Recent submissions

Comment · 11 months ago
Ok, in the extreme case, that's a fair point. Tests can't be unlimited in length. But I don't think it's actually that tricky to draw the line. If a typical school test is 1 hour during class, just give students the option to come in at lunch or a free period for an extra period for extra time if needed. That seems easy and reasonable enough to me.
Comment · 11 months ago
Agree!
Comment · 11 months ago
That's a much bigger meta question, like what's even the point of putting timing constraints on any test?

Logistically, my kid has to go a testing center at the school during his free period and/or lunch periods for his extra time. I can imagine that if everyone got extra time, it would be a logistical nightmare.

But I think the reality is that our educational system had just decided that faster is better and that speed is a legitimate way to grade and rank students. Which is stupid.

Comment · 11 months ago
I have a teenager who is at an academically rigorous college prep school. He is incredibly bright and one of the best students in the school. But he has an accommodation in math for extra time because he has a form of dyscalculia which makes him very prone to misreading and mixing up in working memory the numbers, symbols and other formulas. He understands all the concepts well, but his disability results in calculation/mechanical errors unless he has the extra time to check his work multiple times for these errors. I believe this kind of disability and accommodation is legitimate, but I understand why others may disagree. He even says he often feels guilty for getting extra time when others don't. I am sure there are also people who abuse the system and get accommodations when then don't actually need them.
Comment · 7 years ago
"In retrospect Sandy Hook marked the end of the US gun control debate. Once America decided killing children was bearable, it was over." –Dan Hodges
Comment · 7 years ago
Just curious, anyone using Siri regularly these days? If so, how/for what? I keep trying Siri every once in a while but it doesn’t seem to stick. Only use I find is setting an alarm now and then, but I still often just open the app to do it manually.
Comment · 7 years ago
It’s also one more possible point of failure. My adapter causes intermittent skipping and cracklings noises, probably because the contact points aren’t secure. So I’ve basically stopped listening to music and podcasts on my iPhone 8 Plus because of it.
Comment · 7 years ago
I don't think this is a common case for "regular users" but in my library of coding books, I find both very useful. For example, O'Reilly has a very different style/quality compared to Packt. And it's helpful to know when the book was published to know it's recency and whether it may be outdated.
Comment · 7 years ago
I find all notifications and badges disturbing which is why I turn all of them off on my iPhone except for phone calls/text messages from my family, alarms I set, and calendar appointments. Nothing else is so important that it needs to interrupt my work or peace of mind.

I realize that many company cultures won't allow this. But it is a huge boon to productivity and peace of mind.

I check my apps when I want to check them, not when the apps or other people want me to check them.

Comment · 7 years ago
I love Colemak and have used it for years. Typing with it feels absolutely great compared to QWERTY (mostly with less finger travel to reach common keys) but I agree that it's not worth the switch for most people. It took me about 2-3 weeks to be able to type functionally, and then about 6 months before I was as fluent as I was with QWERTY. Hardest part was remembering that the S key was moved right by one key - I kept mistyping S for almost a year.

I did try Dvorak before Colemak and really hated it. Not only was Ctrl+XCVZ a pain, I found that my left pinky got very strained because of the position of the L key which is a very common letter in the English language.

After learning Colemak, I tried practicing QWERTY occasionally to be "bi-keyboard" but I just could not do it. The more I practiced QWERTY, the worse I got with Colemak. So eventually I had to drop QWERTY. Now, whenever I use someone else's computer (usually just to do a small task), I have to hunt-and-peck and it makes me sad.

Comment · 7 years ago
I'm really surprised that Gumroad has such low gross margins. For April 2018 $65k gp on $273k revenue is 24% gm. It looks better in December $135k gp on $341k revenue is 40%, but still lower that what I would have thought. Is it credit card processing fees? Server costs? What am I missing?
Comment · 8 years ago
Few thoughts: For me personally, I experience a lot of ego depletion during the day. But having kids tends to do that. There's no way I can write at the end of the day, I'm just way to mentally tired. Also as someone who both codes and writes, writing is far more emotionally taxing. Coding is problem solving - there is usually a clear path to follow and I generally know when I've solved a problem. Writing for me is unclear and amorphous. There is almost never a road map, and I never really know when I've "finished." Finally, I think that lark/owl stereotypes are overblown. Up through college, I was absolutely an owl and did my best work from 10pm to 2am. Once I entered the workforce, I was forced into becoming a lark and after a painful transition, loved mornings and did my best work from 6am to 10am. 18 years later, I'm still a "lark" but from time to time, I have to pull late nights and my "owl" tendencies come back quite easily for short periods of time. But I need 8-9 hours of sleep... I can't do both lark and owl at the same time. I think studies show that the vast majority of people are in the middle - neither larks nor owls, and for those people, I believe you can train yourself to be whichever one you want.
Comment · 8 years ago
Also referenced in the news article: https://www.forbes.com/sites/johnkoetsier/2018/10/04/app-sca...

Has anyone else had issues with these deceptive scams in the Apple App Store? I feel like there should be a watchlist of scammy apps somewhere to warn users.

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