15 ms·

PG's Rarely Asked Questions

299 points by wallawe 15y ago

shoham 15y ago
"I'm about to become a teacher. How can I be a good one?" Also, be ready to put up with bullshit from parents, admins and other teachers who insist on the path of least resistance.
denisonwright 15y ago
Interesting, now that I think of it, I have never met someone (except pg) who is a painter and programmer. I've met several programmers who are writers, musicians, carpenters, etc, but never painters. I draw cartoons/caricatures (examples here: http://www.smileecards.com http://www.smileecards.com) and have painted a few times, but I don't quite call myself a painter. About teachers, I totally agree that good teachers earn the respect of the students by having high standard, calling students out on bad quality work. I once suspected a teacher only read the beginning and the end of essays, so I submitted a 4 page essay that contained a recipe for banana cake in the second and third pages; I received a B+!
- _delirium 15y ago
  Harold Cohen is probably the most famous example--- a painter who also programs AI systems (which are themselves painters...): http://crca.ucsd.edu/~hcohen/ http://crca.ucsd.edu/~hcohen/ Although, looking for painters who are also programmers, but programmers of things other than computer-art systems is also an interesting question. Likewise with musicians, people who are musician-programmers in computer music, and people who are musicians and also programmers separately, might be interesting to consider as different groups.
- yannis 15y ago
  I am a Mech Engineer with a passion for programming. I used to paint when I was a kid, but that was a long time ago. Now what I find interesting is that without having read the PG article, I tell people that I program using the water-color technique. I 'sketch' quickly the code and then go back and fill the 'colors' the small refinements for completion and over write a little bit. Now I know other people they code like Architects, have master plans draw out all the details and then code, perhaps Djikstra was one of them and then there are the oil painters (possibly Knuth's style). Reminds me of Michelangelo where he had a great vision but had a lot of assistants to fill some parts (think of all the Ph D students slaving away).
- RodgerTheGreat 15y ago
  I'm a programmer and an artist- my art is mostly done in traditional media like ink, which I consider close enough to paint for comparison. If you pore over my photobucket (http://s280.photobucket.com/home/RodgerTheGreat/index http://s280.photobucket.com/home/RodgerTheGreat/index) you'll find a blend of my drawings and screenshots of projects I've worked on. I think part of this comes from my interest in video games. If you find yourself working as a one man show you'll quickly start developing skills with pixel art (or modeling and texturing if you work in 3D), much as programmers interested in webdev frequently start to pick up skills in graphic design. It would be nice to collaborate with other people and outsource some of these skills, but at the end of the day the best way to get precisely the results you have in mind is to be able to build every component of a project.
- wollw 15y ago
  I guess I do both. While I haven't been doing a lot of real painting recently (working on other projects) I certainly do. I have some paintings on Picasa (https://picasaweb.google.com/105616061675197682498 https://picasaweb.google.com/105616061675197682498) but I'm working on some sculptural work currently that lets me both program and make art (building some cellular automaton related stuff, see https://github.com/Wollw/Automaton-AVR https://github.com/Wollw/Automaton-AVR).
muhfuhkuh 15y ago
"I want to start a startup, but I don't know how to program. How long will it take to learn? I would guess a smart person can learn to hack sufficiently well in 6 months to a year." Hmm... interesting take considering the source, especially when contrasted with the general mentality that programming and software development is the finest of all trades and takes a near preternatural mastery only found elsewhere in classical musicianship 300 years ago. I quite enjoy the feeling that I could be good in a year.
- edanm 15y ago
  Note: he means "good enough", not good. Which brings to mind patio11's constant reminders, that running a successful software business has very very little to do with programming well. Which means that pg thinks that 6 months is the level you need to be at to be able to start a startup. This seems intuitively right to me, especially these days.
  - _delirium 15y ago
    In fact the usual advice is that you shouldn't be doing something technically virtuosic in a startup. If your startup's critical path includes writing something as technically impressive as the Glasgow Haskell Compiler, you might have trouble... Though there are a few people around here who've built software businesses around things that are also nontrivial technical advances; cperciva comes to mind.
    - edanm 15y ago
      I know that's a sentiment that's thrown around here, but I think it's simplistic. I live in Israel, where a very common path to an Exit is to build some sophisticated technology, then sell it after a few years to a larger company. So it is a very possible path you can take. It has its own advantages and disadvantages over the much more visible, much more HN-friendly, "Consumer Internet Startup".
      - bergie 15y ago
Estragon 15y ago
> Couldn't you add something equivalent to Lisp macros to languages like > Perl or Python? > > Not without turning them into dialects of Lisp. Real macros need to > operate on the parse tree of the program. Actually, I've thought about porting some of On Lisp to python using lib2to3 (http://docs.python.org/library/2to3.html http://docs.python.org/library/2to3.html) It's probably an obscenely bad idea, but I keep getting drawn back to it...
- apgwoz 15y ago
  How does 2to3 help you with this? If you intend to port macros, you're sort of out of luck in python.
- njharman 15y ago
  PG's requirements; public ally exposed parse tree and ability to manipulate it before "compiling" doesn't python provide already? It just seems more in your face and 1st class sin lisp.
extramoose 15y ago
I must say that one of the things I value most is the fact that as a Hacker, I have also worked extensively in Landscaping, Kitchens, Coffe houses & Hotels. A wide range of interactions & processes in one's past can always be used as perspective when approaching the next fork in the road.
sthlm 15y ago
The pointy-haired boss is a manager who doesn't program. So the surest way to avoid becoming him is to stay a programmer. What tempts programmers to become managers are companies with old-fashioned corporate structure, where the only way to advance in salary and prestige is to go into management. I have to disagree with that. I've met many people, especially in larger enterprises, who started in development but then became more abstract over time. They weren't bad people, in fact, they were excellent at their job. Programming to me has never been something that has to be continually pursued in order to stay fluent or able, but merely something that reflects your more basic skills and talents. It's like playing a musical instrument. Almost anyone can learn playing the guitar, but it takes a special talent to excel at it. For the guitar this requires hearing, sense of rhythm, and others; for programming, this is analytical thinking, systematic thinking, and more. Some people will try to program but never be really good at it. I studied with people like that. It's not their fault, their skills are just in another area. Some others are great at it. Once they learned, it doesn't matter if they don't develop anything for 3 years; after their break, they look at a piece of code / framework / technology, understand what it does, and continue programming. And the traits that make you a good programmer help you in other fields, even management. Yes, large corporations have structures, but we need structure to manage them. And we need managers. And a manager who was a distinguished developer will be much better suited for leading a team of developers -- even if he doesn't program any longer. This is a valid career path, and an interesting one at that. My general opinion is that if you want to stay a programmer, find yourself a role where you can do that. If not, don't bother pursuing programming at all costs. It won't lead you in the right direction.
- iand 15y ago
  My attitude is when you hire enough programmers that are better than you the best thing to do is get out of their way and focus on building the best environment for them. Call that role management if it helps.
  - sthlm 15y ago
