GeekStack Postmortem - <AUTHOR> http://geekstack.com/blog/geekstack-postmortem/

<comment><USER2> This is a honest and fantastic postmortem. The lessons teach us more than the success stories.

I had the same problem of envisioning bigger product goal than I can achieve; I simply overestimated my energy, attention, or ability. Nowadays I try to trim down feature ruthlessly and limit scope to the bare minimum. Work not needed are work done great.

Hope it's not too intrusive. Is $10K/month necessary for living expenses?

Thank you for the great self revelation. I'm sure you'll gain more from it even it doesn't pan out the way you want. Good luck.

<comment><USER3> $10K/mo is a little more than my current salary, but I would have to exclude taxes, health care for four (COBRA is a US law that lets you buy your old employer's health plan for 18 months after you leave, and at my last job it was $1800/mo), etc. I live in Chicago which isn't NYC or SF but still isn't cheap. Plus I would need more savings bc of unpredictable cash flow. Plus stress kills productivity.

<comment><USER4> $1800/mo. Damn. That's the equivalent of working a 40 hour week $10.80/hour job. I'd be pushing my kids down the stairs to make sure we got our money's worth.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I'm sorry to see this. Peter was a friend, and it was great to meet someone else in Chicago working on similar stuff. (We joked that you can tell us apart because _he's_ the Peter in Chicago bootstrapping a social game built in Rails, and _I'm_ the Peter in Chicago bootstrapping a social game built in Rails.) I'm hoping he finds a way to reactivate this project or starts something else great. I had similar issues working steadily on my project and eventually started a little contest at <http://www.soplayweall.com> to help keep myself accountable.

<comment><USER3> I'm not dead, just resting :)

This was mostly about me not wanting to face reality, and then finding out that reality didn't care whether I was paying attention or not. Lesson learned.

<comment><USER6> I am somewhat older than you. This is an insight I wish I'd when I was your age. A useful lesson, one that will strengthen you for the future.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Very honest analysis. It did make me wonder if the author really wants to be an entrepreneur. For me, starting a business is something I feel compelled to do -- I don't think I can be happy if I'm not in control. I'm certainly happier in my current job than I have ever been in any job where I worked for anyone else. Knowing that if I don't make the business work the kids don't eat and the mortgage doesn't get paid is pretty motivating as well. The author says he's happy in his current job -- so why not stick with it?

<comment><AUTHOR> > For me, starting a business is something I feel compelled to do -- I don't > think I can be happy if I'm not in control.

Weird - I think I would be very unhappy as an enterpreneur. You see it as being in control - I see it as being controlled by outside forces (investors, angels, customers, contractors, employees.)

<comment><USER8> Only if you really need outside capital. Then yes. But small businesses are set up all the time with just the owner's resources. Bootstrapped entrepreneurs who build lifestyle businesses rarely make the headlines but they do enjoy an enviable amount of control over their own lives.

<comment><USER9> That only eliminates the first two outside forces (investors, angels) in the list. You still have to deal with customers and employees - in other words, the market.

<comment><USER8> Well, that remains true regardless of whether you're an entrepreneur, a freelancer or a salaryman. Anyone you do work for is a client of sorts and, even as a salaryman, you can end up in charge of other people. Plus, as an entrepreneur you do have a degree of control over the course to take when engaging the market and hiring people.

As long as we're talking about control, I can't see how it's possible to trump a bootstrapped entrepreneur who has a minimal team or none at all.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> That's such a good article!

It puts "get-rich quick" hot heads under cold shower.

It shows why startup must be something to enjoy even if there is no money there.

It shows that quick growth is highly unlikely.

It shows that ~5-10 years of consistent effort is the must for success.

<comment><USER11> The article was fantastic, but I couldn't disagree more on your conclusions.

> It puts "get-rich quick" hot heads under cold shower.

Everyone I've known to become a millionaire in a short time (a year or less) did it by shipping blazingly fast and getting lucky. You can't get lucky _if you never ship_.

> It shows why startup must be something to enjoy even if there is no money > there.

I agree here.

> It shows that quick growth is highly unlikely.

This article doesn't even tackle growth. You can't grow _if you never ship_.

> It shows that ~5-10 years of consistent effort is the must for success.

The article shows that you can't have success _if you never ship_.

\</comment></comment><comment></comment><comment></comment><comment></comment><comment></comment><comment>

Overall, I think the article is fantastic. It really hits home for me, and matches my experience attempting a side-project-into-business. But the biggest takeaway isn't "it takes hard work.". This guy obviously worked hard for a long time.

The moral of the story is:

* work hard -on the right things-

* use milestones that give you -visible progress-

* get product validation -early and often-

* actually ship

I've learned the same lessons from my past mistakes and I'm actively using these lessons in my current startup.

<comment><USER12> > Everyone I've known to become a millionaire in a short time (a year or less)

I'm honestly curious about this, can you give us a couple of startups that got rich in less than 12 months from the start of development?

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Thanks for this honest post-mortem. It sure wasn't easy to describe your shortcomings in our world filled with infinite news of shiny web successes. I think one of the main takeaways can be that attacking a large project like this should not be done alone. It's a huge amount of tasks and context switches for one person to handle, and the risk of loosing motivation and even running into a burn out is much higher.

I think the way to go for solo devs is mobile (Android + iOS), since the project scope is often more limited / condensed and it's easier to get users with little marketing efforts.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Goddamnit, now I want to try writing my own online trading card game.

<comment><USER3> Well don't forget to read the part where I split it into three tasks - the web part, the game engine part, and the game design part. For game design, I highly recommend A Theory of Fun for Game Design [1] and the column Making Magic by the head designer for Magic: The Gathering[2].

[1] [http://www.amazon.com/Theory-Fun-Game-Design- ebook/dp/B004D4...](http://www.amazon.com/Theory-Fun-Game-Design- ebook/dp/B004D4YI52/) only $4 on Kindle or $12 on paper

[2] Look for the ones he gives 4 and 5 stars. WARNING: Lots of reading

<comment><AUTHOR> Where is the column?

<comment><USER14> [http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Archive.aspx?tag=makin...](http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Archive.aspx?tag=makingmagic&description=Making%20Magic)

<comment><USER3> Thanks, I totally meant to paste it. Look for a recent one called something like 500 And Counting. Thats where he rates his own columns.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Wow, your story is very familiar. I experienced similar challenges with my first and second startup attempts. The nice part is, you can try again and bring these lessons with you.

</comment><comment><USER16> We need more posts like this. Success stories are great, they make us believe it can be done. But failure stories are maybe even more valuable as they teach us that so many things can go wrong..so many.

Success stories makes us dream (which is great) and failure stories wake us up (which is necessary). Also, failure stories make us appreciate more the success stories. It's never easy even if sometimes it seems so.

</comment><comment><USER17> I wish that my customers would read this. I just don't know how to suggest it to them with out sounding like I hate them. The big problem is that most of the pain outlined I will go through. The customers I have work for the guy that will feel the pain Peter felt.

</comment><comment><USER18> Honest analysis like this are worth their weight in gold. I just quit my job 4 months ago and I'm going through what your going through. I've realised I need to ship and I've already been talking to customers. I showed them the initial crappy product and understood their market a little from their product.

Stories like this really highlight the need to ship immediately, the need to talk to customers and test the validity of the idea as soon as possible.

Thank you so much for this.

Also the guys with a family who start companies are the ones with the biggest balls in SV. Kudos. You took your fear and charged right at it. I admire that!

</comment><comment><USER19> i found your article to mean a lot to me, personally, as i saw a lot of the reasons for my past projects abandoned in your analysis. best of luck for the future!

</comment><comment><USER20> This is one of the best HN articles I've read for some time.

<comment><USER21> Yes, I'm very grateful to Peter for writing about this so candidly. He really made himself vulnerable, and is even publishing comments from jerks who are taking advantage of that (<http://geekstack.com/blog/geekstack- postmortem/#comment-197>)

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> What does MVP mean?

<comment><USER3> Minimum Viable Product - [http://www.startuplessonslearned.com/2009/08/minimum- viable-...](http://www.startuplessonslearned.com/2009/08/minimum-viable- product-guide.html)

BTW, if you see any of yourself in this article, do yourself a favor and look in to the Lean Startup methodology.</comment></comment>


Fast Transaction Log: Windows - <AUTHOR> http://ayende.com/blog/174785/fast-transaction-log-windows <comment><USER2> > Like quite a bit of other Win32 APIs (WriteGather, for example), it looks > tailor made for database journaling.

Indeed, WriteFileGather and ReadFileScatter are specifically tailored for writing from and reading into the buffer pull. The IO unit is the sequential layout of an extent (8 pages of 8Kb each), but in memory pages are not sequential so they have to be 'scattered' at read and 'gathered' at write.

