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I agree about the limitations - but to buy a 4K TV for the "wow 4K TV!" factor and yet miss including information on the HDMI 1.4 limitations which are not going to be fixed? I disagree with encouraging people to buy such things without showing that it's not as perfect as it sounds.

It's not at all rare to see 120hz at 1080p. You can buy TV's that do that which are twice the size for the same price. So that's not really "rare". We're talking $400 60" tv's here, if black friday is a legitimate comparison. Here's a non black friday deal for military for a $400 40" that does better than the seiki, for example: http://www.amazon.com/Sony-KDL-40R450A-40-Inch-1080p-Black/dp/B00AWKBZQQ or http://slickdeals.net/f/6506806-sams-club-50-tcl-led-1080p-120hz-hdtv-389-fs .

120hz at 1080p was rare in 2009.

Hmm that was the wrong product... http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B008LPFEDO these use a passive filter, and should be much cheaper (if you can consider $300 cheap).

I appreciate you responding back. Thank you.

This is easy to say, a PITA to do

You are so spot on with that comment.

The list of suggestions you give are very similar to the items in What Color Is Your Parachute? and the book offers more suggestions with context as to what works best and highly suggest combinations along with studies to back up everything. Excellent book. I've owned two copies in my life. The most recent I own is the 2012 version, although I link to the 2014.

Despite your excellent advice and the book's excellent advice, I do get frustrated for a few reasons. I'm naturally an introvert. This does not mean I'm shy. (Often people are shocked to find out I'm an introvert because face-to-face, I am easy to talk with and can usually step into conversations when I want.) I've been out networking all week because I am looking for a job close to where I live. Unfortunately, being an introvert, I need my down time. That means not interacting with others to "recharge my batteries". (By contrast, extroverts recharge their batteries when they are around people and interacting with them.) When I do have a full time job, I come home and want to be with my family and doing something other than programming -- not networking and not coding. I have other interests like writing books, martial arts, weight lifting and running, and science fiction related activities. I live seven time zones away from family so that is also high on my priority list. I'm also really bad with names. (I'd forget my name if I didn't remind myself what it is from time to time.) The energies required to maintain a list of contacts over time is too cost prohibitive. My example:

Before I left my last job, I decided to look for a job. I looked for over a year. I kept my full time job during that year and (because I like to think of myself as a man of principle), I don't go looking for work on my boss' dime. Where I used to live, I knew a number of people, but the full time job prevented me from getting out face-to-face which is where I excel. I suck when networking online and over the phone. Despite my challenges, I did manage to get about half a dozen phone interviews. I was not impressed with recruiters nor those potential bosses I spoke with. No one read my resume before getting on the phone with me. I'm not exaggerating. They told me that over the phone or a 30 second glance would have answered most of the questions and saved us an interview. I'm still trying to figure out how they chose me over the piles of others. I'm not even getting into my HR stories. (They actively stopped me from interviewing with two managers at one particular company even though both me and the managers were interested in talking with one another.) I am glad you can find good recruiters. The ones I tend to work with are only for one specific job and then I never hear from them again -- even if I contact them.

My personal experience suggest extroverts have a huge advantage over introverts when finding a job, but the introverts have the advantage when writing good programs. The enjoyment of solitary pursuit allows them think more deeply about problems and find better solutions. (Even John Cleese alludes to this.) I'm speaking very generally, of course, and the world needs both kinds of people.

Thanks for the reply. Maybe we'll remain in contact on the 'Net, eh?

EC2 is inherently scriptable. There's nothing stopping you from using the command-line tools to fire up an instance, and let it run, and store its results to S3, and then decommission the instance.

You are correct that what you propose is easy and well documented. However, that is not what the OP needs.

The OP needs lower-priced spot instances, which are intermittently available and designed exactly for this workflow. When the entire AWS datacenter has some spare capacity, these spot instances turn on for those who requested them to run (usually to crunch data that is not time-sensitive). The use and configuration of these instances is not so well documented, probably because you cannot run a webserver on them and that seems to be the focus of much AWS documentation. However, it is exactly these 'spot instances' which are in my opinion the genius of the cloud: they let the heavy, non-time-critical work (i.e. scientific computing) be done when the webservers and mailservers aren't so busy, thus flattening out the daily CPU demand curve.