    I find this to be a fairly hostile attitude toward management roles and unfortunately it's one that many people share. And it's ruining part of this industry. Not every manager is a 20-year old MBA grad who's out to ruin your business. What you're describing -- a small team of independent programmers -- accounts for only one part of software engineering projects: programmers are at the center of the efforts, everything else is just overhead. Many projects are more complex. Development spans multiple long-termed iterations, is time and safety-critical, very expensive and only an integrated part of a larger development process (e.g. automotive, aeronautics, ...). A lot of the man hours on these projects go into tasks that don't directly include programming. These are not necessarily management roles. You have Architects, Test Designers, ... not to count all the roles that have nothing to do with IT at all (if you design a car, what percentage or project members are programmers?). I personally think that anyone who works in software engineering should have a strong background in programming/development. But active programming is not necessarily part of many roles in many software engineering projects today. If you don't wish to work in such an environment, no one is forcing you to. If you are, and you are unhappy, explore different options. But don't underestimate the incredible importance that non-programmer roles play in many, many, many projects.
rwmj 15y ago
He's really wrong about LISP macros. Would suggest pg takes a look at camlp4. Edit: maybe instead of downvotes, you could reply explaining what's wrong with this position. Or just look at camlp4 and see how it provides macros that are better (with a better underlying language) than LISP. And yes, I've written a LISP compiler.
- zedshaw 15y ago
  You questioned PG and LISP in one comment then advocated another language with a lesser Nerd Lore Composite Score. About the only thing you could have done worse is to admit you wrote a child porn site in both and found LISP's parentheses to be annoying. :-)
  - Goladus 15y ago
    PG's assertions are often hard to question, probably because he studied philosophy and is very good at logic. He doesn't say it's impossible and his definition of lisp is very inclusive. I read some of the docs for camlp4. It looks like a library for extending ocaml using syntax grammars, similar to Langscape(formerly EasyExtend) for Python. It's not clear whether that really addresses PG's point (a). It would be really nice if rwmj would make his point explicit instead of whining about downvotes and telling people to go slog through camlp4's incomplete, broken-english documentation.
- biot 15y ago
  The downvotes are likely because your position consists of little more than "google why he's wrong". If you wish to refute pg's statement you should explain what's right about your position, such as why camlp4's macros aren't just a prettier syntax on top of a LISP-like abstract syntax tree as the Wikipedia article states.
  - colanderman 15y ago
    Easy reason: camlp4's macros are typechecked. Meaning, it's impossible to build an invalid syntax tree using them.
larrys 15y ago
"Two startups want to hire me. Which should I choose? The one with the most determined and smartest founders (in that order) is the more likely to succeed. " All else being equal this is true and it's good advice. But unfortunately when you are choosing from two startups to work for all else is not equal.
NY_Entrepreneur 15y ago
Nice. He covers several topics that would be good to have covered on some "What I wish my father had explained to me when I was 12, however, I've come to expect that mostly he didn't understand very well.". But among topics it would have been good to have had Dad cover, PG omits the biggie, especially for hackers, maybe for painters -- how to make an A in Women 101-102!
- larrys 15y ago
  "how to make an A in Women 101-102!" My initial reaction to this was to agree with the statement. And I still sort of do. But I think women (or men) can be a big distraction if you are trying to create something. That being said the correct woman or men can help you achieve as well if the relationship is stable. The statement "behind every great man" there is a ... is basically true from my experience.
  - NY_Entrepreneur 15y ago
    "Behind every great man is a woman"? Maybe! In the case of FDR, Ike, Patton, and McArthur, I suspect it was more their mothers than their wives! Few men have such helpful mothers! Then there is your "if the relationship is stable". Well, yes, and 'effective'! So, and especially for the huge fraction of men who don't have mothers as helpful as FDR's, how to get such a 'relationship'????!!!! May I suggest Women 101-102!!!! Otherwise, yup, "can be a big distraction if you are trying to create something". Twelve year old boys, BELIEVE this! Indeed, one of the first lessons in Women 101-102 is: Since the sixth grade or so, you REALLY wanted the girls to like you, right? So, you did this and that and it didn't work very well, right? Well, heavily what the girls want to see in a boy or man is someone strong, capable, and confident who understands the emotions of girls and women and is nice to them. For a while, being a successful quarterback on the varsity football team can work well. But, big secret: What REALLY works well is to be out of school, have a good career going, have plenty of money in your pocket, have a nice car, say, a recent Corvette, have a house bought, and have plenty of money to be able to support a wife and children. Then a large fraction of the females will, to exaggerate a little, do 'just ANYTHING' to be 'friendly'! Usually they won't even be able to help themselves! Uh, that reaction is a 'built-in function'! With these advantages in place, your brand of aftershave, blue jeans, shoes, cell phone, manner, tone of voice, pickup lines, even height and weight, etc. won't much matter! How 'bout that! In particular, largely f'get about females your own age. Instead, in your teens, go for girls 1-4 years younger than you are. If she is 13 and you are 16, then she can be REALLY impressed that you have your own car but won't expect you to have a good career or a house yet! Next, as from an expert on females, "Of COURSE, women are MUCH more emotional than men. That's the cause of all the problems.". Yup, not exactly right, but close! In a 101 level description, what rationalism and logic are for a hacker programming, fixing a car, diagnosing a network problem, etc. emotions are for females. In simple terms, first-cut, at the level males need to understand starting at age 12, the life of a female is all about emotions. Even when she is doing math or science, mostly she is seeking good 'emotions' from praise, acceptance, and approval from others she wants to please! That's enough!
siglesias 15y ago
Re: philosophy, I think understanding the difference between representing the world in language and representing it in logic is critically important to programmers. It has implications for natural language processing as well as artificial intelligence. I personally recommend to anyone endeavoring to understand Wittgenstein's transition from Tractatus Logico Philosophicus to Philosophical Investigations. In fact, Google used the family resemblance concept from PI to inform its search algorithm early on to attribute diffent meanings to the same search term. What you take away is a very precise way to pose questions that make sense and to avoid questions that don't make sense.
- dzuc 15y ago
  (I designed a nested version of the Tractatus if you're interested: http://tractatuslogico-philosophicus.com/ http://tractatuslogico-philosophicus.com/)
  - andreasvc 15y ago
    I spotted two mistakes: it says somewhere "thought it need not be red"; should be "though". Proposition 4.022 should be called 4.002, according to my edition and another edition on the web I checked. Perhaps the Gutenberg edition you used is not as properly proofread as one would hope. Mentioning the source on the site is probably a good idea, for those not inclined to open up the source and hunt for it.
- chernevik 15y ago
  I disagree with pg about the use of philosophy. If nothing else, Plato should disabuse anyone of the notion that what's obvious to them isn't really that solid. Aristotle at least demonstrates your point about just how hard it is to think systematically about this stuff. The humility gained from those encounters would do a great deal to open people's minds that "there's more on heaven and earth than are dreamt of in your philosophy". Maybe people would less adamant, and pay more attention to why they hold their opinions. If everyone did that, we'd have far more productive discussions.
  - 15y ago
zackattack 15y ago
If somebody compiles the history books into an Amazon shopping list, I would gladly use your affiliate link. I haven't read any of them, which is shameful.
- portman 15y ago