You also have to keep in mind that the entire IO stack, Windows and SQL Server, was designed in the days of spinning media where sequential vs. random access was ~80x faster. SSD media has very different behavior and I'm not sure the typical 'journaling' IO pattern is capable of driving it to the upper bound of physical speed.

As a side note, I was close some folk that worked on ALOJA [http://hadoop.bsc.es/](http://hadoop.bsc.es/) and it was a very interesting discussion I had with them: the default configuration for Java/Hadoop was providing, out of the box, the best IO performance on Linux. Same configuration was a disaster on Windows and basically every parameter had to be 'tuned' to achieve decent performance. This paper has some of their conclusions: [https://www.bscmsrc.eu/sites/default/files/bsc- msr_aloja.pdf](https://www.bscmsrc.eu/sites/default/files/bsc-msr_aloja.pdf)

<comment><USER3> SSDs also like nice big sequential writes, although it matters less. It's easier on their wear-leveling firmware and erase blocks. And fewer commands back and forth to the drive reduce latency.

<comment><USER4> > SSDs also like nice big sequential writes

Sure, but the point of the remark is that random IO on spinning rust is absolutely dreadful compared to sequential (on consumer drives it's common to have a difference of 2 orders of magnitude or more), the difference is significantly lower on SSDs _and_ SSDs have a ton of IOPS so random accesses can happen concurrently leading to much lower effective latency.

<comment><USER3> You're absolutely correct. Wear leveling can affect total IOPS and drive longevity though, so it's still something to consider for those eking out the best total performance from the drive.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Windows is fast at some things and slow at some things.

For instance, metadata reads on the filesystem are much slower on Windows than Linux, so it takes much longer to do the moral equivalent of "find /"

Circa 2003 I would say the Apache Web Server ran about 10x faster on Linux than Solaris, but that a Solaris mail server was 10x faster than the Linux server.

Turns out that Linux and Apache grew up together to optimize performance for the forked process model, but that fsync()-and-friends performance was much worse than Solaris at that time, if you want to meet specifications for reliable delivery.

<comment><USER6> [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11864211](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11864211) contains an interesting discussion from the author of PyParallel about how doing IO on NT in the style preferred by Linux is slow. This leads people to believe "NT IO is slower than Linux". However, doing IO on NT in the style preferred by NT is faster than Linux doing it's preferred thing.

<comment><USER7> That discussion and others have led me to the conclusion that the NT kernel has an excellent design and a subpar implementation (since only Microsoft's team can work on it), whereas Linux has a crappy design and an excellent implementation (being constantly refined and iterated by anyone). Kind of makes you wonder what could be possible if Microsoft would ever open-source it.

<comment><USER8> "constantly refined and iterated by anyone"

Thats the theory, if you remove device driver folks, how many really works on the Linux kernel ?

<comment><USER9> Here's [1] the current block I/O code from the kernel, annotated with the authors who last touched each line.

While I don't have time right now to actually go and count the number of distinct people involved, that's a lot of hands that have touched that source file over the years. And this view's only showing the changes that make up the current version of that file-- there are authors not credited there because their code has since been overwritten or edited by someone else.

[1] [https://github.com/torvalds/linux/blame/master/block/bio.c](https://github.com/torvalds/linux/blame/master/block/bio.c)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Been a while since I used AWS in anger, but EC2 instances were massively (hair-pullingly) variable from one moment to the next. I can't see any detail on either blog post (GNU/Linux or Microsoft Windows) regarding how they catered for this, how many runs they did of their custom benchmark code, and what kind of variances they were seeing in each iteration.

<comment><USER11> Agreed. I'd love to see the numbers again but running on dedicated hardware.

<comment><USER12> "Jonathan, I highly doubt that. We see similar results when running on physical hardware. I'm posting the results of EC2 instances here to ensure that they can be easily reproduced, but we are we have two identical boxes in the office that sit there are show Windows being much faster in this kind of thing." \-- from the comments

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> As a former Windows/C++/C# dev who has been working on linux for five years now, I have never automatically assumed Windows was slower than linux. The main advantages of linux over windows are not in the performance area, imo, but in any case I think you'd have to average a lot of runs to make sure of getting reasonably meaningful numbers from an ec2 instance.

</comment><comment><USER14> The Linux version was benchmarked with gettimeofday() while the Windows one with QueryPerformanceCounter. The first has a lower resolution of 10 micros and as such the benchmark is not comparable.

<comment><USER15> gettimeofday() is totally inappropriate for benchmarking. Any time the system clock is being adjusted by NTP, for instance, your benchmark timing will be skewed.

They should be using the following API if they're going to use the system time to measure time differences:

clock_gettime(CLOCK_MONOTONIC, &timespec);

It's a really good clue that a timing function is inappropriate for benchmarking when the man page talks about time zones.

<comment><USER16> While that may be true, the kind of errors you'd expect that to cause do not appear present in their results. It doesn't matter, here.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> The site is having problems. Google cache: Windows benchmark[1], Linux benchmark[2].

1\. [http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache%3Ahttps...](http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache%3Ahttps%3A%2F%2Fayende.com%2Fblog%2F174785%2Ffast- transaction-log-windows)

2\. [http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?hl=en&q=cache%3...](http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?hl=en&q=cache%3Ahttps%3A%2F%2Fayende.com%2Fblog%2F174753%2Ffast- transaction-log-linux)

</comment><comment><USER18> An 80% performance difference? Something doesn't seem right here.

<comment><USER16> 80% difference in a microbenchmark is not nothing, but it's hardly unusual. In a real application, these kind of tiny differences may well be much less dramatic, especially if you consider that most apps will be tuned to the OS they're designed for and thus pick the "happy path" for that OS.

And that 80% difference is in the buffered case, but that's also the least relevant - you can use user space buffering (which is normal anyhow, on both OS's) to amortize the system call costs.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Either I am reading this wrong or something is not right here.

Buffered:

windows = 0.006 linux = 0.03

80% Win for windows?

But where do those numbers come from?

The time in ms for linux was 522, the time for windows was 410. That's not an 80% win.

where does the "Write cost" number come from?

In general for the other numbers I don't think they are comparing the same things. I don't think it is a coincidence that the two systems had write times of both about 10s and 20s for the different tests. Where linux took 20s and windows took 10s I'd bet that they were comparing different behaviors.

<comment><USER20> I believe write cost is ms/write

0.006 write cost = 410ms

0.03 write cost = 1966ms

<comment><USER19> I figured that is what it was, the raw data doesn't match up with the results in the table.

<comment><USER21> Time is the total running time for 64k writes, write cost is for a single write, so just dividing time by 65536 gives the write cost. This is correct for all listed tests on Linux and Windows except two, the two buffered tests on Linux. I am not sure what went wrong, both write cost values are about 3.75 times to high assuming the total time is correct.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Windows also has the cool and little known CommonLogFileSystem if you need logging:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_Log_File_System](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_Log_File_System)

[https://msdn.microsoft.com/en- us/library/windows/desktop/bb9...](https://msdn.microsoft.com/en- us/library/windows/desktop/bb986747\(v=vs.85\).aspx)

<comment><USER23> Not that kind of logging.

<comment><USER24> Yes, the same kind of logging - transaction logging.

<comment><USER23> You're right! The name of it was so generic it fooled me. Sorry!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> UK-AL It's well known windows performs better in these sorts of situations. Probably because of the reasons mentioned, they have their own products that rely on good performance for these code paths.

</comment><comment><USER25> Duplication of [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12084481](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12084481)

<comment><USER12> This one has more comments / points though</comment></comment>


Anyone looking for a co-founder? - <AUTHOR> For the last few months, I have been looking to join an early-stage tech project as a co-founder.
There have been a few false starts along the way, but I suppose that's inevitably part of the process!
I am desperate to get my teeth into a new venture, and based on my past experience I would be most suitable for a CMO/Sales Director type of role. My background is in finance so any fintech/financial start-up would be ideal, although I am definitely open to other concepts.
In terms of credentials, I have a degree from the University of Cambridge and I've got a strong financial sales background, having been a top performer at JP Morgan. I've also got an extensive network in the PE/VC world. My skillset lies in fundraising, marketing strategy and managing an end-to-end sales process. Of course, I'm more than happy to muck in wherever needed.
My current role is highly flexible, so I would be able to commit a significant amount of time to a project. I have the drive and energy to get a project off the ground! I'm currently based in London, but am happy to work remotely or relocate.
I've been amazed at the generosity of our community, so I thought I would reach out. If you're looking for a team or if you've just been sitting on an idea for a while, I'd love to hear from you.
Original post on Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/Entrepreneur/comments/fi1kba/anyone_looking_for_a_cofounder/ <comment><USER2> I am looking for a co-founder with whom I can work on monetising this:

[https://github.com/etewiah/property_web_builder](https://github.com/etewiah/property_web_builder)

Might not be ideal for you as it is very early-stage and I have only a couple of paying clients but worth a shot anyway.

