a_square_peg

5 ms·

1.
by a_square_peg 1mo ago
I think the tradeoff is that in the US, on average one gets to spend about $4000 more per year and live about 3 years less when compared to Canada. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Life_expectancy_vs_h...
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by a_square_peg 1y ago
It's amusing to think about what the technical hiring process would have been like if it were to happen now. "Need 10+ years of experience in nuclear detonation device."
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by a_square_peg 2y ago
I'm sure everyone has worked with engineers who might be 10x on their own but drag the team down being inflexible or insisting on solving the wrong problem. I like the saying that "engineering is a team sport" and agree that
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by a_square_peg 2y ago
This is fantastic to see - I've been thinking about the need for something like this for a while. I think there are two markets for this and I feel like you are already addressing the homeowners. Have you reached out to utilities who a
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by a_square_peg 2y ago
Wow - that was painful to read because I can relate so much. Thanks for sharing. Another aspect of such dysfunction is the diffusion of responsibility that comes with it. The stubborn people who pushed for a particular solution rarely suffe
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by a_square_peg 2y ago
I recommend this essay often to people, especially in a start up. When someone describes their organization as being "flat", it's often a red flag because it means that there are unwritten power structure that newer employees
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by a_square_peg 2y ago
Thanks for sharing!
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by a_square_peg 2y ago
I understand there is updates being made to the space export control rules ( https://www.space.commerce.gov/new-space-export-control-rule... ) regarding space/satellite components that were previously classified as ITAR.
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by a_square_peg 2y ago
Woah - this is strange. This was posted yesterday but I see that the timestamp has changed so it's only 4 hours old now. The timestamps for the comments seem to have changed also.
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by a_square_peg 2y ago
You're absolutely right on both accounts - it did work to engage us and that I would rather that such posts don't get upvoted. Thanks for your understanding. :)
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by a_square_peg 2y ago
Fair enough. I feel like I've been seeing a lot of questions on Reddit along this line that comes off as very low effort to generate engagements so that's really the reason behind my comment but I see how my response also comes of
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by a_square_peg 2y ago
I think this is as meaningful as the question "what's the best food you've ever eaten?", which is to say, it's not a very meaningful question.
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Ask HN: How do you convince a company to transition away from its own jargons?
1 points by a_square_peg 2y ago|0 comments
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by a_square_peg 3y ago
I never got to ask this as an interview question, but I always thought it would be interesting to ask - 'if you were wrong, would you want to know?' Not on any particular topic but in general. When I asked this in casual settings,
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by a_square_peg 3y ago
Interesting to know - thanks for the info. Strange to think that something designed for 'known, understandable, repeatable work' got adopted by software development.
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by a_square_peg 3y ago
Not an issue if one can do both but when there's a conflict, a great engineering firm will prioritize safety & quality over profit, whereas a business will prioritize profit & stock price over safety & quality.
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by a_square_peg 3y ago
Wonder how 'Sprint', 'Scrum', 'Kanban' etc. all evolved out this? I really can't understand how it went from 'individuals and interactions over processes and tools' became formalized processes of
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by a_square_peg 3y ago
Yep - certainly lessons learned through painful experiences. Supply chain management is incredibly challenging and it's interesting to see one school of thought moving away to vertical integration as an alternative solution and another
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by a_square_peg 3y ago
The way the project was structured, it was in the interest of everyone to succeed since everyone paid for their own development cost and only made money when the planes were sold. Not the easiest client to work for mind you - I've been
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by a_square_peg 3y ago
Can confirm. I worked as Airbus' tier 1 supplier and they were even accompanying us to manage our own supplier, which in hind-sight, ensured that things like this didn't happen.
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by a_square_peg 3y ago
This was the practice of 'configuration management' - I mentioned it in another thread but a lot of this is discussed in the book 'The Secret of Apollo'. It's a quite a good read and gave me a whole new appreciation
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by a_square_peg 3y ago
Another book that I enjoyed on the topic - "The Secret of Apollo: Systems Management in American and European Space Programs". This also comes to the same conclusion that it was the systems engineering process that allowed it to s
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by a_square_peg 3y ago
It reallly depends on what problem you're solving - I don't think there is a generic answer unfortunately. If there is a specific industry that you're targeting and you've reached out to potential users to validate your
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by a_square_peg 3y ago
ChatGPT has already saved me from hours of Googling when I'm trying to find out how to do certain things. It almost feels magical - I don't have to read through half-dozen slightly different variations of what I need to do. Before
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by a_square_peg 3y ago
I think the word 'tip' should be replaced with the word 'subsidize' on these payment prompt machines. Quite absurd practice that I really wish we can move away from as a society.
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by a_square_peg 3y ago
If you're going to note his credentials as a physist & Caltech president, you should also note that he was also employed by BP as the oil and gas company’s Chief Scientist from 2004 and 2009. Remember, one of the oldest ruse of cli
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by a_square_peg 3y ago
I seem to be hearing about these torrential rain/flood in the news more often and this data visualization that I made a couple of years ago seems relevant. https://twitter.com/oikoweather/status/13386912444704
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by a_square_peg 3y ago
This is really interesting - reminds me of Matt Levine's observation about some of the crypto scams promising outrageous returns that do it for the same reason, which is to filter out the most gullible targets out of the set.
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by a_square_peg 3y ago
I really hope people don't take this result at its face value - the model used and the approach is extremely simplistic, which is essentially a pseudo 2-D simplification of urban canyon geometry, a street with buildings on either sides
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by a_square_peg 3y ago
Assuming technical competency is given, I think senior engineer really needs to do two things well: 1. Be able to make a design decision - among multiple options and with incomplete data and uncertainties, a senior engineer needs to be able

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