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Sad day. I enjoyed the fiction and the Byte column, despite him being a jerk sometimes. Anyone interested in science fiction should read at least The Mote in God's Eye .

wiki.c2.com looks almost the same as it has for decades. Today I found some subtle modern buttons at the top right. They seem to have appeared in 2016. See also https://github.com/…

I was given Robinson's New York 2410 . Delighted to find references to Ken Thompson's hack. http://nymag.com/selectall/2017/03/kim-stanley-robinsons-new-york-2140-review-a-drowned-…

see also perhaps https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15094196 and https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2017-08/uota-nbr0817...

I see some of my favourites among other replies. I don't think I see these: http://aegis.sourceforge.net/auug97.pdf http://www.cs.virginia.edu/~evans/cs655/readings/steele.pdf

My favourite bit of design advice is for when a program is about to delete a lot of user data. The program should require cognizant confirmation: Are you sure you want to destroy 5…

I tried to stick to (old) Apple interface guidelines for a long time. Eventually I realised, for instance, that only tiny numbers of people need to be taught how to use a mouse.

Thank you for scanning and posting this. I have a copy kicking about and keep meaning to share.

Sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a magical level of reliability.

Priest, like Aldiss, is a favourite writer of mine. I especially enjoyed reading Inverted World as a teenager.

Obituary by Christopher Priest. https://www.theguardian.com/books/2017/aug/21/brian-aldiss-o... IIRC Priest and Aldiss were friends.

Upvoting your comment. I hope you won't minding me suggest you update the first line to read Clarke rather than Clark. Perhaps I'm tired, but it took me a minute to figure out who …

I think he was pretty constructive about it, by HN standards.

Reproducing the link to the Ask HN from which the article was compiled. I didn't find it on the first read, though it's probably my own fault. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=…

On inspection of the examples, perhaps even Dickensian.

Retailers in Sydney are worried. Some of them at least. Apparently Amazon is coming soon.

I report bugs sometimes. I develop and test software for a living, and so my paying clients come first. This includes both software they are using and relevant tools that I am usin…

Great idea for a wicked problem. Phone manufacturers will be against it, telcos, retailers, and many consumers. Maybe we could get Green movement groups on board?

By the way, the Mac I'm using now was bought in Australia and the keyboard has a rectangular Return key and the modifiers labeled using text rather than icons.

Historically the Macintosh distinguished between Enter and Return. IIRC on the Lisa the Return key was on the main part of the keyboard and the Enter key was on the numeric keypad.…

smh.com.au is the Sydney Morning Herald. It has some of the best news in Sydney but I hate the website. When I follow a link like this one and the article is interesting, I invaria…

Smell, or perhaps taste, is one of the first senses that evolved. Maybe it will be one of the first we get right in machines.

(I am pleased you brought up Stephen W, and also that you asked us not to. That's all you'll get from me.)