  http://www.amazon.com/Civilisation-Kenneth-Clark/dp/0719568447/ http://www.amazon.com/Civilisation-Kenneth-Clark/dp/07195684... http://www.amazon.com/Medieval-Technology-Social-Change-White/dp/0195002660/ http://www.amazon.com/Medieval-Technology-Social-Change-Whit... http://www.amazon.com/Penguin-Atlas-Ancient-History-Hist/dp/0140511512/ http://www.amazon.com/Penguin-Atlas-Ancient-History-Hist/dp/... http://www.amazon.com/New-Penguin-Atlas-Medieval-History/dp/0140512497/ http://www.amazon.com/New-Penguin-Atlas-Medieval-History/dp/... http://www.amazon.com/World-We-Have-Lost-Explored/dp/0415315271/ http://www.amazon.com/World-We-Have-Lost-Explored/dp/0415315... http://www.amazon.com/Extension-Man-History-Physics-Quantum/dp/0262523868/ http://www.amazon.com/Extension-Man-History-Physics-Quantum/... http://www.amazon.com/Autobiography-Benjamin-Franklin/dp/1612930131/ http://www.amazon.com/Autobiography-Benjamin-Franklin/dp/161... http://www.amazon.com/Life-English-Country-House-Architectural/dp/0300058705/ http://www.amazon.com/Life-English-Country-House-Architectur... http://www.amazon.com/Mohammed-Charlemagne-Henri-Pirenne/dp/159740487X/ http://www.amazon.com/Mohammed-Charlemagne-Henri-Pirenne/dp/... http://www.amazon.com/Fall-Constantinople-1453-Canto/dp/0521398320/ http://www.amazon.com/Fall-Constantinople-1453-Canto/dp/0521... http://www.amazon.com/Guns-Sails-Empires-Technological-Innovation/dp/089745071X/ http://www.amazon.com/Guns-Sails-Empires-Technological-Innov... http://www.amazon.com/History-Rome-Origins-Roman-Historians/dp/B000KTLMLC/ http://www.amazon.com/History-Rome-Origins-Roman-Historians/... http://www.amazon.com/Art-War-Middle-Ages-378-1515/dp/0801490626/ http://www.amazon.com/Art-War-Middle-Ages-378-1515/dp/080149... http://www.amazon.com/Lives-Artists-Oxford-Worlds-Classics/dp/0199537194/ http://www.amazon.com/Lives-Artists-Oxford-Worlds-Classics/d... http://www.amazon.com/Golden-Trade-Moors-Kingdoms-Fourteenth/dp/1558760911/ http://www.amazon.com/Golden-Trade-Moors-Kingdoms-Fourteenth... http://www.amazon.com/Gallic-Wars-Caesars-Account-Conquest/dp/1934941425/ http://www.amazon.com/Gallic-Wars-Caesars-Account-Conquest/d... http://www.amazon.com/Copernican-Revolution-Planetary-Astronomy-Development/dp/0674171039/ http://www.amazon.com/Copernican-Revolution-Planetary-Astron... Note that about half of these are out of print.
NY_Entrepreneur 15y ago
"I want to start a startup, but I don't know how to program. How long will it take to learn?" A year? Depends! To be very useful on Windows, really need to be okay on the content of several books, each about 1000 pages long, have worked through about 2500 Web pages of documentation at Microsoft's MSDN, along with more pages from other sources. Then need to write some code, at least as exercises, using what learned. For writing code, need to learn either an integrated development environment (IDE), e.g., Visual Studio, or get good with a powerful text editor (I use KEdit) and its macro language (I have about 150 such macros) and a scripting language. And need to get good with Windows, e.g., have traversed much of the obscure tree of things to click on. And need to be good at software installation, e.g., .NET Framework, service packs, IIS (for a Web server), Internet Explorer and some other Web browsers, likely some version of Office, maybe Knuth's TeX, SQL Server or some alternative, etc. Should learn some Word, Excel, and PowerPoint. Should learn some T-SQL, HTML, CSS, ASP.NET, and ADO.NET. Also need to be good at backup and recovery, ESPECIALLY of the operating system and boot drive. A year? Want to give up sleep for a year?
- pbreit 15y ago
  For web development, you don't need any of that. And anyone taking up pg's suggestion should not be using anything from Microsoft.
  - NY_Entrepreneur 15y ago
    "For web development, you don't need any of that." For Web development on Windows, that is a good list of a minimal list of EXACTLY what is needed. Web development on Windows is JUST what I'm doing, and that list of topics is JUST what is centrally involved. What are you going to leave out? T-SQL? OS backup and recovery? Good skills with an IDE or editor? Yes, learning most of, say, Visual Basic by itself is easy. The 'rub' is that for anything at all serious in Web development or just software development, it is just crucial to make good use of .NET, and that is HUGE. For a long time, nearly each time you turn around, you will need to use another .NET class, and that will take you 1-3 dozen Web pages at MSDN to find, download, save, index, abstract, and read. The total of MSDN Web pages needed adds up quickly: I have over 2500 now, and it grows quickly. Just yesterday I downloaded a lot just for 'request data validation'. Before that, the topics were HtmlEncode and UriEncode. Before that, TCP/IP sockets. Before that, Windows Communications Foundation. Before that Windows 'remoting'. Before that, Windows remote procedure call. Before that, a LOT on SQL Server administration and mangement. And on and on and on. It's ENORMOUS.
richcollins 15y ago
Couldn't you add something equivalent to Lisp macros to languages like Perl or Python? Yes, see Io: http://iolanguage.com/ http://iolanguage.com/ http://www.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/64mgk/why_io_has_a_very_clean_mirror_on_the_io/ http://www.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/64mgk/why_io_ha... http://web.archive.org/web/20090427182332/http://hackety.org/2008/01/05/ioHasAVeryCleanMirror.html http://web.archive.org/web/20090427182332/http://hackety.org...
- phaedrus 15y ago
  I was about to say the same thing. Since Io represents the program as an expression tree of messages, you can write macros to operate on the message tree, and they work for Io's syntax as easily as Lisp macros work for Lisp syntax.
- anatoly 15y ago
  Also see metalua.
- thisrod 15y ago
  Also see Smalltalk, for contrast. Lisp's uniform syntax lets the interpreter rewrite parts of programs; Smalltalk's uniform semantics let programs rewrite parts of the interpreter. PG's discussion of objects overlooks that. OMeta looks like a combination of the two. It sounds really interesting, but I suspect it's for people smarter than me.
- draegtun 15y ago
  Ditto for Ioke & Perl6. Some previous HN posts: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2144067 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2144067 & http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2157961 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2157961
jackfoxy 15y ago
What should I read to learn more about history? I used to consider my knowledge of history better than at least 95% of the population, but while reading The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire I realized how sketchy my view of history really was. So at the ripe old age of 35 I set off on a course of study centered on two series of books, The Story of Civilization, by Will and Ariel Durant, and Timeframe, a Time-Life series focusing on a timeframe in human history and what was going on in all parts of the world inhabited by man: lots of pictures and of course superficial, but it painted in a lot of gaps I othewise would have never covered. The Timeframe series starts much earlier than the Durant's, but once both series were in sync I would read the books in both series for an epoch, as well as at least two other books, either written in the era or about the era, drawing mostly from science, culture, and biography. For instance I read all the books of Euclid, Newton's Optiks and Principia (I slogged through the Motte transaltion before the first modern English translation became available), The Wealth of Nations, Shelby Foote's 3-volume history of the Civil War, and The Origen of Species. (It's real easy for me to spot folks who spoot-off about Wealth or Origen who have not actually read the books.) My program culminated with Tragedy and Hope, which being such an inflammatory work, I did not trust to read without the full background of history. The process was like watching Western Civilization unfolding. Now for the unintended consequences: I became a bore at cocktail parties. I wanted to talk about the ideas in the fascinating book I was reading. I used to love arguing politics. Even with my prior knowledge it was hard enough finding opponents who would engage in rational discourse, now it is impossible. It's been so long my debating skills have totally gone down the tubes. The sad thing is I believe my problem is really society's. Political correctness (among other problems) in academia, has produced a generation of intellectually crippled intellectuals; and the entertainment industry, including the 24-hour news cycle as entertainment, has just stupefied people. I fear for democracy and republican government.
- zedshaw 15y ago
  The force is strong with this one. I'd love to debate random topics with you. Assuming you've actually read everything you claim, I think you'd be a refreshing change from the vast majority of people who simply regurgitate whatever their heroes say. If you're interested, email me sometime: zedshaw at zedshaw.com.
dgreensp 15y ago
>I never had to manage anyone in our startup, even though I was the president. The other hackers were my peers, and would have given me the raspberry if I'd tried to "manage" them. We operated by consensus. And the rest of the company reported to our experienced COO, who was also more of a peer. Operating by consensus and not valuing the role of "manager" only goes so far. It may work when you're a few people living together, but I think it ultimately leads to cultures like Google's, where every decision requires a room full of engineers to agree.
- frisco 15y ago
  Are you saying that Google is anything other than one of the world's most wildly successful companies of the last decade?
  - sjtgraham 15y ago
    No, he is saying operating by consensus doesn't scale.
    - deleted 15y ago
      [deleted]
    - tarmstrong 15y ago
