Show HN: Parse complex json structures using a simple query syntax - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/EmilStenstrom/json-traverse <comment><USER2> I guess I should point out there is JSONPath, a kind-of-standard language with libraries in all languages, so unless this is doing a new, amazing, thing I don't see why someone should use it.

I, however, don't like JSONPath since jq[1] exists. But, of course, it is not the same thing as using a native library.

[1]: [https://stedolan.github.io/jq/manual/](https://stedolan.github.io/jq/manual/)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for pointing out JSONPath, didn't know it existed. Seems like a quite complicated query syntax though. Guess it's up to anyone to decide.

About JQ, I think it has a different target audience. It's more for command line things, while this is for parsing JSON with python.

<comment><USER2> Now that I've read it again, my comment seems rude and offensive. I'm sorry if it sounded like that, I'm not a native English speaker so sometimes these things happen (with me, personally, they happen a lot).</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: How can we help each other? - <AUTHOR> We are an Italian dental chain, with more than 6000 patients, I was wondering how to get involved in new ventures. Think about your company how could it be useful to dentist? any way? if yes, just let me know and lets test it. For eg yesterday i was talking to a VR company and we agreed it would be nice having the ability to show to our patients very clearly their deasise. We are also thinking how to let them see how we will fix it and the final result.
Let's have a chat and see if we can help each other!
send me an email email@example.com <comment><AUTHOR> All right maybe I could give some further food for thought, let'see what happens.

I could give a discount from 20 to 40% discount on treatments, said discount should be transformed into a coupon that patient can spend into another local shop near my clinic. Eg. you need a 1000$ dental treatment, pay 1000$ to the coupon website, be treated by the dentist (who earns 700$) now you have another 300$ to spend.

I know something like this already exists, but with dentistry, we can make it much more powerful, consider my average selling ticket is 4000$</comment>


Show HN: My new service - Certician, a tool for monitoring your SSL certificates - <AUTHOR>

Hello HNers.
I'm launching my new service, Certician, and I'd love some feedback from HN users.
A while back, I asked if anyone knew of any good, simple tools or services for monitoring SSL certificates [1]. I didn't find any compelling services, so I decided to build one.
I tried to keep it simple, since it's self-run and bootstrapped.
I know my landing page needs help. It's a lot harder to distill down a service (even a simple one) into compelling, actionable copy than I thought!
I have to work at my real job today, so I'll only be able to reply when I have time to take a break for a coffee run or lunch. I will do my best to reply to all comments over the weekend though.
Thanks for your feedback and for being an awesome community!
P.S. As others have said, I'm a little embarrassed the state of parts of the site, but I needed to launch. I've never asked anyone to pay me for a site like this, but I really do think it will be useful to many people and businesses. Hopefully others do too!
[1] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1675586 <comment><USER3> I like the simplicity of the design! I too have a few suggestions:

1] The top screenshot is pretty "jarring", which I'm sure was you intent and works well.. However, it doesn't indicate what happens when the ssl cert is invalid & users would see this screen. I think it would be much more informative to add an arrow pointing to an email inbox or something indicting that you get alerted when this situation happens. Additionally you may want to change the site url to "www.mysite.com" or something - If I was Amazon and saw that screen, I wouldn't be very happy.

2] Email is great, but you gotta add cell phone (sms) support in some capacity. You can do this on the cheap by just offering support to the major cell providers via their email-to-sms gateway instead of using a paid service like Twilio or Tropo. It's not as clean, but it's cheap and easy. You just have to have the user put in their cell phone & provider and just send a much shorter alert notice. Here's a good list of email-to-sms gateways: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_SMS_gateways>

3] If I were going to use this service, it would be important for me to know how often your service is pinging my sites to verify SSL cert integrity - <USER2> ever minute, once every five mins? Couldn't find this on the page or FAQ

Otherwise this is a great idea! I can definitely see the usefulness of a service like this, and I wish you great success!

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you for taking a look, I appreciate your feedback!

1) I see what you mean. I need to make more use out of that area.

