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Issue #60 - April 26, 2020
Here are the top threads of the week, happy reading!
1. Ask HN: I'm a software engineer going blind, how should I prepare?
Top comment by kolanos
You can definitely continue as a software engineer. I'm living proof. It won't be easy, especially at first. For a while it will feel like you're working twice as hard just to keep up with your sighted peers. But eventually, the better you get with your tools, you'll find you have some superpowers over your sighted peers. For example, as you get better with a screen reader, you'll be bumping the speech rate up to 1.75-2X normal speech. You'll be the only one who can understand your screen reader. You'll become the fastest and most proficient proof reader on your team. Typos will be easily spotted as they just won't "sound right". It will be like listening to a familiar song and then hitting an off note in the melody. And this includes code. Also, because code is no longer represented visually as blocks, you'll find you're building an increasingly detailed memory model of your code. Sighted people do this, too, but they tend to visualize in their mind. When you abandon this two dimensional representation, your non-visual mental map suffers no spatial limits. You'll be amazed how good your memory will get without the crutch of sight. Good luck. If you're a Mac user you can hit me up for tool recommendations. My email is my username at gmail dot com.
2. Ask HN: How do I overcome mental laziness?
Top comment by DanielBMarkham
"Lazy" is just another way of saying that you're not doing something somebody else thinks you should be doing. Nobody is lazy at playing video games or eating a favorite food. If you like doing it, you do it. You can't be lazy. You can only be lazy in some kind of context where you or others judge you and find you wanting.
So two pieces of advice. First, stop judging so much. Do what you love doing and don't feel the least bit guilty about it. Second, find things you love doing that generally make you a better person over time and do those things. This might require trying out new things every weekend for a while. Once again, don't judge yourself; instead find things you truly love that you feel are also good for you. There are plenty of these things for everybody, and each person has his own mix. Never feel like you have to have somebody else's.
A lot of commenters here are using the mountain metaphor. I'd like to say the same thing a different way. Stop being so goal focused and instead become habit focused. You don't want to accomplish some big goal, all you want to do is do fun stuff that makes you a better person. As a result of that, you'll probably accomplish some cool goals. But you'd never do that if you started from zero and tried to guilt yourself into striving towards some goal you couldn't care less about.
Habits are easy to change. The trick is to try new things and start with really, really small changes. Most of life is Zen anyway. You either enjoy doing things and die or you suffer and die. It's your choice.
3. Ask HN: What are some great posts or articles about history of computing?
Top comment by pfarrell
Top of my head, here are some books on specific histories I enjoyed. All old, but there are timeless nuggets in them.
Soul of a new machine, previously mentioned. Where I first learned about mushroom management.
Just for Fun: the story of an accidental revolutionary [0] was fun bio on Torvalds from 2001
The Mythical Man Month [1] offers some insight into the management and thinking that went into OS/360
Masters of Doom [2]: offers an enjoyable history of the shareware years and the rise of id software
The multicians site [3]: is a collaborative history of Multics, one the most influential operating systems.
The Mother of All Demos [4]: even better than Steve Jobs keynotes
Steve Jobs iPhone introduction [5]: I’m not a huge fan of Mr Jobs, but this is one of the best presentations ever. It’s not history, per se, but very interesting through our eyes.
0: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/160171.Just_for_Fun
1: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13629.The_Mythical_Man_M...
2: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/222146.Masters_of_Doom
3: https://multicians.org/
4: https://youtu.be/yJDv-zdhzMY
5: https://youtu.be/vN4U5FqrOdQ
4. Ask HN: Are there any substantial examples of blockchain solving a real problem?
Top comment by joosters
Many people solved their lack of money problems through launching blockchain-related companies. The actual systems they launched can't be considered substantial, functional, or often even real, but the (actual) money that poured into their own bank accounts was substantial enough. Does that count?
5. Ask HN: As a Facebook or Google engineer, do you consider your company evil?
Top comment by throwaway22349
Googler. Yes, I think the backlash is all deserved. I’ve been here for many years, since back when any criticism was still very niche, and at the beginning it was different. Obviously morally superior to working at a bank, and more meaningful than working on Snapchat for Sourdough Starters or similar dumb startups. Now it’s no better than the banks, and they’re even chasing military contracts. And the work is largely pointless tedium.
I’ve thought of leaving for years. Problem is: I have a wife who doesn’t work, two kids, piles of debt, and live in the most expensive city in the country. We can’t just leave, our whole life is here. And moving to a bank now to make more money (if I even would, the tenure and promotions do pile up) means working harder and more hours. That comes out of spending time with my young kids.
I spent a couple of years having a tough time with this. It genuinely caused a long-term, slow burn existential crisis that only recently started to settle into a stable state. All of life is moral compromise, I think. It sucks and I’m sorry, but it would be too hard to stop and I’m just sort of accepting that now.
6. Ask HN: How to get good at social media?
Top comment by tomhoward
In the offline world, much of what "trends" is stuff that hacks people's reward system.
E.g., high-fructose corn syrup, french fries, nicotine, slot machines.
It's bad for us long term, but satisfies our evolved physiological needs in the short term.
Most of the trending content on social media is the same, and much of modern news and commerce has adapted to it.
From what you've said, you're trying to win at the same game, against people/companies who are far more experienced, skilled, resourced and cynical than you.
The answer: don't play that game.
Find a small niche of people you can satisfy with earnestly good quality content.
Think really small - like, 5-10 people, who you can get to know personally and whose interests you can address really really well.
Then grow gradually.
It will seem painfully slow at first, but with a consistent effort over a long enough period of time, you can achieve exponential growth and eventually build a huge audience that really cares about what you have to offer.
One of the best people to follow for guidance on how to do this is Seth Godin. Follow his daily blogs/emails, and read his books, particularly Linchpin, Permission Marketing, Purple Cow and The Dip.
Simon Sinek is another person worth paying attention to.
Top comment by epoch_100
While I use (and mostly like!) GitHub, this is yet another reminder that centralizing so much infrastructure—from package managers to CI pipelines to static websites and more—around one company is a very bad idea, and will likely bite us in the end.
8. Ask HN: What is the best way to learn Lisp in 2020?
Top comment by twalla
Racket is nice, as it's very "batteries-included", you get a nice IDE in DrRacket plus a fairly complete standard library.
I feel like most people seem to gravitate towards Clojure afterwards for "real" projects - it definitely has the most real world adoption. The Java interop and JVM runtime feel like simultaneously Clojure's biggest strength and biggest weakness.
Here are some resources for both:
[Racket]
https://docs.racket-lang.org/guide/intro.html
https://htdp.org/
https://beautifulracket.com/
[Clojure]
https://www.maria.cloud/
https://www.braveclojure.com/clojure-for-the-brave-and-true/
9. Ask HN: What is your strongest argument against remote work?
Top comment by one2know
Wow, so many people here want to date their coworkers. There are other places to meet women than the office. In fact it is probably better that you meet someone not in your office.
Managers are going to be PRO office work because without a venue for all manner of office politics, their effectiveness is diminished, particularly in age-identity politics. They will say something like "we are unable to foster a community of communal idea sharing and mentorship of younger employees." What they want is to use their new hires who are going to be college age to ostracize and push out more experienced workers they want to replace. The whole kumbaya campfire thing does not work if no one can see what the other looks like or if they are in their peer group or not.
10. Ask HN: Tricks to improve posture?
Top comment by Imanari
Wall slides [1]
They are quick and easy to perform and surprisingly effective. After 20 of them I fell my back and neck muscles kind of "activated". They wont fix everything but they are a good immediate action and will also make you more aware of your posture and muscles.
[1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Apk-frSspcU