Even if its not for you, perhaps someone else who sees this might want to reach out.

</comment><comment><USER3> Hey! Put your contact info in your profile to make it easier for people to reach out to you!

FYI - I am currently working on Webase: [https://www.webase.com](https://www.webase.com)

</comment><comment><USER4> I'm working on an API development platform. MVP is done, applied to YC Summer program, working on ramping up marketing and initial launch material. A couple early paying users.

Would love to chat - adam at restfuldata.com

Thanks!

<comment><USER5> Check the expiration date of the certificate at [https://docs.restfuldata.com/](https://docs.restfuldata.com/). I had to click a lot on Firefox just to let me see the docs..

<comment><USER6> And you should be able to set up a cronjob on your server to renew your lets encrypt certs automatically.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Hello, please send your contact @ email@example.com, i am looking someone on fintech side for my already started project, MVP has been already tested and results are very promising.

<comment><AUTHOR> Done :) Look forward to hearing from you.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Hi, would be happy to chat, do feel free to reach out to vered at fintext.io</comment>


Show HN: New job search site for hackers - <AUTHOR> https://www.staticjobs.com/?from=hn

<comment><USER2> How about some ads that aren't posted by headhunters?

[https://www.staticjobs.com/search.php?query=php+new+york](https://www.staticjobs.com/search.php?query=php+new+york)

Cybercoders, Kforce, Randstad - all bottom feeder headhunters.

Actually, that's my #1 want in a job search site - the ability to filter out all ads that don't explicitly include the company name, the real client, not a headhunter.

<comment><AUTHOR> We heard you. We'll try to attract direct employers and come up with a feature to eliminate staffing agencies from the results while keeping the interface as simple as possible.

We're still an early stage start-up and there are just to few jobs in our database.

<comment><USER2> That's the #1 hard part about a new job search website.

If you have no jobs, why would the candidates search there?

If you have no candidates, why would anyone post their jobs?

Surprisingly, I only get decent interviews from Craigslist. I tried a couple of others with zero conversion rate.

<comment><AUTHOR> Agreed. By creating this thread, we were trying to attract both job seekers and recruiters/direct employers.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> It would be helpful to me if I had the option to disable posts from third party agencies like Yoh and Kforce. I prefer to apply directly to the employer.

<comment><AUTHOR> Michael, I hear you but haven't you noticed that most employers use third party agencies these days? Don't know about OR, but it's very true for NY and NJ (and probably CT). That's why there are threads about jobs being difficult to find. On one hand there are plenty of jobs, on the other hand there are none (or too few).

We're very sympathetic with all the job seekers but right now there are just too few jobs in our database. Eventually we may introduce a special keyword to omit staffing agencies from the search results or something like that.

And thank you for your input too! Good luck with your job search!

<comment><USER4> _> haven't you noticed that most employers use third party agencies these days?_

I have not noticed this in MA, and companies that do this go to the bottom of my response list. I had the same reaction as the grandparent poster, and something that tries to foist those sorts of things off on me is an immediate "nope, I'll look elsewhere."

<comment><AUTHOR> I understand you very well. We're from NYC and most jobs here are in the financial industry. They pay really well but it's hard to go through all those staffing firms and, later, interviews.

My co-worker says "there's life outside of financial industry" but, somehow, we get to stick to "financial" jobs.

Well, that's been my experience for the past 15 years or so.

<comment><USER4> There's a reason why I only chat about consulting opportunities with fintech companies. =) Ain't got time for FT for them.

<comment><AUTHOR> Still, financial industry has lots of high paying jobs as well as bonuses to neglect it.

Would you resist making 140K on a base full-time? Keep in mind benefits and bonuses too.

<comment><USER3> I get offered quantitative investment jobs all the time, as I have substantial experience with finance.

I eventually came to regard it as unethical, so I turn those jobs down.

<comment><USER4> And if you're good you can make $140K base outside of finance (and outside of NYC and SF, too) without too much digging, too.

<comment><AUTHOR> In most places $140K is about the ceiling. In NYC it's not. Plus finances pay bonuses.

Furthermore, what does it mean to be good? If you're smarter than your interviewer or know more, they'll reject you. In general, I would say selling yourself has nothing to do with your programming skills.

<comment><USER4> My total take-home at my last job was about $180K. I'm 27. I'm not top-of- market in Boston; top-of-market is around $220K and that's assuming an average-ish bonus situation. And, no, I tend to be better prepped and, usually, more knowledgeable than my interviewers, because that's what they would be paying me for. Because I am good at what I do, I have a deep and wide base of knowledge and have significant successes in my past, and they know it.

You're digging a real deep hole and making your project seem remarkably unserious. I would suggest that you stop.

<comment><AUTHOR> Ok, thanks! Let's stop.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Searches for "Washington" and "Washington, DC" found nothing for me. When I browse I see "District of Columbia", nobody actually calls it that.

<comment><AUTHOR> What is it called? We chose to use full state names rather than the abbreviations, i.e. "New Jersey" rather than "NJ." That's why "District of Columbia" rather than "DC."

Right now at least one keyword such as Java needs to be specified in order for the search to return results (assuming there are jobs with those keywords). Adding a location (you can have multiple cities and/or states) narrows your search down to jobs in those cities or states.

We may change the logic to return all the jobs if only a location is specified. This seems to be the confusing part. (We're analyzing job searches to improve them.)

Thanks for your feedback!

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Hey Hacker News!

We're a new job search site for all computer professionals. Please, check us out! We made the website intentionally simple but we're C++ programmers, not designers. Therefore, we would appreciate any feedback, both positive and negative.

YC-funded start-ups and everyone else, if you're looking to post your jobs, please, give us a try. We're giving 25 free jobs to promote our site but if you need more, contact us and tell us you found us on Hacker News. We'll figure out something for you.

Those who need a job or looking for a change, we don't require you to register to submit your resume and never will. Just a few basic fields to fill out and you're done!

Thanks, folks!

<comment><USER6> Not a huge deal but from a design perspective the Times New Roman really hurts my eyes. Just changing it to something smoother like Ubuntu or Arial would make it 10x better for me. The blue hyperlinks also look a little ugly to me on the plain white background, so I would either change their color to be a little lighter or add a slight grey background.

The site itself is great, though.

<comment><AUTHOR> What's your OS? And thank you for your valuable input!

I developed most of the site on my 15.6 inch laptop running Ubuntu. I just loved Ubuntu's Times New Roman and didn't like its Arial. On Windows it's the opposite. Arial looks much better.

Similarly, blue hyperlinks looked great on my laptop's monitor but they're so- so on other monitors.

And you just confirmed both of my thoughts! There's indeed a great contrast between blue hyperlinks and white background on most monitors. And the font is hideous on Windows too, :-(.

We're going to fix both problems soon. As well, we're analyzing job searches to improve them. There's a lot of room for improvement both on the front-end and back-end.

<comment><USER6> My response came from a windows desktop with a fairly nice monitor. I just checked on my macbook (retina, 15"), first on osx, and then on Ubuntu. You're right, it looks much better! I still think that loading the ubuntu font from google fonts would be better (and then using arial/tmr as a fallback) but to each their own.

As far as the general design, I don't want to be too harsh but the website looks a little 2005 to me, if you judge by this (obviously unofficial) scale: [http://i.imgur.com/7f24Qfs.jpg](http://i.imgur.com/7f24Qfs.jpg). This reddit thread is a great place to find good websites ([http://www.reddit.com/r/web_design/comments/2zpk4u/best_site...](http://www.reddit.com/r/web_design/comments/2zpk4u/best_sites_for_web_design_inspiration/)) but a few quick suggestions would be to toss the plain white background, make the main search box a little more pleasing, making the logo and text a little bigger, and try a more modern design for the actual job list (I would look into something like what hckrnews.com does or one of these [http://www.freshdesignweb.com/free-css- tables.html](http://www.freshdesignweb.com/free-css-tables.html)).

Also, and I hate myself for saying this, but you may want to look into using bootstrap ([http://getbootstrap.com/](http://getbootstrap.com/)). I was originally against it since it makes websites look similar and I generally like to write my own code, it does make it easy to modernize projects.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you for all your feedback again! You were not harsh at all and I can't help but agree with you. We'll try to improve it on the front end and back end and if we make enough money, we'll hire a professional designer.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I think the biggest threat to this site's success is that it lacks differentiation in a market that's already extremely saturated.

One problem the current job search sites have that you might be interested in tackling, is that they lack a way of objectively measuring the capabilities of the applicants.

There are software engineers that are 100x as productive as some others, but the pay for all of us is always within a factor of 3 or 4. If you can solve that problem, employers will love you for helping them hire better engineers, and qualified applicants will love you for getting them higher-paying jobs.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you for your feedback!

