tom_b

48 ms·

1. 211.▲
   by tom_b 15y ago

   I want one to play with and I'm a Linux OS user. I should have picked one up at $99 over the holidays. The comments from the msdn blog are interesting in indicating the lifetime customer value of XBox users with a Kinect to Microsoft. The
2. 212.▲
   by tom_b 15y ago

   Fuck this. I think the real danger is being the 12-year master of TPF reports at BigCorp, Inc. How do you spin 20 years at BigCorp in an increasingly non-technical role over that time window in a way that would actually excite Google or Fa
3. 213.▲
   by tom_b 15y ago

   Anyone have any insight to why the article says the Kinect for Windows will be $250 vs the $150 regular prices of Kinect for the XBox?
4. 214.▲
   by tom_b 15y ago

   Link to paper FTA: http://research.google.com/pubs/pub36632.html
5. 215.▲
   by tom_b 15y ago

   I love SQL (stay with me). I cut my SQL teeth on SQL scripts written by programmers who were mainly Java jockeys. Lots of imperative code built around getting a result set and iterating over it. I was learning relational programming by pla
6. 216.▲
   by tom_b 15y ago

   Colin, since you also wrote the Tarsnap back-end data engine yourself, how would you weigh a cost vs loss-of-control of that functionality in Tarsnap? From my perspective, the flexibility and control you have over kivaloo generates some val
7. 217.▲
   by tom_b 15y ago

   I am perfectly happy to pay artists and creators directly for their efforts. But I am a traditional consumer - I buy music from iTunes happily, watch movies on-demand even though I hate the cable company, and occasionally buy art directly f
8. 218.▲
   by tom_b 15y ago

   I go to /newest and upvote almost any story that on first glance looks both programming-related and hacker-interesting. Sometimes I upvote startup news/blog postings if they talk about technical details in business (SEO, marketing, languag
9. 219.▲
   by tom_b 15y ago

   The "hard to talk to" test is almost the perfect description of how I feel about working with certain clients (for lack of a better phrase) in my current job. Prior to this gig, I would have said one my strengths was actually working and co
10. 220.▲
    by tom_b 15y ago

    Yes - I remember using these techniques addressing 2d dense matrices. The specific case was when the matrices involved grew so large that the linear access operations were causing page faults for sequential row or column access. This was
11. 221.▲
    by tom_b 15y ago

    Any one that has tools that let me create little DSLs easily (see treetop - ruby, common lisp in general).
12. 222.▲
    by tom_b 15y ago

    So seductive that the focus is on hacking rather than business building. Would love to hear anecdotes about past batches, how far they progressed, and maybe even know a little more about how placements have worked out from the perspective o
13. 223.▲
    by tom_b 15y ago

    I am watching the Durham startup scene these days. There might be a sustainable startup movement cranking up there. The RTP area(Research Triangle Park, where Triangle=Raleigh, Durham, and Chapel Hill for folks who don't already know) is f
14. 224.▲
    by tom_b 15y ago

    The Higbee memory book is fun. I used it to help my kid memorize some things before kindergarten (spell a complicated last name, sing daddy's phone number, where I live, etc). I am planning to refresh my data structures and algorithms back
15. 225.▲
    by tom_b 15y ago

    Challenge HN: Share your checklist for training yourself to be a better hacker. Or to have more successful projects.
16. 226.▲
    by tom_b 15y ago

    Have YC startups done well with a founder(s) remote after the initial 3 months? For example, two stay there and one moves elsewhere but is able to continue contributing at a founder-level?
17. 227.▲
    by tom_b 15y ago

    I have stored XML in Oracle XMLType columns off and on as part of a reporting/data warehouse infrastructure with some success. It is a really cheap way of adding in XML data documents that are small-ish and infrequently used. We typically
18. 228.▲
    by tom_b 15y ago

    The overlap point for me (and I'm too quick because these papers and tools have been knocking around in my head lately) is once you mention what happens in a fatal server crash and you've listed durability as a requirement, we've stepped in
19. 229.▲
    by tom_b 15y ago

    You should check out Lamport's Paxos and logical clock/timestamps for background. Maybe Google's chubby paper and the Apache Zookeeper stuff as well.
20. 230.▲
    by tom_b 15y ago

    patio11 - you say pick up a book on a/b testing - recommendation?
21. 231.▲
    by tom_b 15y ago

    Might be fun to pair with a bluetooth heart rate monitor for highly customized aerobic (running/cycling) workouts. Particularly for allowing someone to easily get a customized interval workout. More specifically, I would enjoy having a hea
22. 232.▲
    by tom_b 15y ago

    I am not sure a web-based job board is the ultimate answer to finding good jobs or candidates. I am coming around to the idea that what top hackers probably should do is build small firms or consultancies where (in addition to the hackers)
23. 233.▲
    by tom_b 15y ago

    I was once handed a database with four SQL procedures in it. Each procedure was 6+ pages of run-on PL/SQL. The picture in the original article is frighteningly close to what I had in hand at that point. Mostly nested cursors and imperati
24. 234.▲
    by tom_b 15y ago

    Second this - I've cooked up some weird SQL to do neat things. Other devs on my team had real problems with it - they were stuck and found it really difficult to "think in sets." They kept asking me about how to use cursors to go through d
25. 235.▲
    by tom_b 15y ago

    "Why do I find all the really howling bad stuff so close to the databases?" Because the database and queries against were were coded as an afterthought. Because the programmers ran all the db access tests against tables with 4 rows of data
26. 236.▲
    Writing a simple SQL data source (SmartGWT Grid Populator))(blog.markwatson.com)

    1 points by tom_b 15y ago|0 comments
27. 237.▲
    by tom_b 15y ago

    I'm a firm believer in the personal network. Finding qualified co-workers through friendship networks has been productive for me and anecdotes I hear usually say this is a good approach. Asking about family when interviewing a candidate is
28. 238.▲
    by tom_b 15y ago

    http://www.tarsnap.com/kivaloo.html The author is pretty active here on HN. Very well documented design and goals. Also well documented for what problems it does not solve. I think around 20k LOC. Seems pretty non-trivial.
29. 239.▲
    by tom_b 15y ago

    I am attracted to these types of DSLs but . . . I work with a number of legacy data sources that often have models that are not ORM-friendly. I fall into SQL code patterns that seem left behind by tools like this on a regular basis, particu
30. 240.▲
    by tom_b 15y ago

    Have a look at: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/208835/function-pointers-... This may help your thoughts in this direction. I'm beginning to think that lambdas/closures/function pointers are design techniques that we should be more fu