The OP should start here:
http://aws.amazon.com/ec2/spot-tutorials/

And end here:
http://docs.aws.amazon.com/AWSEC2/latest/UserGuide/tutorial-spot-adv-java.html

EC2 is inherently scriptable. There's nothing stopping you from using the command-line tools to fire up an instance, and let it run, and store its results to S3, and then decommission the instance.

You are correct that what you propose is easy and well documented. However, that is not what the OP needs.

The OP needs lower-priced spot instances, which are intermittently available and designed exactly for this workflow. When the entire AWS datacenter has some spare capacity, these spot instances turn on for those who requested them to run (usually to crunch data that is not time-sensitive). The use and configuration of these instances is not so well documented, probably because you cannot run a webserver on them and that seems to be the focus of much AWS documentation. However, it is exactly these 'spot instances' which are in my opinion the genius of the cloud: they let the heavy, non-time-critical work (i.e. scientific computing) be done when the webservers and mailservers aren't so busy, thus flattening out the daily CPU demand curve.

The OP should start here:
http://aws.amazon.com/ec2/spot-tutorials/

And end here:
http://docs.aws.amazon.com/AWSEC2/latest/UserGuide/tutorial-spot-adv-java.html

This is more or less exactly the problem, their spot instances for science page is a friggin joke.[0] Their API seems reasonable for spinning up instances and I am now looking at writing some scripts to do this, however their docs avoid ever telling you that you can run scripts in the "user data" field when starting an instance... kind of a major hurdle that the command line tools don't make clear. I've actually got something going now with the CLI tools + docker that makes getting an environment running pretty simple. I'm going to formalize it and post it online in the near future. [0] http://aws.amazon.com/ec2/spot-and-science/

Have you tried Google or the AWS documentation? What you are asking for is the bare-bones most basic use case. They even have services setup to make this kind of thing easier, like the Simple Workflow Service, Messaging Service and Simple Que Service.

high-level introduction to workflow service:
http://docs.aws.amazon.com/amazonswf/latest/developerguide/swf-dg-intro-to-swf.html

recipes using workflow service:
http://aws.amazon.com/code/2535278400103493

Have you tried Google or the AWS documentation? What you are asking for is the bare-bones most basic use case. They even have services setup to make this kind of thing easier, like the Simple Workflow Service, Messaging Service and Simple Que Service.

high-level introduction to workflow service:
http://docs.aws.amazon.com/amazonswf/latest/developerguide/swf-dg-intro-to-swf.html

recipes using workflow service:
http://aws.amazon.com/code/2535278400103493

https://aws.amazon.com/datapipeline/
https://aws.amazon.com/swf/

Between these two sets of functionality, I think the submitter should be able to full automate his workflow.
If you want someone to actually set it up for you... that's what starving grad students are for

https://aws.amazon.com/datapipeline/
https://aws.amazon.com/swf/

Between these two sets of functionality, I think the submitter should be able to full automate his workflow.
If you want someone to actually set it up for you... that's what starving grad students are for

This is sort of a scripting issue, and Powershell has modules for everything under the sun-- including Amazon:
http://aws.amazon.com/powershell/

Not sure whether your instances themselves are running windows, but if so that would be even easier to integrate.

Amazons http://aws.amazon.com/cloudformation/ can get you 95% of the way there (add a few small scripts via Boto, or some integration with http://docs.aws.amazon.com/AWSCloudFormation/latest/UserGuide/aws-resource-cfn-customresource.html)

A little elbow grease will get you the rest of the way without additional costs.

Amazons http://aws.amazon.com/cloudformation/ can get you 95% of the way there (add a few small scripts via Boto, or some integration with http://docs.aws.amazon.com/AWSCloudFormation/latest/UserGuide/aws-resource-cfn-customresource.html)

A little elbow grease will get you the rest of the way without additional costs.

