I was asked this question in an interview and I said the downsides would be extra disk space used to store it and more disk writes from the database to maintain the index on updates. I asked a friend and he said the downsides are space used in memory to store the index as well as the fact that an index could take days to build on a large dataset.

What does everyone here think about this question?

World Health Organization condemned for classifying intersex as 'disorder'

Here's the open letter from intersex organisations around the world: Joint statement on the International Classification of Diseases 11

For example: I've got mild issues with what I'll call "big dark things within emptiness." I'm sure there's probably a very specific term and associated subreddit for this, but I don't particularly enjoy searching it up.

An example would be looking at a planet in Celestia or Google Earth, especially the unlit side. Another example would be seeing the hull of a submerged ship underwater. I have no idea why these kind of things give me the willies, but they do.

Intellectually I think it's absurd and will often try to will myself to ignore the nonsense feeling based on completely unthreatening stimuli, but that doesn't seem to alleviate my instantaneous lizard-brain reaction. For whatever reason, I can't get past it.

It's been this way for a long time, too. I can remember when I was very young, I had a picture book about space. It had shots of all the planets, most of which I was fine with, but there was a close-up of Jupiter in shadow that I would deliberately avoid looking at.

Another book had a very dark picture of a giant squid that caused the same reaction in me. I remember memorizing the page numbers for these two photos so that I could skip them whevener I looked at the books. If I ever opened the book to a random page, I would crack it ever so slightly so that I could peek the page number to make sure it was safe.

Do you have something like this? Some absurd fear, phobia, or aversion to something strangely specific or benign? When's the first time you realized it? Has it stayed that way over time?

I recently floated this idea in a comment elsewhere, but I wanted to gauge interest in having an unofficial Tildes IRC channel. The purpose of this channel would just be general, casual discussion with other users of Tildes about anything, and particularly those topics which may not warrant an entire thread on the site here. I know that these days IRC isn't the most popular chat option, with things like Discord filling the void. However IRC is appealing in that users can choose between multiple clients, and in that such a Tildes channel would not need many of the features offered by Discord. How would people feel about such a space?

This thread might seem weird, but I am considering buying a new smartphone and I have my eyes on the Moto g7 power (for its awesome battery!). Sadly, it is 6.2"! My current phone is 4.7". I have small hands, 6.2" seems way too big.

If anyone has a 6.2" phone, how do you feel about it? Does it even fit in your pants?

What have you been listening to this week? You don't need to do a 6000 word review if you don't want to, but please write something! If you've just picked up some music, please update on that as well, we'd love to see your hauls :)

Feel free to give recs or discuss anything about each others' listening habits.

You can make a chart if you use last.fm:

http://www.tapmusic.net/lastfm/

Remember that linking directly to your image will update with your future listening, make sure to reupload to somewhere like imgur if you'd like it to remain what you have at the time of posting.

Top level comments should fill in the blank with some sort of descriptor identifying a kind of song you would like suggestions for. Be as generic or specific as you want.

Replies can then recommend songs to that individual.

Hint: Use the "collapse replies" button to view only top-level posts.

See previous posts of this type: books, games

I could use some optimism and positive reframing right now, and I'm sure I'm not the only one. As such, I want to know about some good things! Progress and such!

In my question, I asked about "the world" but I am really interested in any example, no matter how global or local. It also doesn't have to be explicitly human-focused, so feel free to gush about the improvements in, say, a programming language you love, or the tabletop gaming ruleset you use. I'm interested in positive examples of all types.