My partner has exactly the same thoughts. The market is indeed extremely saturated and there's huge money in it. However, I haven't seen good websites (in my opinion, that is) without all that clutter and visual noise.

Our focus is more on simplicity and we don't want you to spend hours on our site. Instead, we want you to quickly find a job, send your resume and move on. When you need a job, of course.

We too discussed the problem you suggested. That, however, imposes an additional burden on job seekers. Think about it. Interviews used to be 50 minutes long with one interviewer. Now we have phone screens in addition to face-to-face interviews, tests, job seekers have to fill out forms with hundreds of fields, meet with a bunch of interviewers, post JSON objects to URLs and other "clever" things.

This is not normal and we want to change that. I wonder if anyone else has given a thought to the whole situation.

Anyway, it's not our final decision and right now we just don't have the capacity for all extra stuff.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Feedback: To be honest if I saw it while browsing links to check out I'd immediately disregard it due to the design - it seriously looks like an old geocities template. Even if your content is good - I think the design needs to be worked on, it doesn't need to be flash, but just modernised.

<comment><AUTHOR> mrmondo, you've got a perfectly valid point! The website was developed by C++ developers. We can write CSS but modern web UI isn't our strength, :-(. And thank you for your input too!

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> My first view shows me the site is already flooded by recruiters. That's a deal breaker got me personally.

<comment><USER10> yup searched 'angular' and only recruiters showed up no _real_ companies. If I want to sift through a sea of recruiters, indeed does a great job of that.

<comment><AUTHOR> Gents, it's in the subject. We're a new site and to be honest, it is difficult to attract and satisfy both job seekers and recruiters. We'll do our best to attract direct employers!

<comment><USER10> I still gave your thread an upvote because I hope it does take off and get better. I was just a little disappointed to see all recruiting companies.

<comment><AUTHOR> Sorry to disappoint you and thank you for an upvote!

By creating this thread, we were raising awareness among job seekers _and_ recruiters/direct employers (not just job seekers) but right now it's too early to judge.

A couple of direct employers signed up yesterday and we all can help each other by telling our employers about this site. Yeah, I know I need it more than you.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I am a social sciences research professional following hn. Naturally all job board announcements are geared towards programmers and engineers...

Any idea where i should go to find research jobs? Apart from the crappy Indeed and LinkedIn that is...

<comment><AUTHOR> Unfortunately I don't know how to help you. If you're in academia, maybe you should check various colleges and universities' websites?

<comment><USER12> (I'm the OP, was on my phone so ended up with a diff account.)

Unfortunately, I am trying to move from academia to the private / non-profit sector's 'research associate' etc roles. Finding it to be truly difficult.

Thanks for the reply though!

<comment><AUTHOR> Why do you want to move out of academia? Get a tenure and you'll be doing your research plus you'll secure a job for the rest of your life.

<comment><USER12> > Why do you want to move out of academia? Get a tenure and you'll be doing > your research plus you'll secure a job for the rest of your life.

In short, the privatization (education for profit) and adjunct (severe labor exploitation) issues are horrible in that sector and I want no part in these.

These are the same issues both the non-profit and private non-academic sectors deal with too, but the private and non-profit sectors do not have the same amount of hypocrisy and blindness as academia when it comes to sticking a ten- feet pole on fire up one's ass.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> By the way, our friend Evan has jobs paying up to 180K in NYC. You might want to contact him. [https://www.staticjobs.com/search.php?company=Quantitative+S...](https://www.staticjobs.com/search.php?company=Quantitative+Systems+%28QS%29&order=desc)

<comment><USER13> err, 180K and 2+ years of professional programming experience with.. blah blah blah

2 years of experience and 180k?! What do I get for 10? Im in the wrong city I guess

<comment><AUTHOR> That's the problem. Most recruiters stuff every keyword they're aware of into their job ads and raise salaries to get resumes but 180K in NYC is definitely not the limit.

I know that man, though he never placed me. He has jobs in HFT field and financial industry in general.

How true those 180K I don't know.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Not intended to find remote work - always "location". It's not even funny in 2015.

</comment><comment><USER15> It's fast but needs some work. I get a lot of false hits, especially when you add the city.

<comment><AUTHOR> I wonder how fast it'll be when (hopefully) we have more jobs in the database. Just curious to know.

And a great catch! The search is not perfect yet. False hits are returned if a city name occurs within a job description itself. For example, you search for Java in San Francisco, other jobs will be returned too if they contain San Francisco.

We're aware of this issue and it's on our top to-do list. Plus we're analyzing searches to make them better but right now there are just to few jobs in our database.

And thank you for your input too, old man!

<comment><USER15> "old man!"

???

<comment><AUTHOR> Sorry, didn't mean any offense. I meant it as an old-fashioned way of saying "good friend", etc.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


37signals Finally Launches Highrise - <AUTHOR> http://mashable.com/2007/03/19/highrise/ <comment><USER2> they did away with a-typical quicktime videos to explain the thing this time around, now its follow the GREEN arrow... i dunno if i like that, though it does appear simpler in my head vs a movie telling me how to use the app

looks like a good product, i could see using it for work, but like anything, i tend to be alone in that catagory at times, i'm still trying to get co-workers to see the light on social networks and heck photo-sharing..</comment>


Flotr2 : a library for drawing HTML5 charts and graphs - <AUTHOR> http://humblesoftware.com/flotr2/ <comment><USER2> Beautiful, only complaint is it's 100kb minified - that's a lot of JS. Would love to know if there is any kind of modularization (if I only need 1 kind of chart can I lose some of the weight?).

<comment><USER3> Oh dear. 100kb is bad for this sort of thing? Does anyone know if that's a commonly held view?

I've been working on a Canvas library for full-powered diagramming for a year and a half and it currently weighs in at _597kb minified._ (private alpha going on right now, so its nearing final size)

It's super awesome and covers an enormous amount of enterprise diagramming needs like customizable nodes, links, layouts, an undo manager, data binding, models, overviews, events, commands, tools, you get the idea.

But do you think people will reject it based on the size? Do you think not having a slimmer version would be a deal breaker?

<comment><USER2> > Oh dear. 100kb is bad for this sort of thing? Does anyone know if that's a > commonly held view?

Not at all. For what you are actually getting 100kb is awesome. However I like to develop really light pages especially for mobile. It's not even all about download size, mobile browsers can bog down even just parsing and keeping JS in memory.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> It seems I always stumble upon these awesome graphing libraries _right_ before I'm supposed to post an interesting dataset somewhere.

This invariably results in complicating my life far beyond what is reasonable and never managing to publish the dataset/graphs because it's too fun figuring out how everything works.

<comment><USER5> Stick to something (like d3js,) it's what I've decided to do.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Well done, will likely use.

My only criticism right now is that your demo site breaks back button functionality (click on a chart on the landing page and then hit back to see what I mean).

<comment><USER7> Demos definitely need work!

Edit: back button should be ok now.

<comment><USER8> I had problems with these too, better check them again

</comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Version 2 has a lot of great new features. The went in search of this because I need to draw a client side chart with 300,000 points on a scatter plot, and I wanted to see if canvas could do it. Turns out it can. At least with Chrome <http://jsfiddle.net/vN4C3/>

</comment><comment><USER9> Is this suitable for realtime streams of data?

Looking for something easier to work with then d3.js/cubism.js.

<comment><USER10> I'm working on something like that but it's very far from ready. I'm interested in any feedback...

<http://frasergraham.github.com/live_stats.js/>

<comment><USER11> Can it also be used with socket.io? I'm working on a real-time app and I'm using socket.io to transport the data and graphing it on canvas. I'd be happy to use a graphing library that 1) looks good, and 2) works with real-time data, instead of my custom solution.

<comment><USER10> I looked into it briefly, right now i'm more focused on getting the charts right. Once I've done that I was going to work on different data transport options.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Wow! Looks great for Gridspy ( see <http://your.gridspy.co.nz/demo/> )

We need to visualise power usage data in the browser. The more tools we have the better. We're currently using dygraph but this looks much more flexible. I hope that the browser support is good.

<comment><USER13> Gridspy, what do you need that Dygraphs doesn't provide?

<comment><USER12> Bar Graphs. Animations. Performance while adding data live. A streamlined API.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I used to use the original flot, but lately, we've been playing with jqplot. How do you feel this compares? I like the plug-in system in jqplot and recently we added 2D plots (heatmaps) in our local version.

</comment><comment><USER15> I'm currently working on a project to combine it with pivot.js. should make it a pretty good js only reporting solution

</comment><comment><USER16> I'm currently using GnuPlot's HTML5 canvas terminal for the dashboard of a in- house app. It's worth considering if Flotr2/Google Visualisations don't quite fit the bill.

