Archive for October 2022

New top story on Hacker News: Ask HN: HNers with MS (multiple sclerosis, not Microsoft), can we get in touch?

October 22, 2022 Add Comment
New top story on Hacker News: Ask HN: HNers with MS (multiple sclerosis, not Microsoft), can we get in touch?
Ask HN: HNers with MS (multiple sclerosis, not Microsoft), can we get in touch?
6 by mush_room | 0 comments on Hacker News.
I was diagnosed with MS 15 years ago, and was doing pretty well for a long time, but with the pandemic experienced an tremendous amount of stress that has left me with my first major flare-up since diagnosis and, more importantly, developing over the past 3 years, a feeling in my brain that feels like having been lobotomized, and symptoms like "mild" dementia. Difficulty multitasking, make silly mistakes, mentally tired easily, emotional issues, etc. The MS was so far outside my concerns for all these years that I didn't know about the cognitive effects of MS (though I retrospect I realize I had some milder form of these symptoms all along), but I know understand MS causes brain atrophy and damage irrespective of flare-ups and lesions. I've tried many things to make it better over this past year especially, but it's getting worse. It's quite evidently different from depression, it feels like I've lost part of my brain, which seems to be what's happening with MS. I'm posting this in hopes I can get in touch with others with MS that are programmers and are doing well, and have found ways to make this better, or have gone through periods where they felt like this and it improved. I can't imagine living like this with worsening, I don't have any support from family and any savings (lost an enormous amount of life-changing money few years ago), my programming abilities have waned, and if I can't support myself in the future I'm going to end up homeless. I want to believe I can do something, that there is hope, perhaps medical advances, or anything I could do. If you want to get in touch my email is mush_room_hn at protonmail.com. (but you would also reply here)

New top story on Hacker News: Ask HN: Why don't I see gold at the end of the remote working rainbow?

October 19, 2022 Add Comment
New top story on Hacker News: Ask HN: Why don't I see gold at the end of the remote working rainbow?
Ask HN: Why don't I see gold at the end of the remote working rainbow?
15 by samuel_backend | 23 comments on Hacker News.
Saying the following feels like heresy and whenever I say it, fellow software engineers look at me as if I just asked them if there are GOTOs in Javascript. I used to love going to the office. Discussing our team's latest Python problems over a coffee. Looking over at their screen and then asking them why they look like they want to beat someone over the head with their keyboard repeatedly. Guessing people's emotions in a heated Retro from their body language. Grabbing dinner with a few colleagues after a long workshop meeting in the evening and then realizing that, aside from all the differences we might have about static typing in programming languages, we all like the same exotic progressive metal bands. Many of these things that made my job much more than slaving at a digital conveyor belt seem to be gone these days. And the worst thing for me is that I feel few people relate. On the contrary, many are screaming in outrage if asked to come to the office even for a single day a week and threaten to quit. To provide a bit of context, I have been working in the Berlin Tech Startup scene for almost a decade. I remember thinking after the first few weeks on my entry-level job that this couldn't possible be the horrible "working world" I have seen relatives complain about all their lives. It was fun, gratifying and stimulating to learn new things, meet new people and all the while be payed for doing so and building a career. Now, I am fully aware that there's a low of people for whom the horror of commute doesn't make up for the gains of socializing and others that just abhor having to talk to real-life people. Then there are people who work mainly to get paid and do not care to invest themselves beyond what is necessary. But are those really the majority? I always saw tech as the field where a disproportionally large amount of people truly love what they do. Mostly, because it takes so much grit and persistence to get good at it that most people wouldn't succeed unless they see something in it beyond putting food on the table. Have I been under some weird form of Stockholm Syndrom where I actually enjoyed something that was pure torture to most? Have a lot of people realized they don't actually like being among other people, apart from their closest friends and family? And finally, I feel no one else is realizing that they are happily hacking away at the amazingly well-paid branch they're sitting on. As soon as a company's IT department is practically fully remote, why should they page a German wage for someone who is a face on a screen, when they can pay a fraction for that same face broadcasted from a few hundred kilometers further east or south? German is hardly used in business context here anyway and lower-wage countries within ±3 hours timezones abound. All in all, there is a gnawing feeling in me that Covid made a significant dent on the once fun (Berlin Startup) tech working culture for good. And worse, I suspect there is gonna be more consequences down the road for the tech job market at large that few people seem to see. I know that "the office" is a bad place for a lot of people. There may be product managers that ignore the noise-cancelling headphone stop-sign and make you lose your stack of thoughts just to ask if the dev app URL is still the same it was yesterday. There can be bad managers and unpleasant situations all around. But shouldn't we rather work on fixing those things instead of making them bearable by just turning off a camera in a Zoom meeting? From talking to friends, I feel this is a very controversial opinion to have and I don't really get why. Any help to make me understand would be greatly appreciated! And just to be clear, I absolutely do get that for some people (fresh parents, people living at home to take care of their parents etc.) remote work is a real blessing. I am just wondering if that is really the case for the majority or what it is that I'm missing.