2) I agree. Twilio is pretty inexpensive, so I may go ahead and integrate with them. At first, I was seeing this as less of a near-real-time service and more of a, "hey, heads up" service, but I can see real value in providing more immediate monitoring and notifying.

3) Great point. I'll definitely add this to the FAQ, and FYI, it's polling every hour right now. As I mentioned above, I'm rethinking this, so I'll probably decrease the polling wait period significantly and I might make it user configurable. The connection is very light weight, so it's easy on my server and the clients'.

I'm glad you think it's a good idea. There doesn't seem to be much interest yet, but I'm still optimistic!

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Don't be embarrassed, great job on going ahead and shipping it! Some suggestions:

1\. Make the call of action buttons larger. E.g. "subscribe now", "try for 30 days" etc. They should be larger.

2\. I see that your layout is single column with images showing the app. But when I scroll down to the bottom, there is no call of action there! You should probably put a big button there saying "Begin your free 30 day trial today!"

[added more:]

3\. The "Try Certician free for 30 days!" link goes to your FAQ page! This should go to your payment page.

4\. Right now the different plans all lead to different payment pages. I suggest you make them all go to the same page but use a drop down select box to allow the user to change the plan if one wants.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the feedback!

I like all of your suggestions, and I'm going to work on implementing them.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Link: <https://www.certician.com/>

<comment><USER5> Can't access the site. Getting an error in Chrome 12: Error 111 (net::ERR_TUNNEL_CONNECTION_FAILED): Unknown error.

<comment><AUTHOR> Are you still? I'm able to access it using Chrome 12.0.742.122 for Mac.</comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: Weekend project helps you find your friends by sharing a link - <AUTHOR> http://ff.mouseofdoom.com

<comment><AUTHOR> If anyone wants to help improve the service I've shared the code on git. Big ups to the [http://openkeyval.org](http://openkeyval.org) project.

[http://github.com/ndroo/friend-finder](http://github.com/ndroo/friend-finder)</comment>


Concorde 'B' - <AUTHOR> https://www.heritageconcorde.com/concorde-b <comment><USER2> Concorde was a fantastic technological achievement; It's beautiful and revolutionary. My heart really wants it to be successful.

However, my head tells me that no amount of tweaking or tuning will change the fundamental problem with Concorde. The root problem with this aircraft is that people prefer cheaper flights over faster flights.

The real success that we can take from the Concorde program was that some of the technology found its way into the A300 program and its derivative, the A320.

Cheap, reliable aircraft are what people want. Fast, expensive ones are cool, but not really economic.

<comment><USER3> Disclosure: I'm at Boom, which is building a Mach-2.2 airliner. [https://boomsupersonic.com/](https://boomsupersonic.com/)

I think it all depends on how much cost savings for how much speed. In today's dollars, a round-trip ticket on Concorde from New York to London was $20,000, or 4x today's business class price. For that, you got a tiny seat in a cramped cabin.

What we're targeting at Boom is an improvement over business class. We're making it profitable for airlines to operate the plane at today's business class fares. We're getting you there in half the time. And instead of a cramped two-and-two cabin arrangement, it's a one-and-one configuration (every seat is a window AND an aisle). The seats are similar to today's domestic first class seats, only designed for productivity.

So the choice a business traveler could soon face is: Would you like to get from New York to London in 7 hours in a lay-flat bed, or in 3h15m in a comfortable, productive environment? Price is the same either way. We think most people will pick the supersonic flight.

It should be noted also that the premium cabin market today is much larger than it was a few decades ago.

And finally, premium-cabin economics are only the first step. We think there's a roadmap to making supersonic flight _cheaper_ than subsonic flight is today. It will take a few decades, but that is absolutely the path that Boom is on.

<comment><USER4> Uh-huh. You're delivering seat prices 1/4 of Concorde _and_ halving passenger capacity. So that's about an order-of-magnitude cost reduction through the power of...magic, I guess?

<comment><USER5> Not sure why all these people are saying it totally makes sense that technology can provide a magic 10x improvement in efficiency.