<http://gnuplot.sourceforge.net/demo_canvas/>

</comment><comment><USER17> I can't test this on IE<9 right now, but comparing to flot it seems they added the option to put axis labels, which I think is a big deal. In flot you can do it, but you need a plugin.

Now if they add also a 3rd parameter to points (x,y and identifier) it will be amazing.

</comment><comment><USER18> Awesome! I used Flotr for a personal project a while back.

Made a simple page with graph of common O-notations: [https://students.ics.uci.edu/~zmohiudd/ONotationVisualizer.h...](https://students.ics.uci.edu/~zmohiudd/ONotationVisualizer.html)

</comment><comment><USER19> Neat, I used Flotr for a personal project a long time ago and really liked it. The author also helped me with a problem and implemented a feature I needed. I'll keep this around for any future uses.

</comment><comment><USER20> Is there any charting library which supports fetching data from server as the chart is horizontally scrolled? I want to chart some historical data that spans over years.

<comment><USER7> My other project envision.js handles this nicely. You can check out one example here: <http://humblesoftware.com/envision/demos/ajax>

The library is still young, and that functionality you see there will mature a bit yet.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> The docs don't say much about stacking area charts, and when you add lines : { fill : true } to a line chart it seems to overlap the areas. Anyone know how to do it?

<comment><USER22> In normal flot theres a stacking add-on and you can add {stack: true} to your chart. Not sure if this works the same but I'd guess it's similar.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> This is awesome!

I wasn't a big fan of color scheme initially (very powerpointy mind-you) but I looked at the source and saw the colors can be changed. Great work!!!

</comment><comment><USER24> Will definitely be checking this out as I need some charts to go with my bottle + elixir + bootstrap + datatables admin backend. :)

</comment><comment><USER25> How does it stack up against Google Charts?

<comment><USER10> Last I looked most of the cooler Google charts were Flash based, which was a problem for me at the time as I was looking for something that works on iPad.

From what I can tell this is one of the better HTML5 chart libraries i've seen but in general these days I like to build stuff with d3 instead.

<comment><USER26> The only chart that was flash based were the map charts. They were redone and now it's svg. [https://developers.google.com/chart/interactive/docs/gallery...](https://developers.google.com/chart/interactive/docs/gallery/geochart#Configuration_Options)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> This page is a prime example of how one can break the browser's history (back- button). (Chrome)

<comment><USER7> Added back button support. Wasn't a bug, just was never implemented.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> Benefits over dygraphs? <http://dygraphs.com/>

</comment><comment><USER29> differences between this and jqPlot? (<http://www.jqplot.com/index.php>)

</comment><comment><USER30> Could this be modified to output SVG perchance?

</comment><comment><USER31> would be nice to have some tooltips.

</comment><comment><USER32> does it have anything to do with flot which is a jquery charting plugin?

<comment><USER33> I looked into this, and apparently flotr2 is forked from flotr. flotr was "inspired by" flot, but uses Prototype instead of jQuery. Note that flotr2 removed the Prototype dependency so:

        flot:   the original       uses jQuery
        flotr:  inspired by flot   uses Prototype
        flotr2: branch of flotr    no dependency

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> Benefits over Highcharts?

<comment><USER21> It's free.

<comment><USER34> Do you have a paid subscription to Highcharts?

<comment><USER35> Free as in freedom. Flotr2 is BSD-licensed, Highcharts is CC-BY-NC, with commercial licensing needed for anything beyond that.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Bits of Advice for VM Writers [video] - <AUTHOR> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vzzABBxo44g

<comment><USER2> This is a really impressive video: there's a lot about the interface between VM and native code that I hadn't thought about.

Another small thing that jumped out at me: Click said that if he were to write another VM, he wouldn't use a memory-unsafe language. His throwaway comment was "Java is fast enough."

<comment><AUTHOR> HotSpot's next-gen JIT[1], which will be available as a simple plugin in Java 9[2], is written completely in Java. True, it is "only" the JIT -- not the bootstrap interpreter or the GC (no need to throw away all the work) -- but it works extremely well. It is one of the most impressive advances in compiler technology of the decade.

[1]: [https://wiki.openjdk.java.net/display/Graal/Publications+and...](https://wiki.openjdk.java.net/display/Graal/Publications+and+Presentations)

[2]: [http://openjdk.java.net/jeps/243](http://openjdk.java.net/jeps/243)

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> What are some important books / seminal papers on VM design that every starting VM writers should read?</comment>


Please help us improve and get the word out. A new vertical Search Engine - <AUTHOR> We are working on Aaron's Cat search engine ( https://aaronscat.com/ ) and would love to have your feedback. It's the beginning so please be nice :-)
Aaron's Cat is focussed on content relevant to the creators (A creator is described as a bot or a person who is curious, is able to think, invent, hack, make, produce or bring something into existence).
No matter how hard this is, we want to do it and we will. Please help us if you can.
We have added 2 new features recently, broad search and a simple command line.
And by the way, this search engine will always be private.
Look forward to any feedback.
https://aaronscat.com/ <comment><USER2> 1) When your cursor hovers over the "More Results" link, it changes to a "text" cursor rather than the "pointer" cursor.

2) I don't know what "broad search" is. Maybe add an explanation in a tooltip or a help page or something?

3) Switching "broad search" on and off doesn't change the URL. So there's no way to bookmark a broad search.

4) The header isn't consistently located. When you're looking at search results, it's stuck to the left side of the screen. On the blog page, or the "hello world" page, or the "dream" page, it's more centered.

5) The background of the blog page is black, which is really jarring when you're on the search results page and click over to it. Could you make the color scheme consistent?

6) How do you plan to keep this thing running once the bandwidth and data storage costs reach a point you can no longer personally maintain? Accept donations? Ads? Charge a monthly fee for premium search features?

<comment><AUTHOR> Hey @phendrenad2 thanks for detailed feedback. Yeah, we have to work on the colour scheme and UX in general. all your points are extremely useful.

Regarding the cost of running and the plan. It's a good problem to have. We have some other projects so we will keep this running from the revenue we already have. In future we would have to experiment and see what works best.

I don't like ads but if its not intrusive it might be option. Or affiliations with companies like Amazon could be an option. As long as the revenue model resonates with the soul of the product (Thats quality, focus and privacy) we will try out.

Thanks again.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> [https://aaronscat.com/](https://aaronscat.com/)</comment>


Scientists Can Publish Their Best Work at Any Age - barry-cotter http://www.nature.com/news/scientists-can-publish-their-best-work-at-any-age-1.20926 <comment><AUTHOR> I've always been a little bit worried about trying to get my "best work" in life done as soon as possible. I frequently read that most people (physicists, artists, entrepreneurs, etc.) did their greatest work when they were young, and I had always assumed that it is because your brain loses plasticity or something as you age. Being 26 years old, that often makes me feel like I only have a few good years left.

This article considers a different explanation for the trend — one that I hadn't considered. Namely, young people produce greater works because they have more _time_ available. This study finds that the probability of producing something "great" is evenly distributed across all works that a person ever produces, so it seems that if you want to produce something great later in life, then the secret is to rearrange your priorities so that you have enough free time available to pursue whatever interests you.

That said, I will say that the Q factor makes me a little nervous — if you have an inherently low Q value, how do you improve that? (Maybe you can't — which would be unfortunate.)

<comment><USER2> I have a hypothesis about how most people seemingly did their greatest work when they were young: most of the very famous people we know of on average is several generations before - when you think of theoretical physicists you think of Einstein, Feynman, Higgs etc. . They started their careers a lot earlier than us now, their institutions were less crufty, the edge of the field, any field, is a lot closer. I'm willing to bet that on average the current generation would do their best work later in life. It's as big as the difference between how Baby boomers and Millennials starts their careers.

That said, experimental physicists and biologists have always done their best works later in life (mid 40s last time I read). Elon Musk's best work should still be ahead of him if he doesn't flop. And Jobs's best work (turning Apple into the monster it is today) wasn't done in his youth either.

<comment><USER3> Math and theoretical physics -> best work is extremely intellectually challenging -> done by youngsters. (Gauss is a special case)

Engineering and biology -> best work is managing a long-term research and development program, managing large teams -> done by veterans.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> >> The Q factor is obtained from a researcher's citation record: it is proportional to the logarithm of the number of citations that a scientist has received over a certain time frame.

I'm not terribly convinced by this Q-value. What happens if a scientist's field is a sub-field of a sub-field that's only of interest to very few people? What if their field only has a couple of journals? Then they'll get a low Q value but it won't be representative of the quality of their work.

For instance, see [1] :

 _The average biochemist ... will always score more highly than the average mathematician, because biochemistry attracts more citations._

There's some reserach from Lise Getoor I think, that shows how scientists tend to cluster in "cliques" [2] and that they will tend to cite each other's works. It means you can't really draw many conclusions from even a normalised h or Q, or whatever similar metric, except that the work is interesting to researchers in the same field, so, er, to people who are interested in it.

