) and a large number of people who are sincere (the pumpers). For example, you have promoters saying "BTC is decentralized" because the ledger is decentralized, but on the other hand ownership and mining power are highly concentrated.
One area where I think the author is wrong is that he seems to be predicting a slow death. I think that is unlikely since it has already crashed hard twice in three years: https://blockchain.info/charts/market-price?timespan=all
EDIT
Here is an example of some stock market manipulation from the 1800s:
The entire period in the affairs of the Erie system from the ascendancy of Daniel Drew in 1851 to the end of the Civil War witnessed an endless succession of stock-market exploits both large and small. In the spring of 1866, however, Drew found an opportunity to achieve a real masterpiece in manipulation. The stock of the Erie road was then selling at about 95 and the company was in pressing need of funds. The treasurer came to the rescue as usual and made the necessary advances on adequate security. The company had in its treasury a considerable amount of unissued stock and had also the legal right to issue bonds to the extent of $3,000,000 which could be converted into stock. Drew took these bonds and the unissued stock as security for a loan of $3,500,000.
It so happened, naturally, that Drew was soon heavily short of Erie stock in Wall Street. The market was buoyant; speculation was rampant; and the outside public, the delight and prey of Wall Street gamblers, were as usual drawn in by the fascination of acquiring wealth without labor. All this time our friend, Daniel Drew, was quietly selling Erie stock and closing contracts for the future delivery of the certificates; and he was doing this at rising prices. As the days went by, his grave, desponding manner grew more and more apparent. Erie stock continued to rise. In the loan market its scarcity became greater hour by hour. The rumor began to spread that "Uncle Daniel" was cornered. His large obligations for future delivery must be met. Where was the Erie stock to come from? The stock continued to soar, and Treasurer Drew seemed to become more and more depressed.
Then the blow fell. Drew laid his hands on the collateral which he held for his loan to the Erie. In the twinkling of an eye his $3,000,000 in Erie bonds was converted into Erie stock, which he proceeded to dump in Wall Street. Eric quotations fell from 90 to 50. Every one at last realized the trap—but not before Daniel Drew had pocketed a few millions in profits.
Source: Moody, The Railroad Builders, Chapter 6.
http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/3036
https://archive.org/stream/cu31924070687961#page/n93/mode/2u...
The struggle for control that follows the part I quoted is also pretty interesting.
One big thing that helped me get started was following this workflow: http://nvie.com/posts/a-successful-git-branching-model/
If you have co-workers whose workflow you can copy then I don't think it is needed, but if you want to start a project from scratch with Git then having a plan like this can be really helpful.
They are just quantifying the terms rare and very rare.
Rare is 1 in 100, very rare is 1 in 10000.
NASA said it would pay SpaceX >>its<< largest single contract ever
the "its" here refers SpaceX, so largest contract of SpaceX, not largest contract of NASA.
could be considered a vague pronoun reference: http://www.towson.edu/ows/modulepro.htm