If you want to go the same distance for 1/10th the cost, you need to use 1/10th the fuel, have 1/10th the maintenance overhead, and have 1/10th the staffing cost all at the same time.

You can't go over 100% efficiency in any area, so to see 1/10th the cost you would need the entire aircraft industry in the 1970s to be operating at under 10% efficiency, a low bar I am highly skeptical of.

It's not like Aeronautics engineers or the Airline industries were gorillas banging rocks together with no understanding of what they were doing, and I find it hard to believe there is enough room for a 10x increase in efficiency from the 1970s even with a perfectly efficient aircraft and airline behind it.

But hey, if you really believe it's possible, invest in Boom because they must have designed a cold fusion reactor running on tap water to power their jet and everyone who invests will probably become a trillionaire overnight once they reveal it.

<comment><USER6> In 50s cars were 15mpg in average. Today's top tier mpg cars are over 120mpg. Order of magnitude. They are also safer, quieter, faster, cheaper in maintenance, etc.

Technology does enable 10x improvements over half a century sometimes.

<comment><USER7> You just compared fleet average in one time period to an extreme outlier in another time period.

In reality, fleet average fuel economy has been nearly flat for four decades, with the biggest periods of movement being driven by brief excursions in the price of crude oil. Those efficiency excursions were in turn driven not by technological improvement, but by changes in the makeup of the vehicle fleets themselves (lighter cars, smaller engines).

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

<comment><USER6> and here we're comparing "average" of supersonic flight half a century ago to a potential future outlier. i don't think i'm being outrageously unreasonable here.

<comment><USER8> The Concorde is not "average", it is the most fuel efficient supersonic aircraft to date by a huge margin. Yes it's kind of old but I think you are dramatically overestimating how much aircraft turbojet engines have improved in the past 40 years.

<comment><USER9> While Concorde was efficient at supersonic cruise, it was ridiculously inefficient getting there (and this was one of the main arguments for the proposed Concorde B).

Also note most aircraft capable of supersonic cruise nowadays don't use turbojets, they use low-bypass turbofans (mostly around 0.3:1).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I have a hard time imagining SST making any sense given that we spend hours stuck in traffic, then stuck in the TSA line, customs, stuck in traffic again. The gain of a few hours from NY to London or Paris doesn't seem enough. If you could extend the range to where you can do really long-haul flights maybe it would be interesting to a tiny elite.

<comment><USER11> There's a wealth of public transit options that will reliably get you from Manhattan to JFK in about an hour.

I haven't waited in a security line at an airport for more than 30 minutes in years. When lines get long they drop the security theater and start letting people through very quickly. I imagine people who are willing to pay for SST would also pay the troll toll and spend comparatively very little time in security lines.

For context, I fly (usually coast to coast) about a dozen or more times a year.

<comment><USER12> > When lines get long they drop the security theater and start letting people > through very quickly.

Which airports? US domestic flights? Because internationally I've never seen this happen.

<comment><USER13> Any airport which _doesn 't_ fly to the USA.

Generally, security rules are made and enforced by USA authorities. Any airport which doesn't fly to the USA only needs to follow local rules of the country they are in, which while typically are as strict as the USA rules, are typically not enforced.

Some airports for example only xray one in 10 bags at peak times, or none at all if the machines broken.

Source: Personal experience only, but I've been to a lot of airports.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Isn't this what Boom (a YC company, I think) are essentially doing? [https://boomsupersonic.com/](https://boomsupersonic.com/)

<comment><USER15> Yes--there's a great discussion of their strategy on this podcast: [http://www.airplanegeeks.com/2017/08/02/463-boom- supersonic/](http://www.airplanegeeks.com/2017/08/02/463-boom-supersonic/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> TGV, Concorde, Leclerc tank, Rafale, it's almost like the cliché of the French not being good engineers is inaccurate.

Yes I'm French, yes I'm salty.

<comment><USER17> Uh, there was never such a cliché? I've never heard anyone say French people were bad engineers.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> Is there any reason why people don't buy Concorde for Private jet? Surely there are lot more people who can afford this compare to what was 20 years ago. And those who buy private jet are likely to care about the much shorter trip.