________

[1] [http://www.nature.com/news/who-is-the-best-scientist-of- them...](http://www.nature.com/news/who-is-the-best-scientist-of-them- all-1.14108)

[2] A term from graph theory meaning a collection of nodes all connected by edges, and not implying collusion, or a citation mill etc.

</comment><comment><USER5> Original article: [http://science.sciencemag.org/content/354/6312/aaf5239](http://science.sciencemag.org/content/354/6312/aaf5239)

<comment><USER5> PDF: [http://www.barabasilab.com/pubs/CCNR- ALB_Publications/201310...](http://www.barabasilab.com/pubs/CCNR- ALB_Publications/201310-04_Science-ScientificImpact/201310-04_Science- ScientificImpact.pdf)

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Their Q value (ability) reminds me of Paul Graham's relentlessly resourceful concept: [http://www.paulgraham.com/relres.html](http://www.paulgraham.com/relres.html)

</comment><comment><USER7> Ehhm, Nope, they can't. Two real life examples.

"The selection process is open to candidates with a PhD who meet the following criteria: Be in possession a PhD, awarded no later than three years"

"You can't apply if you are over 30 years old"

Enough said.

If airplane pilots where scientists, they would lose their pilot licenses after three years, _without possibility to renew it_ of course (unless they start again and wait for four or five years). Isn't science superfunny?

And it seems that nobody though on this.</comment>


Is a smart electricity tariff worth it? - <AUTHOR> https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2019/04/is-a-smart-electricity-tariff-worth-it/ <comment><USER3> In a BBC video from the same domain, [https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2017/11/talking-solar-batteries- wit...](https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2017/11/talking-solar-batteries-with-bbc- click/), it seems like the installation (panels and batteries) is £5.000 and that this a community trial in the Rosehill area in Oxford where the batteries are subsidized.

I think it is valuable to bake in fixed costs and maintenance when these things are discussed. Apart from saving the planet it is nice to see if a project pays itself in 2, 5 or 15 years . . .

<comment><AUTHOR> The panels are on track to pay for themselves in under 10 years. The battery is a bit more complicated because of the direct subsidies.

But it is the sort of tech which could be built into every new home without dramatically raising the cost.

<comment><USER3> Thanks for the information. :-)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> > If we're willing to change, our power bills drop.

This is the big thing. I think with modern renewables we have to change our behaviour. ie doing washing/drying when its windy, charge cars during the day instead of night.

<comment> munk-a You don't have to change your behavior. And if you're busy and making good money you may find it's worth it to just eat the tariff cost. In some respects this is the same scenario as toll roads, there is always a free way to get there - how much is your time worth?

There are already a lot of areas that have peak power pricing and, in fact, a lake I went to as a kid[1] actually took advantage of this by (at a scarily low efficiency) pumping water into the lake during off hours and running the turbines during peak usage - it's basically a giant battery (but, again, super inefficient in terms of the energy required to pump the water into the lake, still efficient enough to be profitable though).

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smith_Mountain_Dam](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smith_Mountain_Dam)

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> A 15% cost reduction – not bad.

Possibly interesting – I'm working on developing a similar battery - <USER2> panel off-the-shelf system that would be suited for people who live in cities (e.g. if you want to put a solar panel on your balcony):

[https://www.craftstrom.com/](https://www.craftstrom.com/)

<comment><USER6> 15% sounds impressive but it's 60 GBP in absolute savings. That might just be enough to finance the hours it probably took to collect, compile and process all things necessary to make this calculation.

<comment><AUTHOR> Per year. And assumes electricity prices won't go up.

It took me half-an-hour to grab the CSV files from my monitoring, a write a scrap of Python to work out the difference in prices, then double-check my workings.

I'm happy with that ROI.

<comment><USER7> What would your advice be to someone with no electric car, no solar battery, no solar panels, and no subsidy available on them? Is the smart tariff still a good deal?

<comment><AUTHOR> Depends on your usage patterns. If your job means you always get home after 7pm, or if you cook with gas, then it may still be worth it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Hmmm this is interesting... currently i'm on a 2 year fixed, i live in quite an energy efficient flat and mostly keep everything off unless i'm home. Currently i pay roughly £16 a month for my electricity. Literally the only things on during the day would be: my alexa, my router, my hue hub and bulbs (in an off state), my fridge/freezer, my home hot water/heating thermostat and the apartment extractor fan.

I'd love to charge my laptop and phones off of a solar battery.

<comment><USER7> The author of the article has a smart battery which (as far as I can tell) outputs 460 watts of power [1] - whereas and a fan oven can use up 2.5kW†, a kettle 3kW, a shower 8.5kW.

So unfortunately you'll be importing electricity from the grid sometimes anyway, if you want to shower or cook when it's dark.

[1] [https://www.moixa.com/solar-battery/wp- content/uploads/2018/...](https://www.moixa.com/solar-battery/wp- content/uploads/2018/09/0240_Moixa_User_Manual_Email_July_UM001.pdf)

†When the thermostat is turned on, that is. So the average consumption over an hour of operation will be lower.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Smart meters will let you switch tariff every half an hour, so you can just switch to a cheaper one for the "peak" period.

(I'm not sure this functionality is actually available yet - most suppliers are still barely rolling out SMETS 2 meters - the ones that aren't supplier- specific.)

<comment><USER10> You can't currently change _supplier_ every half an hour. But with the right technology your supplier can change price every half an hour.

The only UK supplier with a half-hourly tariff is Octopus Energy.

\- [https://octopus.energy/agile/](https://octopus.energy/agile/) changes price every half an hour, tracking wholesale prices.

\- [https://octopus.energy/outgoing/](https://octopus.energy/outgoing/) works like Agile but also gives you half hourly export pricing. So you can sell excess energy from solar or battery storage back to the grid when the price is highest.

(Disclamer: I work for Octopus Energy)

<comment><AUTHOR> OP here. That looks _really_ interesting. Especially the V2G stuff. I've only just started with Bulb, but I'll certainly consider switching to you in future!</comment></comment></comment>


The Secret Button - <AUTHOR> http://www.codersnotes.com/notes/the-secret-button/ <comment><USER3> > _destructive actions should require a little more confirmation, no? It used > to be you had to double-click almost everything if there was a chance of a > strong side-effect;_

I grew up with Windows 98, so for me the X button would be the baseline that feels perfectly logical and natural. But I want to ty and explain why I think it doesn't contradict the above logic:

I think a long-standing design rule in Windows is that the X button action should have as few side-effects as possible apart from closing the window: Closing dialogs and tool windows typically does nothing except closing the window - and your user expectation is that you can trivially restore those windows if you wanted.

For "Yes/No" or "OK/Cancel" type dialogs, the X button typically maps to the action with the least consequences - i.e. "No" or "Cancel". When all choices have consequences is sometimes even disabled to force the user to make a conscious choice.

In the events where closing a windows has direct, irreversible consequences - e.g. closing a program that has unsaved data - the program is expected to show some kind of confirmation: An "Are you sure" or "Do you want to save?" dialog. So in effect, clicking the X button is even safe in these cases because all that click will do is bring up a confirmation dialog.

All of this requires more effort from the developers of applications, but I think treating the X button as a non-destructive action by default actually gives the user more confidence to explore the UI because there is an obvious way how to safely get back.

<comment><USER4> I got to use Windows 3 and see it as an improvement over a CLI-only system, and got to edit my X11 configuration for making my monitor don't blow (or at least stop making that infuriating noise out of frequency monitors do - <USER2> the documentation was adamant it would blow). I saw the beginning of the GUI spread.

Yet, I was never able to make any sense about the Windows double-click required standards. It just looked completely arbitrary, like any action MS wanted to map into a click, but there was an action mapped there already, they made it a double click. I am pretty sure the author is rationalizing that line about side-effects.

<comment><USER5> I've never encountered a doubleclick outside launching programs, opening files in explorer.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Beside the nostalgic value, this hidden button has a very practical use when you use two monitors. I tend to have a window full-screened on each monitor. To close the window on the right monitor, I just mash my mouse pointer to the upper right corner (without having to aim precisely) and click. The pointer will "stick" to the upper right hand corner of the screen.

That is not possible for the window on the left monitor, because there is something to the right (the other monitor), thus, the pointer will not "stick" and it is harder to close the window (you have to actually aim).

Enter the "invisible button": For windows on the left monitor, just mash the mouse into the upper left corner and double click. No aiming necessary.

In Windows 10, most apps still have this button. But it seems to be tied to using the classic Win32 APIs or something. Modern "Metro" apps like the calculator do not have this invisible button any more. Let's hope that that style never catches on ...