New top story on Hacker News: Ask HN: Can you recommend me a fast, light text editor for Windows?

October 13, 2022 Add Comment
New top story on Hacker News: Ask HN: Can you recommend me a fast, light text editor for Windows?
Ask HN: Can you recommend me a fast, light text editor for Windows?
5 by supersparrow | 9 comments on Hacker News.
What do you guys use when you want to quickly open a file? I used to use VS Code for this purpose, but it's becoming more and more like an IDE and doesn't quite have the startup time that I would want anymore. Plus, it's a bit annoying when I already have a project open as it'll open as a tab and look as if it's part of that project if that makes sense. Notepad almost fits my spec (startup time, simple, quick UI), but it doesn't have syntax highlighting or anything useful for text manipulation/navigation/etc. I could never get along with Notepad++ - it's hard to explain why, because I can see it's a fantastic editor and is very popular, but it just doesn't fit into the way I work I suppose. I think the main key points for me are startup time and syntax highlighting. Thank you!

How Arsenal Found Its Voice

October 09, 2022 Add Comment
How Arsenal Found Its Voice
Long ridiculed for having a library-like atmosphere at its games, Arsenal listened to its fans, embraced a nascent ultra group and let its loudest supporters set the tone.

from NYT > Top Stories https://ift.tt/wsvBjU2

New top story on Hacker News: 10k hours rule to master anything. Could I switch career when I am 43?

October 07, 2022 Add Comment
New top story on Hacker News: 10k hours rule to master anything. Could I switch career when I am 43?
10k hours rule to master anything. Could I switch career when I am 43?
4 by michaelcao | 1 comments on Hacker News.
Throughout his book "M. Outliers: The Story of Success.", Gladwell repeatedly refers to the “10 000-hour rule,” asserting that the key to achieving true expertise in any skill is simply a matter of practicing. It could be the greatest practice myth. My american boss founded my company in Viet Nam when he was 55. I admire him a lot. Nonetheless, I am still afraid of switching to other job because time is running out when i am older. A lot of my friends who are technical guys think so. Any advice?

New top story on Hacker News: Ask HN: Examples of Microkernels?

October 04, 2022 Add Comment
New top story on Hacker News: Ask HN: Examples of Microkernels?
Ask HN: Examples of Microkernels?
6 by agomez314 | 6 comments on Hacker News.
I'm reading through the MIT xv6 OS handbook and code (here: https://ift.tt/efBwETh) and they mention the fact that they created it as a monolithic kernel since most unix systems are monolithic. They then introduce the microkernel concept. Are there microkernel concepts out there (especially code) I can check out? I'm curious to see how userspace processes communicate to kernel processes to execute privileged actions.

What to Know About Brazil’s Election

October 02, 2022 Add Comment
What to Know About Brazil’s Election
Jair Bolsonaro has questioned the integrity of Sunday’s election and trails in polls to Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, a leftist and former president, who was imprisoned amid a corruption scandal.

from NYT > Top Stories https://ift.tt/sXapz5c
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