      "Scale" is a funny word. It doesn't scale in terms of decision making speed. But it does scale in terms of decision making quality. Obviously if social cohesion within the group is too high, or if the people present cross too many hierarchical levels, the group won't use its diversity to make excellent decisions. But if done properly, including more people in decision making results in good decisions. This is one of the ways that you can get over narrow-minded specialists making decisions that work for them but screw everybody else.
  - cwp 15y ago
    Google has had both success and failure. The successes have paid for the failures and then some, but the failures did happen.
- 15y ago
breck 15y ago
> The pointy-haired boss is a manager who doesn't program. So > the surest way to avoid becoming him is to stay a programmer. I agree. One of the absolute worst pieces of advice I got over and over again was "don't go into programming. It's all being outsourced overseas anyway. Just learn how to manage programmers." Luckily for some reason I finally decided to ignore that advice and strive to become a great programmer myself. One of the, if not the, best decisions in my entire life. Even now, although I certainly could become more of a "manager", I choose to stay in the pit coding. Although I now do tasks that can be called "managing" such as helping out other coders with their bugs and problems, mentoring, communicating with people outside of engineering, recruiting and interviewing, the biggest chunk of my time is spent programming and working on my skills. It's worked for PG. It's worked for Paul Farmer(replace "programming" with "doctoring"). I'd bet it's worked for nearly every master of their field. I think it's an essential rule to follow.
- kemiller 15y ago
  Those task are not just things that could be called "managing" they ARE managing. I think it's funny that programmers think of managing as this horrid thing outside their realm, but really, it's just the skill of working with others and extending your reach beyond your own fingers. To that end, I think PG is dead wrong. Programmers can make great managers, and find it very rewarding, even if they're not in code all day. There's as much variation in that end of the business as their is in the coding. Would you go into programming if you believed that ever job was a dead-end VB jockey? Of course not. The way to avoid being a PHB is to avoid behaving like a PHB.
moomin 15y ago
Bertrand Russell's History of Western Philosophy is a great place to start. Of course, it's as much an introduction to his thinking as anyone else's, but it's accessible and thoughtful. Memorable for the phrase "existence is not a predicate".
corin_ 15y ago
Does anyone have any insight into why painters are less common among hackers than other artistic persuits, such as music? I've never met anyone who bridged visual art with anything tech-related, but composers, singers, pianists, orchestra members... hell yes. Is it just that painters are less common that musicians and that ratio stays true in the tech world?
- Samuel_Michon 15y ago
  "I've never met anyone who bridged visual art with anything tech-related" You've never met a web designer, video editor, 3D artist or graphic designer?
  - corin_ 15y ago
    Yeah my bad, wasn't specific enough - I meant painters, sculpters and the like. In my head they are called "art", I have to make an active decision to think of "art" as "the arts" including other things - guess just the way I learned the vocab. as a kid. So it was already a step to edit from "art" to "visual art". Perhaps I should have gone with "static visual art that is created for the sake of being art"? As to your examples, I suspect the main reason that there's such a link is (obviously) the big crossover. If you're an artist who wants to make money making websites, or videos, or whatever, it makes sense to learn at least some of the technology related to it to help you. And if you're, say, a website developer, it sometimes makes sense to go the other way too.
    - Samuel_Michon 15y ago
      "I meant painters, sculpters and the like." I don't believe there's a difference. All the good graphic designers I know don't only do applied design for clients, they also create "static visual art that is created for the sake of being art". On the other hand, most sculptors I know mostly create statues for banks and local governments. Having attended art school, I can tell you there is little art free from commerce and it mostly is no good. Having some constraints actually helps the quality of the work.
urza 15y ago
I clicked through to the Return of the Mac [1] article and it would be of interest to me to know how this community and PG sees the Macs today? Recently some people on HN said that they dont like where the Lion is heading [2] or that OS X is goining to be more closed than open [3]. So.. what are you hacking on today? [1] http://www.paulgraham.com/mac.html http://www.paulgraham.com/mac.html [2] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2933895 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2933895 [3] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2368932 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2368932
seanmccann 15y ago
How important is knowledge of history when it comes to building a startup? What are the most important periods of time to learn about?
- biot 15y ago
  Start with 1995 - 2001.
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shithead 15y ago
I wish some people would bless us with dates on their timeless essays. (You too, Peter Norvig.)
- jed_s 15y ago
  http://wayback.archive.org/web/*/http://www.paulgraham.com/raq.html http://wayback.archive.org/web/*/http://www.paulgraham.com/r... crawled 130 times going all the way back to February 7, 2004
ecocentrik 15y ago
PG lost me at the first question. A better answer would be; they are both highly technical skills with almost no overlap that take boatloads of time to master. We all know the bene gesserit mantra...
- delano 15y ago
  That question is a reference to this essay (and later, book of the same name): http://www.paulgraham.com/hp.html http://www.paulgraham.com/hp.html
onan_barbarian 15y ago
The tendentious answer on philosophy is an invitation for what would be another "Dabblers and Blowhards" drive-by shooting. It's not enormously surprising that this question is 'rarely asked'. One would learn a lot more about philosophy ("what questions are these guys asking?" "what are some of the answers they've come to?") from even a mediocre introductory text or a chat with a TA/tutor, than by assuming that this rather sophomoric answer represents a reasonable response to the entire field. Calling it 'sophomoric' doesn't properly engage with the claims, but the claims are so smug, random and content-free: "Books on philosophy per se are either highly technical stuff that doesn't matter much, or vague concatenations of abstractions their own authors didn't fully understand (e.g. Hegel)... It can be interesting to study ancient philosophy, but more as a kind of accident report than to teach you anything useful." ... that I can't find anything remotely meaningful to engage with. Someone recommended Russell's History of Western Philosophy as an option; this isn't bad (although its treatment of Continental philosophy is hopelessly biased, it would still be enough to get you oriented). The fact that whenever PG makes statements on some area I understand more about (philosophy, politics, economics) seem to be incredibly shallow, juvenile crowd-pleasers, makes me wonder at his expertise in areas that I don't know much about (history, painting).
- forensic 15y ago
  What kind of people does pg draw in? Its mainly naive young programmers (socially stunted nerds) who believe they are smarter than everyone and have everything figured out. I believe nerd hubris comes from a fundamental lack of empathy; an inability to put themselves in the shoes of people who are different. People who lack perspective are easy pickings for silver tongued writers who make emotionally-potent audience-felating oversimplifications.
  - AmericanOP 15y ago
    I don't understand why this crowd is more likely to hit the verbal 'dislike' button than average. Why do people think it's so important to share that they resist the attraction of something? The name-calling and prodding is especially disturbing.
- 15y ago
shin_lao 15y ago
I'm not sure the advice about "not becoming a pointy haired boss" is any good. Not all structures can stay small enough to avoid management. The startup phase is just an initial phase that will dysfunction as the number of employees grow. Additionally, I don't think that having a manager who programs is a way to increase management quality. So how do you get good management? There's no simple answer to that, it's a central problem to all companies as they grow.
ekm2 15y ago
All of you have covered Western History extremely well.Which are the best books to study Asian and African History?
draegtun 15y ago
Couldn't you add something equivalent to Lisp macros to languages like Perl or Python? Perl6 comes with full Lisp-like macros: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perl_6#Macros http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perl_6#Macros See previous HN discussion on this: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1279238 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1279238