Wish I had mod points. Was going to say, "Have you looked at what Amazon has available?" I know computational chemists that designed workflows like what the OP is talking about, so I know it is well documented somewhere. [cough, cough]

Well not to mention that unless ALL you care about is getting the teeniest tiniest device with X86 you can possibly get this isn't really a good value because for a few bucks more you can get an AMD Bobcat board which gives you dual cores, an HD6310 GPU capable of 1080P over HDMI and you can use up to 8GB of RAM.

I'd say if you want a dirt cheap X86 board they can't be beat, you can even use something like OpenELEC which has the drivers and XBMC baked in and have a nice media tank/HTPC for less than $200 complete. I've built several as media tanks and even replacements for aging P4s in offices and I have to say everybody just loves the things, quiet as can be, just sips power, great little systems they are.

If you look at the TV on Amazon (not an affiliate link), one of the top-rated comments is a really helpful set of instructions in getting it to work well under Linux.

I have to admit I am strongly tempted in getting the monitor for programming, and there are some indications it might be good for photo work after calibration. But I would really love to see one in person first.

Samsung 10.1" is $299 at Amazon (Prime) - http://www.amazon.com/Samsung-Galaxy-Tab-10-1-Inch-White/dp/B00D029NNA/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1385569209&sr=8-1&keywords=Samsung+10.1%22

The i5-3570k is $199 on Amazon (Prime) - http://www.amazon.com/Intel-Core-i5-3570K-Quad-Core-Processor/dp/B007SZ0E1K/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1385569095&sr=8-1&keywords=i5-3570K

ASUS RT-AC66U is $179.99 on Amazon (Prime) - http://www.amazon.com/RT-AC66U-Dual-Band-Wireless-AC1750-Gigabit-Router/dp/B008ABOJKS/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1385569306&sr=8-1&keywords=ASUS+RT-AC66U

Are you some kind of newegg PR AC troll? That shit don't fly here, go away.

Samsung 10.1" is $299 at Amazon (Prime) - http://www.amazon.com/Samsung-Galaxy-Tab-10-1-Inch-White/dp/B00D029NNA/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1385569209&sr=8-1&keywords=Samsung+10.1%22

The i5-3570k is $199 on Amazon (Prime) - http://www.amazon.com/Intel-Core-i5-3570K-Quad-Core-Processor/dp/B007SZ0E1K/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1385569095&sr=8-1&keywords=i5-3570K

ASUS RT-AC66U is $179.99 on Amazon (Prime) - http://www.amazon.com/RT-AC66U-Dual-Band-Wireless-AC1750-Gigabit-Router/dp/B008ABOJKS/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1385569306&sr=8-1&keywords=ASUS+RT-AC66U

Are you some kind of newegg PR AC troll? That shit don't fly here, go away.

Samsung 10.1" is $299 at Amazon (Prime) - http://www.amazon.com/Samsung-Galaxy-Tab-10-1-Inch-White/dp/B00D029NNA/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1385569209&sr=8-1&keywords=Samsung+10.1%22

The i5-3570k is $199 on Amazon (Prime) - http://www.amazon.com/Intel-Core-i5-3570K-Quad-Core-Processor/dp/B007SZ0E1K/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1385569095&sr=8-1&keywords=i5-3570K

ASUS RT-AC66U is $179.99 on Amazon (Prime) - http://www.amazon.com/RT-AC66U-Dual-Band-Wireless-AC1750-Gigabit-Router/dp/B008ABOJKS/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1385569306&sr=8-1&keywords=ASUS+RT-AC66U

Are you some kind of newegg PR AC troll? That shit don't fly here, go away.

One last question... just one*.

Is psychology evidence-driven, or belief-driven?

(*) This isn't just me asking. Here's a quote from the The New England Journal of Medicine article:

Evidence-based medicine is valuable to the extent that the evidence base is complete and unbiased. Selective publication of clinical trials — and the outcomes within those trials — can lead to unrealistic estimates of drug effectiveness and alter the apparent risk–benefit ratio.

(**) Also, I have no meaningful training in science or statistics. If you want, you can win the argument by pointing this out in your response.