<comment><USER7> Ah the classic "everything is important to someones workflow"

[https://xkcd.com/1172/](https://xkcd.com/1172/)

<comment><USER6> Exactly, this is the important lesson here: Every single little feature that you introduce will be used by someone and you either have to support it forever (the classic Microsoft-strategy) or take it out and risk the anger of a part of your users. Who will probably complain very loudly.

<comment><USER8> See also: the recent removal of backspace to go back a page in Chrome And Firefox. Luckily I have a 4 button mouse with dedicated back/forward buttons or I would be mad as hell.

<comment><USER9> Good riddance. The problem with backspace is that it means "delete one character" unless you managed to unfocus a text box, in which case it means "lose the whole form and maybe hose the whole application flow". It was actively harmful.

<comment><USER5> What you should be asking yourself is why don't forms behave as if the browser had the Lazarus extension (for firefox and chrome) already installed.

[https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/lazarus- form-...](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/lazarus-form- recovery/) [https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/lazarus-form- recov...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/lazarus-form- recovery/loljledaigphbcpfhfmgopdkppkifgno?hl=en)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Oh yes, the Alt+Space button, which I still use for windows restores (Alt+Space+R) instead of Win+Down for some reason. And for the occasional rescue of windows that have entirely escaped by screens.

<comment><USER11> > occasional rescue

That's pretty much the only way to get offscreen windows back onto the desktop - "Alt+Space, M, Left arrow, Up arrow".

<comment><USER12> It's gotten more interesting in Windows 10. With a hi-res surface, scaling often plonks screens in confusing and arbitrary places when docking/undocking. My method is now something like "Alt+Space, M, Hold Left for a few seconds, Hold Up for a few seconds, Hold right for twice as long as Left, Hold Down for twice as long as Up, etc". And it won't work at all on Java sub-windows, who just scale and move any which way. And hitting Win-Left or Win-Right may not even snap the window to a viewport, meaning the secret button _nor_ the red X are at a window extreme.

It's certainly added a fun little extra layer of puzzle to my life. I bet this is how Catherine felt about Atrus' door puzzle locks as she wandered Myst Island.

<comment><USER13> Seriously? Undock _leaves windows offscreen_? Well, 10 < 95, I guess.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> This also exists in e.g. Chrome, if you manage to click the corner on the left of the first tab[1]

The way Chrome's UI is handled on Windows seems quite interesting in general. You can see glimpses of it when it breaks or some other program tries to make sense of it, such as screen recording of Chrome windows.

[1] [http://i.imgur.com/mJSc2lR.png](http://i.imgur.com/mJSc2lR.png)

<comment><USER15> That window is how I always open Chrome's task manager. It's the only way I have discovered so far to open it without remembering the keyboard shortcut.

<comment><USER16> You can also do Hamburger -> More tools -> Task manager, but your way is faster.

<comment><USER17> Or better yet, use Shift+Escape.

<comment><USER18> Not sure if I have some other program intercepting it, but Shift-Escape hasn't worked for me on Windows in a long time.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Another example that comes to mind is Apple's stock Podcasts app. The buttons to skip 15 seconds forward/backward have been removed from the interface (visually anyway) but still work if you press where the icons used to be.

<comment><USER20> Sounds to me like the result of a fight between the developers and the "product owner" who says "remove that button", and the developers don't want to remove it because it is useful and used by the users. So instead of removing it, he just makes it invisible, and everybody (but the new or naive users) is happy.

<comment><USER21> [http://dilbert.com/strip/2007-02-02](http://dilbert.com/strip/2007-02-02)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Windows 10 also still has this. There's also a keyboard-shortcut to open the menu: Alt-Space. To open the same menu in a child window of an MDI application, use Alt-- (Alt-Minus).

Which was intuitive in the windows 3.0 days because the icon of the top level window was slightly longer (like the space bar) than in the MDI child windows (like the minus sign).

<comment><USER23> Ohh yes, the old MDI vs SDI paradigms.

MDI was used by the old Opera browser and it is what later became browser tabs.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> This could be useful to know! I still used to do this on XP, where there was at least an icon there but it seemed to be deprecated. I don't think I'd even tried it in 7+.

Although I am wondering if it has ever bitten anyone by accident, especially given that double-clicking elsewhere on the top bar will maximise a window (and I do this frequently). Could be unfortunate.

Other not really documented leftovers of previous UI standards: I still sometimes use Ctrl-insert and shift-insert for copy and paste, which still work in a surprising number of apps, but not everywhere. I picked up the habit in the DOS 5 era with QBasic/Edit, but it seems to have been an IBM standard from 1987: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_Common_User_Access](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_Common_User_Access)

Especially useful in terminal apps/ssh clients, where you really don't want to be pressing Ctrl-C by accident.

<comment><USER25> I use ctrl-insert and shift-insert myself which I picked up from the old "m" editor that shipped with Microsoft's C compiler, version 2. (2 floppies and a green 3-ring binder.)

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> This isn't a secret button, just a result of using Aero on Windows 7, which hides the button. It was actually something that irked me from time to time, because I'd grab a window to move it, only to hit the button and activate the menu.

</comment><comment><USER27> I very frequently use Alt-Space to open this menu, then M and an arrow key to start moving windows that are positioned on a monitor that I've powered down and don't want to turn back on. Is its analog Alt-Minus still useful in any programs?

<comment><USER28> To move windows between displays, you can also use Win+shift+left or Win+shift+right.

<comment><USER27> I'm using a classic IBM Model M so I have to remember the ancient shortcuts like Alt-Space and Ctrl-Esc, but that's definitely useful to know.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> I see a little computer icon on the top left of explorer windows in Windows 8.1. Double clicking that seems to close the window as well.

<comment><USER30> Same with Windows 10! Even works in all other programs using the Windows chrome.

<comment><USER31> Sadly, it doesn't work in Edge (Although it's a rather good thing : there's no space in the chrome without tabs, so it would've been awkward)

<comment><USER6> The same holds for all "Metro" apps, apparently. The "top-left-menu" is neither present in calculator, nor the new settings app (or weather, mail, calendar ...).

<comment><USER28> The menu itself is present. You just have to press Alt+Space to get to it. Alternatively, you can also right click the title bar - even in modern Windows apps.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> it's invisible because that's where the window icon is supposed to be. the explorer and some programs like chrome and firefox have invisible window icons or completely hide it (steam for example)

</comment><comment> cha-cho If you want to know where Microsoft got the inspiration for the box and "X" buttons that debuted in Windows 95, check out some images of ye old NeXTSTEP Workspace Manager from circa 1990.

</comment><comment><USER33> You guys make me feel old. I'm only 32.

<comment><USER34> :)

I was born in the late 80s, so hit the tail end of Windows 3.1 and mostly grew up on 95 and 98. The article says,

> The familiar up/down arrows got replaced by "line" and "box" buttons, and > the new close button appeared at the top-right. "Up and down" made sense.

I have absolutely no idea what "up and down" are supposed to mean. Z order? Y position on the screen? No clue.

<comment><USER35> If I am remembering correctly, it is the Z order.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> As far as secret buttons I'm most fond of the "advanced settings" dialog in the "advanced" menu that shows up when you hit alt in the network devices folder. Almost nobody would expect a specific folder to make a new menu appear, and it continues to do this in the era of the ribbon when menus are hidden 99% of the time.

<comment><USER5> I was pretty annoyed by this the first time. That menubar didn't use to be hidden.

There's a setting to have it always displayed I think.

</comment></comment><comment><USER37> Disable all window decorations (i.e. adjust for best performance) and it's back - not a big deal.

</comment><comment><USER38> Exists in Windows 10 and I still use it.

Artifacts from the past :)

</comment><comment> vhost- I used to use this a lot. A coworker who was really into macs back in like '06 or '07 used it because he was used to the close button being on the left and showed me. I totally forgot about that button.

</comment><comment><USER39> Similar thing with Chrome on IOS (haven't tried on Android). If you open a new tab there's an empty space at the top where the URL bar normally resides. You can tap this space instead of the "Search or type URL" box in the middle of the screen. This is also a hangover from previous versions where the top URL bar wasn't hidden. Thanks anonymous Google engineer, you saved me from retraining my muscle memory!

<comment><USER40> It's the same on Android and I miss the URL bar then this hideous un- customizable new tab page.

</comment></comment><comment><USER41> This button exits in GNOME 3 as well, except they ruined it. Alt+Space still brings up the menu, but they took away all the keyboard shortcuts for the menu items themselves, so what used to be Alt+Space x to maximize now becomes Alt+Space x, nothing happens, you reach for the mouse and click maximize.

I suspect the problem here is more related to GTK3 and the new window manager, but I can't prove it. I just know it's broken now.

</comment><comment><USER42> I use this all the time, and people wonder what I am doing, i don't tell them though :D

</comment><comment><USER43> This also existed in Windows Vista and Windows XP. Like the author, I don't know if it still exists in Windows 8 or 10. I haven't regularly used Windows since I left Microsoft in 2007 ;)

<comment><USER44> This still exist in windows 8, it's visible as app icon and double click still works.