299 points by wallawe 15y ago

"I'm about to become a teacher. How can I be a good one?" Also, be ready to put up with bullshit from parents, admins and other teachers who insist on the path of least resistance.

denisonwright 15y ago

Interesting, now that I think of it, I have never met someone (except pg) who is a painter and programmer. I've met several programmers who are writers, musicians, carpenters, etc, but never painters. I draw cartoons/caricatures (examples here: http://www.smileecards.com http://www.smileecards.com) and have painted a few times, but I don't quite call myself a painter. About teachers, I totally agree that good teachers earn the respect of the students by having high standard, calling students out on bad quality work. I once suspected a teacher only read the beginning and the end of essays, so I submitted a 4 page essay that contained a recipe for banana cake in the second and third pages; I received a B+!

_delirium 15y ago
Harold Cohen is probably the most famous example--- a painter who also programs AI systems (which are themselves painters...): http://crca.ucsd.edu/~hcohen/ http://crca.ucsd.edu/~hcohen/ Although, looking for painters who are also programmers, but programmers of things other than computer-art systems is also an interesting question. Likewise with musicians, people who are musician-programmers in computer music, and people who are musicians and also programmers separately, might be interesting to consider as different groups.
yannis 15y ago
I am a Mech Engineer with a passion for programming. I used to paint when I was a kid, but that was a long time ago. Now what I find interesting is that without having read the PG article, I tell people that I program using the water-color technique. I 'sketch' quickly the code and then go back and fill the 'colors' the small refinements for completion and over write a little bit. Now I know other people they code like Architects, have master plans draw out all the details and then code, perhaps Djikstra was one of them and then there are the oil painters (possibly Knuth's style). Reminds me of Michelangelo where he had a great vision but had a lot of assistants to fill some parts (think of all the Ph D students slaving away).
RodgerTheGreat 15y ago
I'm a programmer and an artist- my art is mostly done in traditional media like ink, which I consider close enough to paint for comparison. If you pore over my photobucket (http://s280.photobucket.com/home/RodgerTheGreat/index http://s280.photobucket.com/home/RodgerTheGreat/index) you'll find a blend of my drawings and screenshots of projects I've worked on. I think part of this comes from my interest in video games. If you find yourself working as a one man show you'll quickly start developing skills with pixel art (or modeling and texturing if you work in 3D), much as programmers interested in webdev frequently start to pick up skills in graphic design. It would be nice to collaborate with other people and outsource some of these skills, but at the end of the day the best way to get precisely the results you have in mind is to be able to build every component of a project.
wollw 15y ago
I guess I do both. While I haven't been doing a lot of real painting recently (working on other projects) I certainly do. I have some paintings on Picasa (https://picasaweb.google.com/105616061675197682498 https://picasaweb.google.com/105616061675197682498) but I'm working on some sculptural work currently that lets me both program and make art (building some cellular automaton related stuff, see https://github.com/Wollw/Automaton-AVR https://github.com/Wollw/Automaton-AVR).

muhfuhkuh 15y ago

"I want to start a startup, but I don't know how to program. How long will it take to learn? I would guess a smart person can learn to hack sufficiently well in 6 months to a year." Hmm... interesting take considering the source, especially when contrasted with the general mentality that programming and software development is the finest of all trades and takes a near preternatural mastery only found elsewhere in classical musicianship 300 years ago. I quite enjoy the feeling that I could be good in a year.

edanm 15y ago
Note: he means "good enough", not good. Which brings to mind patio11's constant reminders, that running a successful software business has very very little to do with programming well. Which means that pg thinks that 6 months is the level you need to be at to be able to start a startup. This seems intuitively right to me, especially these days.
- _delirium 15y ago
  In fact the usual advice is that you shouldn't be doing something technically virtuosic in a startup. If your startup's critical path includes writing something as technically impressive as the Glasgow Haskell Compiler, you might have trouble... Though there are a few people around here who've built software businesses around things that are also nontrivial technical advances; cperciva comes to mind.
  - edanm 15y ago
    I know that's a sentiment that's thrown around here, but I think it's simplistic. I live in Israel, where a very common path to an Exit is to build some sophisticated technology, then sell it after a few years to a larger company. So it is a very possible path you can take. It has its own advantages and disadvantages over the much more visible, much more HN-friendly, "Consumer Internet Startup".
    - bergie 15y ago

Estragon 15y ago

> Couldn't you add something equivalent to Lisp macros to languages like > Perl or Python? > > Not without turning them into dialects of Lisp. Real macros need to > operate on the parse tree of the program. Actually, I've thought about porting some of On Lisp to python using lib2to3 (http://docs.python.org/library/2to3.html http://docs.python.org/library/2to3.html) It's probably an obscenely bad idea, but I keep getting drawn back to it...

apgwoz 15y ago
How does 2to3 help you with this? If you intend to port macros, you're sort of out of luck in python.
njharman 15y ago
PG's requirements; public ally exposed parse tree and ability to manipulate it before "compiling" doesn't python provide already? It just seems more in your face and 1st class sin lisp.

extramoose 15y ago

I must say that one of the things I value most is the fact that as a Hacker, I have also worked extensively in Landscaping, Kitchens, Coffe houses & Hotels. A wide range of interactions & processes in one's past can always be used as perspective when approaching the next fork in the road.

sthlm 15y ago

The pointy-haired boss is a manager who doesn't program. So the surest way to avoid becoming him is to stay a programmer. What tempts programmers to become managers are companies with old-fashioned corporate structure, where the only way to advance in salary and prestige is to go into management. I have to disagree with that. I've met many people, especially in larger enterprises, who started in development but then became more abstract over time. They weren't bad people, in fact, they were excellent at their job. Programming to me has never been something that has to be continually pursued in order to stay fluent or able, but merely something that reflects your more basic skills and talents. It's like playing a musical instrument. Almost anyone can learn playing the guitar, but it takes a special talent to excel at it. For the guitar this requires hearing, sense of rhythm, and others; for programming, this is analytical thinking, systematic thinking, and more. Some people will try to program but never be really good at it. I studied with people like that. It's not their fault, their skills are just in another area. Some others are great at it. Once they learned, it doesn't matter if they don't develop anything for 3 years; after their break, they look at a piece of code / framework / technology, understand what it does, and continue programming. And the traits that make you a good programmer help you in other fields, even management. Yes, large corporations have structures, but we need structure to manage them. And we need managers. And a manager who was a distinguished developer will be much better suited for leading a team of developers -- even if he doesn't program any longer. This is a valid career path, and an interesting one at that. My general opinion is that if you want to stay a programmer, find yourself a role where you can do that. If not, don't bother pursuing programming at all costs. It won't lead you in the right direction.

iand 15y ago
My attitude is when you hire enough programmers that are better than you the best thing to do is get out of their way and focus on building the best environment for them. Call that role management if it helps.
- sthlm 15y ago
  I find this to be a fairly hostile attitude toward management roles and unfortunately it's one that many people share. And it's ruining part of this industry. Not every manager is a 20-year old MBA grad who's out to ruin your business. What you're describing -- a small team of independent programmers -- accounts for only one part of software engineering projects: programmers are at the center of the efforts, everything else is just overhead. Many projects are more complex. Development spans multiple long-termed iterations, is time and safety-critical, very expensive and only an integrated part of a larger development process (e.g. automotive, aeronautics, ...). A lot of the man hours on these projects go into tasks that don't directly include programming. These are not necessarily management roles. You have Architects, Test Designers, ... not to count all the roles that have nothing to do with IT at all (if you design a car, what percentage or project members are programmers?). I personally think that anyone who works in software engineering should have a strong background in programming/development. But active programming is not necessarily part of many roles in many software engineering projects today. If you don't wish to work in such an environment, no one is forcing you to. If you are, and you are unhappy, explore different options. But don't underestimate the incredible importance that non-programmer roles play in many, many, many projects.