Read this book: Why zebras don't get ulcers. It explains how stress influences our life, and how complex the system works that tries to regulate this. It shows that it all works beautifully, for people living in the wild, but the system is not so good for us.

This book won't give you the solution to depression, but it will show that the body uses many methods to accomplish several things, like redirecting sources when in danger or in rest. There is not one solution - any solution will have side effects, and this goes for the solutions of the body as well.

The original researcher wrote a book on his discovery:

http://www.amazon.com/Case-Frozen-Addicts-William-Langston/dp/0679424652

It's pretty stupid to have some kind of irrational fear of jews when the NSA is already doing all of the things you were so afraid of "zionists" all those years.

Turns out you just needed to fear Liberal Fascists all along.

For those with the inclination to read it, The Universe in a Single Atom is a great book about where science and faith meet, how they can learn from each other, and how they're really not at odds. One of the more interesting books I've read in a long time.

Here, you might enjoy this.

Gad Czudner, small criminals among us.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0882821806/ref=mp_s_a_1_3?qid=1385329133&sr=8-3&pi=SY200

It helped somewhat.

There were war crimes, but they were committed by the few.

After WWII, military leaders were shocked by the fact that only 10% of soldiers had ever fired their weapon. It turns out its extremely difficult to kill another human being.

As such, they modified the training and got the fire rate much much higher for the Vietnam war. They did this by teaching soldiers to dehumanize the enemy.

So yes, modern training.

I'd be willing to bet that GE or Westinghouse or some of the many companies that are in the nuclear sector might be willing to chip in the cost for such a video. How hard could it be? An artist to draw some cute drawings on a whiteboard. A friendly-sounding narrator. Some time-lapse photography. A few ads to encourage viral popularity. All you'd have to do is write a five-minute script and get maybe $10k for a high-quality production.

Agreed with M. Mead quote. You might also find a few lessons in From dictatorship to democracy: A conceptual framework for liberation. While the book is about fomenting a movement (e.g., a revolution), there are some powerful ideas about how to change minds.

However, if you don't need your files often, but rather just want a place to archive them, you can take a look at Amazon Glacier - an archiving and backup solution. You can even implement lifecycle policies inside your S3 buckets to automatically move files older than X days from S3 to Glacier, which is much cheaper.

I use Amazon Simple Storage Service and I really like it. The only wish I have for it is that it would be cheaper. As far as quality of the service itself, I think it's as good as it gets nowadays, but don't take my word for it.

Got you covered: Beta

Because no-one can agree where the pogo pins should go, and it would be impossible to create a universal dock that fits any phone and guides it into place.

Wireless charging fixes all that. Any shape device will work.

I think a universal charger would be trivial to design as long as the contacts themselves are a standard width apart. Just need an adjustable guide on the sides of the charger to keep the phone lined up on the pins when you drop it in place.

I have a universal LiIon battery charger that works with all of my small LiIon batteries from cameras, cell phones, etc. It has an adjustable spring loaded guide along with movable pins that make contact with the battery. I use that when traveling so I don't have to carry along a separate charger for each device. Seems like the same concept could be adapted to a universal Pogo Pin charger if the phones were common.

The Dock itself could be a dumb plastic dock that is molded to be a custom fit for each phone, with a smart charger that plugs in the back making the dock super cheap to create.

I paid for the original qi nexus charger, about $70 or so. As others have pointed out, it kinda sucked due to not being flat.

I bought another qi charger when I ordered my Nexus 5. his is at Amazon for $30, and may be less expensive at other places:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00C40OG22/ref=oh_details_o08_s01_i00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

It works with the Nexus 4, Nexus 5, and Nexus 7 FHD/2013. I believe it would also work with the nexus 10. Charges up good, but it is not fast.

But Google's latest is not their first, so somebody missed something with the title. (Hence my updated one.)

I've been using the Qi charger pad below and it works great. It solved the problem of plugging the Google Nexus 7 Gen2 into a cable then having to remember to turn the plug upside down for the Kindle Paperwhite since the MicroUSB socket is installed backwards on it.

Also my son can take the tablet off the charger and put it back on without having to fiddle with plugging the cable in since he's too young to do that yet. Kids friendly!