<comment><USER45> In other words, it's actually been improved (or reverted to visible) in Windows 8 and 10. So OP, go ahead and take the plunge; you'll probably like it!

<comment><USER46> It does not work for Windows 10 universal apps, but nobody uses those anyway 8-)

<comment><USER47> It does if you hit the keyboard shortcut (alt-space)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER48> Is the button hidden on purpose, or is it just a mistake?

It seems a little weird that they didn't just remove the button, except of cause as others point out it would break the work flow of some people.

</comment><comment><USER49> "There's a secret button hidden in Windows 7. At least, it's a secret to some people. Many modern users won't know about it, whereas some like me have used it every day for over 25 years." 25 Years? How?

<comment><USER50> He literally says in the article he's been doing this since Windows 2.0... not sure if snarking about Win7 not being that old, but the button in Windows is 27+ years old.

</comment></comment><comment><USER51> Milo's backdoor into Synapse?

</comment><comment><USER52> Well, OK.

</comment><comment><USER53> You're living in the past, man.

</comment><comment><USER54> SUCKERS!!! USE PLAN9!</comment>


Why D kicks serious ass over C++, leaving it dead and broken on the sidewalk - <AUTHOR> http://boscoh.com/programming/some-reflection-on-programming-in-d-and-why-it-kicks-serious-ass-over-c-leaving-it-died-and-tired-on-the-sidewalk#cpreview <comment><USER2> "A lot of the features are designed to make it easier for the compiler writer."

That kind of scares me. Who cares how hard the compiler writer's job is? A compiler is written once, whereas the programs that the compiler compiles (hopefully) comprise a much larger body of code.

That said, the article sure made D sound like an improvement over C++, with many of the same benefits. Of course, getting rid of the preprocessor seems kind of strange... I've used quite a few macros in my C code. Even the crappy macros you get with C (as compared to, say, Lisp) are certainly better than none at all.

<comment><USER3> It's really hard to tell what he's getting at with that comment. It appears that there is a stated goal of making it a 'systems' programming language, suitable for replacing C and C++.

Based on features such as the ability to write source code in 6 different character formats, it doesn't seem like the sort of features he's talking about imply sacrificing anything in the language.

It probably means things like this (<http://www.digitalmars.com/d/lex.html>)

 _Complex literals are not tokens, but are assembled from real and imaginary expressions in the semantic analysis:_

           4.5 + 6.2i		// complex number

Stuff that is invisible to a programmer. (This was a completely random example, I don't know whether it's really such an optimization or not.)

One reason to make a compiler easy to write is that it makes the language more portable, which is an important feature of a low-level systems language. Low level languages are more difficult to make portable. One of the reasons the original C was so successful is that it was (relatively) easy to implement a compiler for your architecture.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> "In D, objects are always allocated on the heap. ... <snip> ... So you can eliminate the -> operator. It's always obj.property and your code becomes that much easier to read."

I think one of the best reasons still to use c++ is your control over memory and the speed which you can only get when allocating objects on the stack. Maybe that was the sort of problem he was fighting with in c++, but for me it's an argument which would make D a worse choice than c++ for those tasks where I would use c++ now.

</comment><comment><USER5> Not very convincing.

Those who try to fix C/C++ with a "nicer" declaration syntax always fail unless they just copy C/C++. So what's so special about C-style declarations?

      int a[10];

vs.

      int[] a;

The first is more natural, since you are going to apply the index operator [] to _a_ later on, many times. This is purely psychological. This shows that our understanding of "regularity" and "relevance" of a formal syntax may be against our instincts.

<comment><USER3> The problem with the first one is that what you are declaring is effectively a const pointer named 'a' to 10 consecutive memory locations allocated for the size of int. The second is a declaration of a variable-length array named a.

So, for example, you can't do this:

           int a[10];
           int b[10];

           a=b;

You get a type error, or an lvalue error, because you can't assign anything to a constant.

<comment><USER5> Good point, but still, you can apply operator [] to a and b in some non-C dynamic language, which means the "int a[]" style is probably more relevant psychologically.

<comment><USER3> I agree that int a[10] feels more natural, though if the brackets are empty my only preference is that the language pick one or the other. Don't make "int[] a;" and "int a[];" equally valid syntax, but totally different semantics.

My main point is that this is a relatively cosmetic issue relative to the ability to use 'foreach' syntax instead of iterator objects and while loops.

<comment><USER5> C++0x addresses those things -- foreach etc.

There's clearly a market for some sort of a fixed C++ but not the Java/C# way. D tries to fill the niche, but it doesn't give a feeling of elegance or otherwise of something really new and unseen before.

<comment><USER6> The article only mentions a few of D's features. There are a lot more improvements. The templating system for instance is quite innovative. <http://www.digitalmars.com/d/templates-revisited.html> Variadic Templestes: [http://www.digitalmars.com/d/variadic-function- templates.htm...](http://www.digitalmars.com/d/variadic-function- templates.html)

But there are other things as well like the lazy evaluation, and built in contract and unit test support.

Ave a look at the articles on this page <http://www.digitalmars.com/d/>

And the specifications <http://www.digitalmars.com/d/lex.html>

<comment><USER5> Templates in D look like just a syntactically polished variation of C++ templates. Of course there are some new features there, but I don't see anything that can't be done with a compiler that is capable of evaluating some functions at compile-time. C++ can't do that, but my point is, why bother creating such a complicated template system for something that can be done the easy way?

Variadic templates: can be done with variant arrays and again, with smart compile-time evaluation if necessary.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Isn't Java an adequate alternative to C++ for nearly any purpose?

<comment><USER6> You may find this article about Java, Lisp, D interesting: <http://www.digitalmars.com/d/lisp-java-d.html>

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> "D is a multi-programming language"

No wonder there are so many useful applications written on D!

<comment><USER9> I believe E will be even better then D.</comment></comment>


Show HN: A 89b JavaScript notepad with local persistence - <AUTHOR> http://xem.github.io/postit/ <comment><USER2> Very clever as a minimal proof of concept.</comment>


Sirin Labs nabs $72M to build the Rolls-Royce of smartphones: 'Solarin' - <AUTHOR> http://venturebeat.com/2016/04/24/sirin-labs-nabs-72m-to-launch-the-rolls-royce-of-smartphones-first-phone-launching-in-may/ <comment><USER2> 10,000$ phones. Are they sane? This is the new "I am rich" app, now as a phone.</comment>


Linear Web Design: info - design - code - <AUTHOR> http://sitecollab.com/web-design-process/

<comment><USER2> This article describes an outdated process.

"Adjusting round corners for a button in photoshop is easier then[sic] adjusting border-radius in css"

Actually, in CSS it couldn't be more simple... border-radius: 5px;

This makes me wonder if the author thinks we should be chopping images for rounded corners?

"This process is executed in a linear fashion starting with information and ending in code, but requires iteration loops at each step."

A good web design process is an active collaboration between designers and developers, not hand offs. I'm a firm believer that design should be coded early and often in order to uncover design issues that can't be detected on paper.

It's fine to break things out into steps, however, they should be iterated as a whole instead of individually. This way issues found in one step have a chance to feedback into previous steps.

<comment><USER3> > "Adjusting round corners for a button in photoshop is easier then[sic] > adjusting border-radius in css"

Yes, I got to that, and gave up. Anyone who can write that seriously is clearly at best a beginner skill level in both Photoshop and modern CSS. Anyone who can advocate a waterfall model is, as you say, severely out of date in their understanding of effective development processes (or building the software for very specific types of project where it actually works, but real web development projects are unlikely to ever be among them). And in particular, anyone who advocates mocking everything up in detail in Photoshop before writing any HTML/CSS if you need to produce fluid/responsive designs is simply having a laugh.

<comment><AUTHOR> Your point makes sense when talking about developing software, however the article is in reference to planning a restaurant website for a client.

Try implementing an agile strategy with a sushi restaurant owner, or for that matter an attorney, dermatologist, or chiropractor. That would be a laugh.

B2B web design services struggle with showing tangible deliverables, a waterfall approach is the best way to keep the client satisfied and scope within your spec.

<comment><USER3> Sorry, but I've never accepted that argument. No Photoshop mock-up is going to represent exactly what all of your client's visitors are going to see anyway. Are you really going to make multiple Photoshop mock-ups showing different responsive designs or how a fluid layout looks at different window sizes, and then two or three variations of each using different anti-aliasing settings to simulate how the text will appear on different OS/browser combinations?

Meanwhile, you can show your clients a static page using HTML+CSS just as easily as one using Photoshop, and they will see how it actually looks. And you can still change border radius in CSS more easily than the hassle of working on rounded corners in Photoshop, which still defeats the entire premise of that part of the article.</comment></comment></comment></comment>