Every blog post that took off on Hacker News, ranked by the votes of its best submission. 1,784 posts.
Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayen, June 2009, when asked about HTML5: To the extent that an improved HTML standard accelerates innovation and consistent reach for web content, we’re very supportive . ( context )
On Thursday June 4 th of 2009 I left the comforts of my home in Austin, TX. with no food, no money and no place to stay for 5 days and 4 nights. I did this voluntarily as a small experiment to see what it was like to live on the streets of Austin, TX.
I’ve been playing around with the Text CAPTCHA demo page and wondered how well WolframAlpha is at logic questions. As it turns out, Wolfram is pretty smart! Although, since a CAPTCHA requir…
It is extremely well worn conventional wisdom that for your “average” programmer, it’s pretty much impossible to beat a good optimizing compiler at writing fast code. For those who skip the “understanding” part, and jump straight into the “application” part, this rule of thumb tends to be grossly misunderstood, and…
Last week I finally caught up with the state of Ruby - the language, the community and the tools in fashion. I'm impressed. These guys seem ...
I've been asked by several people to explain why I use Clojure for my professional work rather than Racket. ABOUT RACKET I have been using R...
My new bank, Ally Bank , configures a security question and answer for customer service calls. In addition to your SSN, date of birth, and mother's maiden name they also ask you the question you specify and wait for the answer you've provided. This is good, because many standard questions are…
[EDIT 2010-03-11 18:00 I mention this below, but to place my conflict up front: I'm the author of the Tarsnap secure online backup service, which is in some ways a competitor to ZumoDrive.]
Startups that are searching for a business model need to keep score differently than large companies that are executing a known business model. Yet most entrepreneurs and their VC’s make startups u…
Rarely has one single decision done so much good. From now on when you type in the word "suicide" you get this: That's right. The Lif...
When you’re 21 years old and working on your first startup, you’re convinced that you’re so much smarter than everyone who tried this before you. You don’t need advice or he…
Dr. Martin Odersky, the lead designer/developer of the Scala Programming Language , Generic Java, and Pizza requires no introduction, but the motivation for this micro-interview does. That is, there is an unfortunate view in some circles that sees the existence of Scala and Clojure as somehow being at odds. In…
A common fallacy is assuming that any new platform in an exciting market — recently, smartphones and tablet computers — will be flooded with developers as soon as it’s released, as if developers are just waiting outside the gates, hungrily waiting to storm in.
Starting with this week’s new MacBook Air models, Flash Player is no longer bundled with Mac OS X.
As of this morning I work for Google. The title is “Developer Advocate”. The focus is Android. Fun is expected.
There is a big banking reform bill working its way through the Senate right now. It is sponsored by Chris Dodd, Chairman of the Senate Banking Committee. It has a long name I can't remember, so I'll call it the Dodd Banking Bill. What does a bill attempting to regulate the banking industry have to […]
The Official Web Site of Nicholas C. Zakas