rwmj 15y ago

He's really wrong about LISP macros. Would suggest pg takes a look at camlp4. Edit: maybe instead of downvotes, you could reply explaining what's wrong with this position. Or just look at camlp4 and see how it provides macros that are better (with a better underlying language) than LISP. And yes, I've written a LISP compiler.

zedshaw 15y ago
You questioned PG and LISP in one comment then advocated another language with a lesser Nerd Lore Composite Score. About the only thing you could have done worse is to admit you wrote a child porn site in both and found LISP's parentheses to be annoying. :-)
- Goladus 15y ago
  PG's assertions are often hard to question, probably because he studied philosophy and is very good at logic. He doesn't say it's impossible and his definition of lisp is very inclusive. I read some of the docs for camlp4. It looks like a library for extending ocaml using syntax grammars, similar to Langscape(formerly EasyExtend) for Python. It's not clear whether that really addresses PG's point (a). It would be really nice if rwmj would make his point explicit instead of whining about downvotes and telling people to go slog through camlp4's incomplete, broken-english documentation.
biot 15y ago
The downvotes are likely because your position consists of little more than "google why he's wrong". If you wish to refute pg's statement you should explain what's right about your position, such as why camlp4's macros aren't just a prettier syntax on top of a LISP-like abstract syntax tree as the Wikipedia article states.
- colanderman 15y ago
  Easy reason: camlp4's macros are typechecked. Meaning, it's impossible to build an invalid syntax tree using them.

larrys 15y ago

"Two startups want to hire me. Which should I choose? The one with the most determined and smartest founders (in that order) is the more likely to succeed. " All else being equal this is true and it's good advice. But unfortunately when you are choosing from two startups to work for all else is not equal.

NY_Entrepreneur 15y ago

Nice. He covers several topics that would be good to have covered on some "What I wish my father had explained to me when I was 12, however, I've come to expect that mostly he didn't understand very well.". But among topics it would have been good to have had Dad cover, PG omits the biggie, especially for hackers, maybe for painters -- how to make an A in Women 101-102!

larrys 15y ago
"how to make an A in Women 101-102!" My initial reaction to this was to agree with the statement. And I still sort of do. But I think women (or men) can be a big distraction if you are trying to create something. That being said the correct woman or men can help you achieve as well if the relationship is stable. The statement "behind every great man" there is a ... is basically true from my experience.
- NY_Entrepreneur 15y ago
  "Behind every great man is a woman"? Maybe! In the case of FDR, Ike, Patton, and McArthur, I suspect it was more their mothers than their wives! Few men have such helpful mothers! Then there is your "if the relationship is stable". Well, yes, and 'effective'! So, and especially for the huge fraction of men who don't have mothers as helpful as FDR's, how to get such a 'relationship'????!!!! May I suggest Women 101-102!!!! Otherwise, yup, "can be a big distraction if you are trying to create something". Twelve year old boys, BELIEVE this! Indeed, one of the first lessons in Women 101-102 is: Since the sixth grade or so, you REALLY wanted the girls to like you, right? So, you did this and that and it didn't work very well, right? Well, heavily what the girls want to see in a boy or man is someone strong, capable, and confident who understands the emotions of girls and women and is nice to them. For a while, being a successful quarterback on the varsity football team can work well. But, big secret: What REALLY works well is to be out of school, have a good career going, have plenty of money in your pocket, have a nice car, say, a recent Corvette, have a house bought, and have plenty of money to be able to support a wife and children. Then a large fraction of the females will, to exaggerate a little, do 'just ANYTHING' to be 'friendly'! Usually they won't even be able to help themselves! Uh, that reaction is a 'built-in function'! With these advantages in place, your brand of aftershave, blue jeans, shoes, cell phone, manner, tone of voice, pickup lines, even height and weight, etc. won't much matter! How 'bout that! In particular, largely f'get about females your own age. Instead, in your teens, go for girls 1-4 years younger than you are. If she is 13 and you are 16, then she can be REALLY impressed that you have your own car but won't expect you to have a good career or a house yet! Next, as from an expert on females, "Of COURSE, women are MUCH more emotional than men. That's the cause of all the problems.". Yup, not exactly right, but close! In a 101 level description, what rationalism and logic are for a hacker programming, fixing a car, diagnosing a network problem, etc. emotions are for females. In simple terms, first-cut, at the level males need to understand starting at age 12, the life of a female is all about emotions. Even when she is doing math or science, mostly she is seeking good 'emotions' from praise, acceptance, and approval from others she wants to please! That's enough!

siglesias 15y ago

Re: philosophy, I think understanding the difference between representing the world in language and representing it in logic is critically important to programmers. It has implications for natural language processing as well as artificial intelligence. I personally recommend to anyone endeavoring to understand Wittgenstein's transition from Tractatus Logico Philosophicus to Philosophical Investigations. In fact, Google used the family resemblance concept from PI to inform its search algorithm early on to attribute diffent meanings to the same search term. What you take away is a very precise way to pose questions that make sense and to avoid questions that don't make sense.

dzuc 15y ago
(I designed a nested version of the Tractatus if you're interested: http://tractatuslogico-philosophicus.com/ http://tractatuslogico-philosophicus.com/)
- andreasvc 15y ago
  I spotted two mistakes: it says somewhere "thought it need not be red"; should be "though". Proposition 4.022 should be called 4.002, according to my edition and another edition on the web I checked. Perhaps the Gutenberg edition you used is not as properly proofread as one would hope. Mentioning the source on the site is probably a good idea, for those not inclined to open up the source and hunt for it.
chernevik 15y ago
I disagree with pg about the use of philosophy. If nothing else, Plato should disabuse anyone of the notion that what's obvious to them isn't really that solid. Aristotle at least demonstrates your point about just how hard it is to think systematically about this stuff. The humility gained from those encounters would do a great deal to open people's minds that "there's more on heaven and earth than are dreamt of in your philosophy". Maybe people would less adamant, and pay more attention to why they hold their opinions. If everyone did that, we'd have far more productive discussions.
- 15y ago

zackattack 15y ago

If somebody compiles the history books into an Amazon shopping list, I would gladly use your affiliate link. I haven't read any of them, which is shameful.

