News for hackers. Stuff that matters.

MuddyMo

Re:Warning: GMail security failure on Wednesday December 26, 2007 @06:43PM (#92817)
So, it's just a given the GMail's security SUCKS?
Re:Code's Worst Enemy on Friday December 21, 2007 @10:51AM (#91740)
I second that "cool".

Hey, nobody reads my blog: muddymo.blogspot.com (well, a few do) but I will link you on my blogroll. Send me an email when you are ready.

Re:Code's Worst Enemy on Wednesday December 19, 2007 @02:04PM (#91226)
Highly recommended piece from a guy who's been in the trenches.
A little slice of Direct Democracy
Re:Amazon Takes on Oracle and IBM With SimpleDB on Friday December 14, 2007 @06:42PM (#89736)
This concept clearly has some distance to travel before it gains wide acceptance, but I think it has enormous potential.
Re:Slutbot aces Turing Test* on Sunday December 09, 2007 @04:11PM (#87506)
The real question: Are they using MySQL?
Updmodded for content and bravery.

I recognize some of my struggles in that piece. People get tired of me saying it, but I don't care:

"Chose your semantics wisely, for they do have consequences."

Ironic that in a discipline which requires such a high degree of precision in the use of its symbols and tokens consistently prescribes obscure and contradictory rules for their usage.

Although not required, success in this field is enhanced if one possesses the ability to mentally manage symbol sets with a fairly agnostic attitude towards their clarity and consistency.

When I was a newbie, I recall more than one veteran C programmer giving me a quizzical look when I asked who the hell thought it was a good idea to use the same symbol to express assignment and equality.

Re:Best software error message ever on Saturday December 08, 2007 @05:18PM (#87339)
Give 'em credit for making progress, they don't have a "Reboot Computer?" button as the default selection ala: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=86329
Bravo! Bravo! Tour de force! Should be read at least once a month as an antidote to creeping groupthink.
Now I have to stop reading Hacker News and clean up the soda I just spewed all over my keyboard. Thanks alot, jey.
Re:Wikipedia black helicopters circle Utah's Traverse Mountain on Friday December 07, 2007 @05:53PM (#87154)
Yes,the Register is shrill to the point of borderline tabloid status. But they do put out a significant amount of original work.

Just to see for myself, I went to the Wiki page for Gary Weiss' bio and saw numerous attempts had been made to add a link to this Register article and all had been undone immediately.

Hopefully, Citizendium (like Wikipedia, but no anonymous editors and there is an editorial board) will be able to gain some traction:

http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/Main_Page

Re:Wikipedia black helicopters circle Utah's Traverse Mountain on Friday December 07, 2007 @01:16PM (#87069)
If recent news reports are accurate, it appears that Wikipedia may be devolving into a Web 2.0 version of "Lord of the Flies"
Re:Bee Dance Strategy Helps Servers Run More Sweetly on Wednesday November 21, 2007 @07:47AM (#82430)
The Honeybee strategy sacrifices speed for reliability. Try selling that strategy to a client!
Re:Bee Dance Strategy Helps Servers Run More Sweetly on Tuesday November 20, 2007 @02:43PM (#82079)
I enjoyed the article. I found it interesting, however, that this is based on work that came out in 2004. Here is the link to Tovey's 2004 article, "The Honeybee Algorithm": http://ormstomorrow.informs.org/archive/fall04/Tovey%20artic...

Re:Bush Finds Error In Fermilab Calculations on Thursday November 15, 2007 @02:36PM (#80322)
It really isn't that difficult:

Funny is fine, just skip it when it involves haranguing, smearing or ridiculing specific politicians, ideologies or religions.

Re:What is it like to work at Google? on Friday November 02, 2007 @01:06PM (#75477)
Looks like Winer is pretty much in line with many in the YC community: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=75433

Might this be the milestone we look back on and eval: (not (not (= google evil)))

Good piece, but I sure hope Anthony Bourdain doesn't get the idea he can start writing books on software dev.
Re:Code Changes to prepare GMail for the Future on Wednesday October 31, 2007 @01:53PM (#74736)
This caught my eye: "One side effect of this change is that if you're using third-party Gmail extensions, they're likely to stop working."

I assume that means GMail Drive?

I am new to Wolfram's work, so I am at a disadvantage, but I find the idea interesting.

Seems unlikely that the "viral potential" for a given random web app could be gleaned by perusing the code or that there will soon be technology available to simulate a user. And if you were to reduce the randomness by somehow requiring the code or the app to conform to some standard in order to make it easier to automate the perusal, well we already have a whole SEO industry dedicated to gaming the current automated search technology, don't we?

At some point don't you think it is likely that the social networking application model will be co-opted by market testing enterprises who will design ways to entice lots of people to test software applications while having their physiological reactions captured online. With a record of human reactions directly correlated to a specific application, predictive results from automated searching would then be feasible.

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