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Reflecting on CS Graduate Admissions

I was just indulging in my favorite bad habit (reading hacker news), when I came across a discussion about  prestige in faculty hiring  - namely, the fact that the majority of CS professors across the US come from the top 18 or so universities, and that even within that, there's bias.  The HN discussion turned to Ph.D. admissions, with a commenter noting: " I'm not sure, but I'd bet that the best institutions actually don't care where their applicants come from. They can afford to just choose the best. It's the so-so places that have to signal their quality by 'hiring the best'. I've seen this in graduate school applications - students with poor marks often stand a better chance of admittance in a top program than a so-so one. " I just finished chairing the CMU CS Ph.D. admissions committee, so I thought it might be worth writing down my experience in doing so.  With two very important notes: I'm not doing it next year, so please don
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Chili Crisp Showdown: Laoganma and Flybyjing

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I've been on a bit of a chili crisp mission lately.  The Internets -- and my friends -- appear convinced that the best chili crisp is Laoganma .  Or Flybyjing .  Certainly one of them.  But which? My answer, alas, is that you might want a bottle of each.  Or five bottles of each.  Let's jump in: Laoganma on the left, Flybyjing on the right.  The famous slightly disapproving face of the old grandmother stares at us, contrasted with the apparently very-hard-to-print rainbow label of the newer entrant.  Opening up the containers, one is immediately struck by the color and texture differences: Laoganma, on the left in both photos, has more "crunchy bits", but also has fewer suspended solids in the oil.  The bottle is about 3/4 full of the solid crispy bits.  The flybyjing bottle is only about 1/3 full of crispy bits. This difference flows through to the spoonfuls below -- much more crispy stuff in the laoganma, but its oil is merely the color of chili o
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Masking the taste of Augmentin - with candy canes

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Or, "how to convince a child with pneumonia to take her antibiotics, part 1 of ... hopefully 1." My 3.5 y/o daughter came down with pneumonia last week.  While it turns out to probably have been viral, she was prescribed Augmentin (amoxicillin + clavulanic acid), and instructed to finish it. She.  Hates.  Augmentin. With a passion unmatched by anything I've seen.  As far as I can tell, this is one of the most singularly nasty-tasting medicines we try to give kids.  And we didn't get it flavored.  The straight stuff causes her to gag and/or vomit. So, in the spirit of trying to educate a budding young experimentalist, we conducted a sequence of experiments, lining up three spoons-full of augmentin mixed with various substances to dilute it.  I asked her to tell me which of the three had the best taste.  Each spoonful contained about 0.25ml augmentin suspension to about 0.25 tsp of masking agent. I can't guarantee that anyone else's preferences will m
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