Or is it Concorde, due to its thrust and speed aren't / can't be as comfortable ?

<comment><USER19> I believe Airbus have let the type certificate lapse. Nobody is allowed to fly them...

<comment><USER9> And, AFAIK, they didn't like making spare parts for it because by the end they were frequently having to manufacture one-off parts.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> It is really sad that this design wasn't built. The Concorde was a great design, but obviously, you don't hit perfection on the first attempt. The Concorde "B" shows, that as with any design, it is important to have enough iterations to get real efficiency. The Shuttle was a great design for the late 70ies. If it had at least a significant design iteration every 5-10 years, it could have been a bigger success. Similarly if the Concorde hat gotten 2-3 design iterations over its life, it could have been very successfull. SpaceX is successful, because they are not trying to fly the initial F9 - it is said that they actually didn't built the exact same rocket twice, but always added small improvements.

<comment><USER21> Concorde was iterated 3 times, each carrying substantial modifications. From flying prototype to a preproduction version to the production version.

<comment><USER20> I was explicitly talking about iterations after the production version. As the linked article shows, there were significant updates possible relative to the production version.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> None of this to address the major problem that plagued and ultimately ended its run though, the exploding tires and subsequent damage.

<comment><USER23> It wasn't really the issue. Yes, that was a major problem but the real issue was the plane was old.

The newest model had been built in 78 (G-BOAF, Aircrat 216). Think about it, how many airlines back in 2000 were flying planes that were between 22 and 25 years old? Not that many. Just looking right now, AF and BA are around 12 to 13 years for their average fleet age.

Yes, the airframe was aging slowly because high temperatures while flying would prevent humidity from building up but the maintenance on this aircrat was expensive as hell compared to more recent aircrafts.

And it was a downward sliding slope. Anything was costlier on this thing because pretty much everything had to be custom built compared to other planes.

And in the end, it stopped flying not only because AF and BA decided to retire their Concorde fleet but above all because Airbus retired the aircraft certificate of airworthiness.

Is it political? Economical? Honestly, probably both. Airbus probably didn't want to get dragged in the mud again if anything else were to happen.

<comment><USER9> > The newest model had been built in 78 (G-BOAF, Aircrat 216). Think about it, > how many airlines back in 2000 were flying planes that were between 22 and > 25 years old? Not that many. Just looking right now, AF and BA are around 12 > to 13 years for their average fleet age.

By way of comparison, the last BA 747-100 flight was late 1999, on G-AWNO, which had been delivered to BOAC in 1973. The last 747-200 flight was not much later (2001, G-BDXO), despite being a far, far newer airframe (delivered 1987).

<comment><USER23> Right (I upvoted you actually) but by another way of comparison, it appears BA itself ended up having 19 747-100 altogether.

Which is 5 more than the _whole_ Concorde fleet.

167 747-100 were built says wiki... [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_747#Model_summary](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_747#Model_summary)

Think about economy of scales for parts, training, maintenance, ...

<comment><USER9> Also worth noting that BA got rid of all of their aircraft that had flight engineers relatively close together around that time (Concorde was the last to go).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Future engine economics would have been interesting, as well as digital design models once there was a market for Concorde B+, C and so on. Current engines for commercial jets are bypass fan designs. If the same efficiency gains had been achieved for the type of engine in a concorde... (who knows? maybe military jets are now significantly more efficient)

</comment><comment><USER25> My 10-year-old son is obsessed with Concorde. I'm going to send him this article.

<comment><USER26> Send him the link below if you really want to blow his mind. 100 pages of discussion between pilots, designers, aerodynamicists, FAs, etc.

CliveL was my favorite.