DigiYes Ultra-thin Black QI Wireless Charger Compatible with LG Google Nexus 4 / Optimus Vu II / Nokia Lumia 920 - Amazon Prime - $28.38

Please, for everyone's sanity, stop it with the JavaScript crap; it's a terrible language, a terrible platform for applications, and supporting it is just prolonging it's Reign of Terror. (this is why we still have flash).

I know there are a ton of responses to this already, so I probably don't have a lot of chance of being modded up. That said...

Please give JavaScript a try.

Just a year ago, I held a similar to view to your own.
JavaScript was just a toy language. Nice for adding special effects to a web page.
I saw some interesting toys built in the browser, but I would never have called JavaScript a 'real' programming language.

I'm not sure what made me consider Node.js; I probably saw it in some Slashdot article.
I downloaded the thing and gave it a shot. Now I am absolutely hooked.

After a decade of writing in various assembly languages,
followed by a decade of writing C/C++,
followed by a decade of writing Java,
I will unashamedly admit, CoffeeScript is now my favorite programming language and Node.js is now my favorite platform.

I learned the ropes with the book Smashing Node.js.
If you enjoy writing software, I humbly suggest giving it a try.

Yeah, they had one before. I got it for my Nexus 4 six months ago. But there's a reason it got 1-2 stars: it's angled and doesn't hold the phone:

http://www.amazon.com/Google-Nexus-Wireless-Charger/dp/B00BGSPIP2

I almost threw it out but then discovered this 3D printed adapter that actually fixed all of its flaws. It now works great, and it charges the phone fast when plugged into the wall! But since most people don't have a 3D printer, it makes sense they'd want to sweep the memory of that one under the carpet.

Years ago I read a book called The 12 Hour MBA Program. I have never met an MBA who knew something important about business that wasn't in that book.

I read a book once about the alphabet. I too have yet to meet someone that speaks English that knew something important that didn't use the pieces found in that book.

Don't worry, the MBA has read this and feels exactly the same about you. It goes so well with the law degree most /.ers have, you do know they call it the soft and hard sciences, not easy and hard sciences right? I'd call it the corollary to the Dunning-Kruger effect, the more you excel in one narrow field the more you think you could wing it in everything else. It's why professors are pretty obnoxious to relate to and a lot of IT people are the same just because they know how to command a machine around but couldn't train a dog if their life depended on it. Like it or not big corporations tend to do a lot of stupid things and without MBAs running around trying to find what the ROI on projects are we'd see a lot more stillborn projects. I've been on far more idiotic projects without a proper business plan than with a business plan, it of course doesn't guarantee that it won't be idiotic but some of it wouldn't pass the giggle test if you tried asking how this would ever be profitable. Because engineers just like to solve problems, they don't like to ask if there's a market of people willing to pay to have this problem solved.

Years ago I read a book called The 12 Hour MBA Program. I have never met an MBA who knew something important about business that wasn't in that book.

Wow!

That's twice as fast as all my programming books!

Years ago I read a book called The 12 Hour MBA Program. I have never met an MBA who knew something important about business that wasn't in that book.

Right here, silly!

And here!

And here!

HTH!

Similarly, the Leviton T5630 one:

http://www.amazon.com/Leviton-T5630-W-Tamper-Resistant-Receptacle-125-Volt/product-reviews/B008O11IEY

also doesn't work reliably. It charges my iphone and Asus tablet, but not my son's Samsung Galaxy Ace. I haven't received my Nexus-5 yet so I don't know whether that'll work. What's tricky about the Leviton one is they pay lipservice to the multiple charging standards by making each port different presumably in hopes that your favourite device will charge in one or the other...

I haven't met many adapters and ports that won't charge my iphone but other smartphone vendors need to get their poop in a group and find a standard that they'll all stick to... Part of the appeal of an Android phone is they're all microUSB and chargers/cables would be easy to make universal but it's an epic fail in my opinion.