portman 15y ago
http://www.amazon.com/Civilisation-Kenneth-Clark/dp/0719568447/ http://www.amazon.com/Civilisation-Kenneth-Clark/dp/07195684... http://www.amazon.com/Medieval-Technology-Social-Change-White/dp/0195002660/ http://www.amazon.com/Medieval-Technology-Social-Change-Whit... http://www.amazon.com/Penguin-Atlas-Ancient-History-Hist/dp/0140511512/ http://www.amazon.com/Penguin-Atlas-Ancient-History-Hist/dp/... http://www.amazon.com/New-Penguin-Atlas-Medieval-History/dp/0140512497/ http://www.amazon.com/New-Penguin-Atlas-Medieval-History/dp/... http://www.amazon.com/World-We-Have-Lost-Explored/dp/0415315271/ http://www.amazon.com/World-We-Have-Lost-Explored/dp/0415315... http://www.amazon.com/Extension-Man-History-Physics-Quantum/dp/0262523868/ http://www.amazon.com/Extension-Man-History-Physics-Quantum/... http://www.amazon.com/Autobiography-Benjamin-Franklin/dp/1612930131/ http://www.amazon.com/Autobiography-Benjamin-Franklin/dp/161... http://www.amazon.com/Life-English-Country-House-Architectural/dp/0300058705/ http://www.amazon.com/Life-English-Country-House-Architectur... http://www.amazon.com/Mohammed-Charlemagne-Henri-Pirenne/dp/159740487X/ http://www.amazon.com/Mohammed-Charlemagne-Henri-Pirenne/dp/... http://www.amazon.com/Fall-Constantinople-1453-Canto/dp/0521398320/ http://www.amazon.com/Fall-Constantinople-1453-Canto/dp/0521... http://www.amazon.com/Guns-Sails-Empires-Technological-Innovation/dp/089745071X/ http://www.amazon.com/Guns-Sails-Empires-Technological-Innov... http://www.amazon.com/History-Rome-Origins-Roman-Historians/dp/B000KTLMLC/ http://www.amazon.com/History-Rome-Origins-Roman-Historians/... http://www.amazon.com/Art-War-Middle-Ages-378-1515/dp/0801490626/ http://www.amazon.com/Art-War-Middle-Ages-378-1515/dp/080149... http://www.amazon.com/Lives-Artists-Oxford-Worlds-Classics/dp/0199537194/ http://www.amazon.com/Lives-Artists-Oxford-Worlds-Classics/d... http://www.amazon.com/Golden-Trade-Moors-Kingdoms-Fourteenth/dp/1558760911/ http://www.amazon.com/Golden-Trade-Moors-Kingdoms-Fourteenth... http://www.amazon.com/Gallic-Wars-Caesars-Account-Conquest/dp/1934941425/ http://www.amazon.com/Gallic-Wars-Caesars-Account-Conquest/d... http://www.amazon.com/Copernican-Revolution-Planetary-Astronomy-Development/dp/0674171039/ http://www.amazon.com/Copernican-Revolution-Planetary-Astron... Note that about half of these are out of print.

NY_Entrepreneur 15y ago

"I want to start a startup, but I don't know how to program. How long will it take to learn?" A year? Depends! To be very useful on Windows, really need to be okay on the content of several books, each about 1000 pages long, have worked through about 2500 Web pages of documentation at Microsoft's MSDN, along with more pages from other sources. Then need to write some code, at least as exercises, using what learned. For writing code, need to learn either an integrated development environment (IDE), e.g., Visual Studio, or get good with a powerful text editor (I use KEdit) and its macro language (I have about 150 such macros) and a scripting language. And need to get good with Windows, e.g., have traversed much of the obscure tree of things to click on. And need to be good at software installation, e.g., .NET Framework, service packs, IIS (for a Web server), Internet Explorer and some other Web browsers, likely some version of Office, maybe Knuth's TeX, SQL Server or some alternative, etc. Should learn some Word, Excel, and PowerPoint. Should learn some T-SQL, HTML, CSS, ASP.NET, and ADO.NET. Also need to be good at backup and recovery, ESPECIALLY of the operating system and boot drive. A year? Want to give up sleep for a year?

pbreit 15y ago
For web development, you don't need any of that. And anyone taking up pg's suggestion should not be using anything from Microsoft.
- NY_Entrepreneur 15y ago
  "For web development, you don't need any of that." For Web development on Windows, that is a good list of a minimal list of EXACTLY what is needed. Web development on Windows is JUST what I'm doing, and that list of topics is JUST what is centrally involved. What are you going to leave out? T-SQL? OS backup and recovery? Good skills with an IDE or editor? Yes, learning most of, say, Visual Basic by itself is easy. The 'rub' is that for anything at all serious in Web development or just software development, it is just crucial to make good use of .NET, and that is HUGE. For a long time, nearly each time you turn around, you will need to use another .NET class, and that will take you 1-3 dozen Web pages at MSDN to find, download, save, index, abstract, and read. The total of MSDN Web pages needed adds up quickly: I have over 2500 now, and it grows quickly. Just yesterday I downloaded a lot just for 'request data validation'. Before that, the topics were HtmlEncode and UriEncode. Before that, TCP/IP sockets. Before that, Windows Communications Foundation. Before that Windows 'remoting'. Before that, Windows remote procedure call. Before that, a LOT on SQL Server administration and mangement. And on and on and on. It's ENORMOUS.

richcollins 15y ago

Couldn't you add something equivalent to Lisp macros to languages like Perl or Python? Yes, see Io: http://iolanguage.com/ http://iolanguage.com/ http://www.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/64mgk/why_io_has_a_very_clean_mirror_on_the_io/ http://www.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/64mgk/why_io_ha... http://web.archive.org/web/20090427182332/http://hackety.org/2008/01/05/ioHasAVeryCleanMirror.html http://web.archive.org/web/20090427182332/http://hackety.org...

phaedrus 15y ago
I was about to say the same thing. Since Io represents the program as an expression tree of messages, you can write macros to operate on the message tree, and they work for Io's syntax as easily as Lisp macros work for Lisp syntax.
anatoly 15y ago
Also see metalua.
thisrod 15y ago
Also see Smalltalk, for contrast. Lisp's uniform syntax lets the interpreter rewrite parts of programs; Smalltalk's uniform semantics let programs rewrite parts of the interpreter. PG's discussion of objects overlooks that. OMeta looks like a combination of the two. It sounds really interesting, but I suspect it's for people smarter than me.
draegtun 15y ago
Ditto for Ioke & Perl6. Some previous HN posts: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2144067 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2144067 & http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2157961 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2157961

jackfoxy 15y ago

What should I read to learn more about history? I used to consider my knowledge of history better than at least 95% of the population, but while reading The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire I realized how sketchy my view of history really was. So at the ripe old age of 35 I set off on a course of study centered on two series of books, The Story of Civilization, by Will and Ariel Durant, and Timeframe, a Time-Life series focusing on a timeframe in human history and what was going on in all parts of the world inhabited by man: lots of pictures and of course superficial, but it painted in a lot of gaps I othewise would have never covered. The Timeframe series starts much earlier than the Durant's, but once both series were in sync I would read the books in both series for an epoch, as well as at least two other books, either written in the era or about the era, drawing mostly from science, culture, and biography. For instance I read all the books of Euclid, Newton's Optiks and Principia (I slogged through the Motte transaltion before the first modern English translation became available), The Wealth of Nations, Shelby Foote's 3-volume history of the Civil War, and The Origen of Species. (It's real easy for me to spot folks who spoot-off about Wealth or Origen who have not actually read the books.) My program culminated with Tragedy and Hope, which being such an inflammatory work, I did not trust to read without the full background of history. The process was like watching Western Civilization unfolding. Now for the unintended consequences: I became a bore at cocktail parties. I wanted to talk about the ideas in the fascinating book I was reading. I used to love arguing politics. Even with my prior knowledge it was hard enough finding opponents who would engage in rational discourse, now it is impossible. It's been so long my debating skills have totally gone down the tubes. The sad thing is I believe my problem is really society's. Political correctness (among other problems) in academia, has produced a generation of intellectually crippled intellectuals; and the entertainment industry, including the 24-hour news cycle as entertainment, has just stupefied people. I fear for democracy and republican government.

zedshaw 15y ago
The force is strong with this one. I'd love to debate random topics with you. Assuming you've actually read everything you claim, I think you'd be a refreshing change from the vast majority of people who simply regurgitate whatever their heroes say. If you're interested, email me sometime: zedshaw at zedshaw.com.

dgreensp 15y ago

>I never had to manage anyone in our startup, even though I was the president. The other hackers were my peers, and would have given me the raspberry if I'd tried to "manage" them. We operated by consensus. And the rest of the company reported to our experienced COO, who was also more of a peer. Operating by consensus and not valuing the role of "manager" only goes so far. It may work when you're a few people living together, but I think it ultimately leads to cultures like Google's, where every decision requires a room full of engineers to agree.