Oh my God people, turn in your fucking geek card:
http://www.amazon.com/Etekcity%C2%AE-Digital-Multimeter-Voltmeter-Ohmmeter/dp/B00B7CS3UY/

Put it in series with your device and set it to amps. It also has 1000 other uses besides checking that the numbers on the side of your USB adapter are accurate.
Also this, AND the above mentioned devices will only tell your the voltage your device is currently drawing. You could have a 2amp capable USB port but if your device only draws .5 at max load, that's all you're going to see.

I recommend USB adapters rated at least at 2 to 4amps (or in the 12 to 24+ watt range) My phone doesn't generally draw more than about 2. Less than 2 and you'll likely use more power than you'll charge with so if you've got it in your car listening to music it'll die even while it's plugged in. The common grab bag 1amp plugs you can get at the checkout are garbage.

Or one of these (it also passes through USB 3.0, which is nice):
http://www.amazon.com/Centech-USB-Power-Meter/dp/B00DAR4ITE

This isn't new.

Instead of that ugly one, you may get something that gives an exact value, like this one. A new iPhone/iPad expects 2A, the MacBook (10W) expects also 10/5 = 2A.

for someone that says they used to teach about the subject.

here's why you can know I am not making up my credentials...I really have done the work I claim

there are volumes of research that have already been done about *buttons* however you want to define the concept

also, why research *where* to put a button with that funciton? you should **let the user have the option** to have the button or where to locate it! as for where to put the button by default, by necessity it has to be on the edge somewhere, after that, since almost all languages read from right to left, virtually all users (except those that read hebrew as their primary language) would **expect** to see the 'start' button on the **left side of the screen**

You absolutely do not need to do anything more than a **simple literature review** and apply some basic technical design theory...that's to arrive at 'either top or bottom of left edge'

so that's two fairly similar options...from there let the design team decide!!!

*and of course let the user have the option to change the location at will or remove completely*

back to your question about 'buttons'......Ben Shneiderman's work is industry-standard here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Shneiderman

Here's a link his University page: http://www.cs.umd.edu/~ben/

I'm not claiming Shneiderman is the magic bullet to all design questions, or that his design conceptualizations are fundamental to the industry...he made significant positive contributions...but his concepts are too linguistic-based 'make X more visible' sometimes & marketing people just have their way with it...

One of Shneiderman's major contributions, starting in the early 1980s, was formalizing a way to academically analyze all the research in computing across disciplines about things like 'how to design a good button'

Designing the User Interface is a current text written by him that is used in 100s of universities nationwide & globally. (btw don't pick him apart to me...i have my quibbles...) He ends up with very linguistic-based heuristics mostly, but if you combine his ideas with more formal language from true cyberneticists like Claude Shannon and Norbert Weiner then you can get some highly quantifiable data...

But regardless...Shneiderman's concepts are industry standard...how they are applied in the lab...well that's up to the researcher!

All of what M$ did with their 'Start' button was covered by Shneiderman in the 80s & continued to refine iteritively since then...

You don't even need to make your own.

Please note that while they mentioned the main bill sponsor is a Democrat, ALL of the bill sponsors are Democrats.

As we have seen through history the only real fascists have always been liberal.

Do not make the mistake again in thinking just because the Democrats espouse support for popular things you believe in, that you should vote for them - they will just continue to clamp down tighter the longer they are in power!

I support gay marriage and other social issues too, but supporting the Democrats is the wrong way to bring about changes in that arena - in order for the government to make any social change, it means they MUST reduce your rights and ability to make choices in some way.

The better way to bring about social change is the way the gay marriage movement has done so, by winning hearts and minds through the media - NOT through force and telling people what they must support from on-high.

He writes and sells books - http://www.amazon.com/Step-Step-Introduction-Statistics-Business/dp/1446208214

The price seems insanely high for a 400 page 10x7 paperback book on basic statistics...

The first will be the most expensive and the second will cost much less.

Those were good enough for me and my peers when I was taking exams (in fact, that's all we were allowed to use). Now get off my lawn!

I was looking for a cheap knockoff version of Myhrvold's $800 cookbook and found On Food and Cooking by Harold McGee, $25 hardcover. All the cooking-theory topics you mentioned are covered. Tell your SO you want it for the holidays.