frisco 15y ago
Are you saying that Google is anything other than one of the world's most wildly successful companies of the last decade?
- sjtgraham 15y ago
  No, he is saying operating by consensus doesn't scale.
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  - tarmstrong 15y ago
    "Scale" is a funny word. It doesn't scale in terms of decision making speed. But it does scale in terms of decision making quality. Obviously if social cohesion within the group is too high, or if the people present cross too many hierarchical levels, the group won't use its diversity to make excellent decisions. But if done properly, including more people in decision making results in good decisions. This is one of the ways that you can get over narrow-minded specialists making decisions that work for them but screw everybody else.
- cwp 15y ago
  Google has had both success and failure. The successes have paid for the failures and then some, but the failures did happen.
15y ago

breck 15y ago

> The pointy-haired boss is a manager who doesn't program. So > the surest way to avoid becoming him is to stay a programmer. I agree. One of the absolute worst pieces of advice I got over and over again was "don't go into programming. It's all being outsourced overseas anyway. Just learn how to manage programmers." Luckily for some reason I finally decided to ignore that advice and strive to become a great programmer myself. One of the, if not the, best decisions in my entire life. Even now, although I certainly could become more of a "manager", I choose to stay in the pit coding. Although I now do tasks that can be called "managing" such as helping out other coders with their bugs and problems, mentoring, communicating with people outside of engineering, recruiting and interviewing, the biggest chunk of my time is spent programming and working on my skills. It's worked for PG. It's worked for Paul Farmer(replace "programming" with "doctoring"). I'd bet it's worked for nearly every master of their field. I think it's an essential rule to follow.

kemiller 15y ago
Those task are not just things that could be called "managing" they ARE managing. I think it's funny that programmers think of managing as this horrid thing outside their realm, but really, it's just the skill of working with others and extending your reach beyond your own fingers. To that end, I think PG is dead wrong. Programmers can make great managers, and find it very rewarding, even if they're not in code all day. There's as much variation in that end of the business as their is in the coding. Would you go into programming if you believed that ever job was a dead-end VB jockey? Of course not. The way to avoid being a PHB is to avoid behaving like a PHB.

moomin 15y ago

Bertrand Russell's History of Western Philosophy is a great place to start. Of course, it's as much an introduction to his thinking as anyone else's, but it's accessible and thoughtful. Memorable for the phrase "existence is not a predicate".

corin_ 15y ago

Does anyone have any insight into why painters are less common among hackers than other artistic persuits, such as music? I've never met anyone who bridged visual art with anything tech-related, but composers, singers, pianists, orchestra members... hell yes. Is it just that painters are less common that musicians and that ratio stays true in the tech world?

Samuel_Michon 15y ago
"I've never met anyone who bridged visual art with anything tech-related" You've never met a web designer, video editor, 3D artist or graphic designer?
- corin_ 15y ago
  Yeah my bad, wasn't specific enough - I meant painters, sculpters and the like. In my head they are called "art", I have to make an active decision to think of "art" as "the arts" including other things - guess just the way I learned the vocab. as a kid. So it was already a step to edit from "art" to "visual art". Perhaps I should have gone with "static visual art that is created for the sake of being art"? As to your examples, I suspect the main reason that there's such a link is (obviously) the big crossover. If you're an artist who wants to make money making websites, or videos, or whatever, it makes sense to learn at least some of the technology related to it to help you. And if you're, say, a website developer, it sometimes makes sense to go the other way too.
  - Samuel_Michon 15y ago
    "I meant painters, sculpters and the like." I don't believe there's a difference. All the good graphic designers I know don't only do applied design for clients, they also create "static visual art that is created for the sake of being art". On the other hand, most sculptors I know mostly create statues for banks and local governments. Having attended art school, I can tell you there is little art free from commerce and it mostly is no good. Having some constraints actually helps the quality of the work.

urza 15y ago

I clicked through to the Return of the Mac [1] article and it would be of interest to me to know how this community and PG sees the Macs today? Recently some people on HN said that they dont like where the Lion is heading [2] or that OS X is goining to be more closed than open [3]. So.. what are you hacking on today? [1] http://www.paulgraham.com/mac.html http://www.paulgraham.com/mac.html [2] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2933895 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2933895 [3] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2368932 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2368932

seanmccann 15y ago

How important is knowledge of history when it comes to building a startup? What are the most important periods of time to learn about?

biot 15y ago
Start with 1995 - 2001.

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shithead 15y ago

I wish some people would bless us with dates on their timeless essays. (You too, Peter Norvig.)

jed_s 15y ago
http://wayback.archive.org/web/*/http://www.paulgraham.com/raq.html http://wayback.archive.org/web/*/http://www.paulgraham.com/r... crawled 130 times going all the way back to February 7, 2004

ecocentrik 15y ago

PG lost me at the first question. A better answer would be; they are both highly technical skills with almost no overlap that take boatloads of time to master. We all know the bene gesserit mantra...

delano 15y ago
That question is a reference to this essay (and later, book of the same name): http://www.paulgraham.com/hp.html http://www.paulgraham.com/hp.html

onan_barbarian 15y ago

The tendentious answer on philosophy is an invitation for what would be another "Dabblers and Blowhards" drive-by shooting. It's not enormously surprising that this question is 'rarely asked'. One would learn a lot more about philosophy ("what questions are these guys asking?" "what are some of the answers they've come to?") from even a mediocre introductory text or a chat with a TA/tutor, than by assuming that this rather sophomoric answer represents a reasonable response to the entire field. Calling it 'sophomoric' doesn't properly engage with the claims, but the claims are so smug, random and content-free: "Books on philosophy per se are either highly technical stuff that doesn't matter much, or vague concatenations of abstractions their own authors didn't fully understand (e.g. Hegel)... It can be interesting to study ancient philosophy, but more as a kind of accident report than to teach you anything useful." ... that I can't find anything remotely meaningful to engage with. Someone recommended Russell's History of Western Philosophy as an option; this isn't bad (although its treatment of Continental philosophy is hopelessly biased, it would still be enough to get you oriented). The fact that whenever PG makes statements on some area I understand more about (philosophy, politics, economics) seem to be incredibly shallow, juvenile crowd-pleasers, makes me wonder at his expertise in areas that I don't know much about (history, painting).

forensic 15y ago
What kind of people does pg draw in? Its mainly naive young programmers (socially stunted nerds) who believe they are smarter than everyone and have everything figured out. I believe nerd hubris comes from a fundamental lack of empathy; an inability to put themselves in the shoes of people who are different. People who lack perspective are easy pickings for silver tongued writers who make emotionally-potent audience-felating oversimplifications.
- AmericanOP 15y ago
  I don't understand why this crowd is more likely to hit the verbal 'dislike' button than average. Why do people think it's so important to share that they resist the attraction of something? The name-calling and prodding is especially disturbing.
15y ago

shin_lao 15y ago

I'm not sure the advice about "not becoming a pointy haired boss" is any good. Not all structures can stay small enough to avoid management. The startup phase is just an initial phase that will dysfunction as the number of employees grow. Additionally, I don't think that having a manager who programs is a way to increase management quality. So how do you get good management? There's no simple answer to that, it's a central problem to all companies as they grow.

ekm2 15y ago

All of you have covered Western History extremely well.Which are the best books to study Asian and African History?

draegtun 15y ago

Couldn't you add something equivalent to Lisp macros to languages like Perl or Python? Perl6 comes with full Lisp-like macros: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perl_6#Macros http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perl_6#Macros See previous HN discussion on this: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1279238 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1279238