[https://www.pprune.org/tech-log/423988-concorde- question.htm...](https://www.pprune.org/tech-log/423988-concorde- question.html)

<comment><USER27> Or he might like this, reorganised for his reading pleasure: [https://paulross.github.io/pprune- concorde/docs/index.html](https://paulross.github.io/pprune- concorde/docs/index.html)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> An interesting aspect in the demise of the Concorde has nothing to do with the Concorde, but how other long haul airplanes changed with time. By the late 90s, you had lay-flat business class seats, in flight entertainment, and even fancier service in first class. The Concorde, on the other hand, was a small plane (2 by 2, single aisle), and while it cost more than first class, seats were similar to premium economy today (38" seat pitch). As you had to pay much more for a crappier seat, it is rumored that as much as half the passengers on each flight were just free upgrades and award flights.

</comment><comment><USER29> With an impractical or uneconomic product, the best version, often a mini tour de force, comes out just before cancellation.

</comment><comment><USER30> It would be nice to make one of these much like a resto mod car or how one might make a space invaders game cabinet with a Raspberry Pi on board. Imagine if you could 3D print the thing, slap in the dashboard from an A340 and the engines from some retired Eurofighter Typhoons.

<comment><USER31> This guy gets aeronautical engineering.</comment></comment>


A beautiful reading, writing and publishing platform you can actually rely on. - <AUTHOR> http://rsr.io

<comment><USER2> Hmm.. URL followed by anything will return the same (not 404) page: [http://rsr.io/hacker](http://rsr.io/hacker)

Some info about the server:

< HTTP/1.1 200 OK < Date: Thu, 26 Dec 2013 09:47:29 GMT < Server: Apache/2.2.22 (Debian) < Content-Location: posts.php < Vary: negotiate,Accept- Encoding < TCN: choice < X-Powered-By: PHP/5.4.4-14 < Cache-Control: no-store, no-cache, must-revalidate, post-check=0, pre-check=0 < Content-Type: text/html

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you for the feedback. We haven't done any bug tracking yet rather than giving-in all our efforts in building a robust api and an easy-to-use and efficient front-end.

</comment></comment><comment><USER2> Ahh found it: [http://rsr.io/login/](http://rsr.io/login/)

</comment><comment><USER3> An about page would be a good idea.</comment>


The Current State of Smart Locks - <AUTHOR> http://schuylertowne.com/blog/smart-locks <comment><USER2> I have been using the August for a few months now and I have a hard time recommending it to people. Smart locks need to be reliable and if they aren't then you lose trust in your lock, and, well if you lose trust in your lock, what's the point of owning it.

* Auto-unlock is great when and if it works, and is the only reason to own the August. Unfortunately it's currently iOS only.

* Everlock is currently in "beta" (it's the feature that auto-locks your door after 30 seconds), but one night after my friends left the house, it didn't re-lock itself, so now we can't trust one of the few features of the lock anymore.

* Opening the door with your phone itself is a slow and painful process. It takes anywhere from 5-10 seconds for the phone to connect to the lock before you can control it (this doesn't include unlocking your phone, opening the app, and selecting which lock to connect to). It's absolutely unusable for day-to-day users. There's no point in using this when your keys work faster. However, I can say this is useful for people that do not live in the home, i.e. friends, cleaners, pet sitters, etc.

That said, I have an extra August coming in that I'm not sure what to do with. Christmas is coming up and I absolutely do not want to give it out as a present because it's just not ready.

</comment><comment><USER3> I replaced all of my door locks with Samsung SHS-3320/SHS-3321. These are standard RFID and I can (and did) buy cards/fobs for them super cheap. You can even stick a fob inside your hand/arm/face/whatever if you like: [https://dangerousthings.com/shop/xnt-ntag216-2x12mm-glass- ta...](https://dangerousthings.com/shop/xnt-ntag216-2x12mm-glass-tag/)

I've been super happy with them with a single caveat. They don't have Z-Wave support. If they made these exact same locks with Z-Wave support I'd replace all of my locks immediately with them. I really would prefer Z-Wave primarily for programming purposes because the existing touch-screen programming can be a bit limiting and it would be nice to be able to combine watching visitors (dog walker or cleaning lady, etc) with allowing access remotely via z-wave (currently they all have their own codes).

That said these locks are rock-solid and I wouldn't give up the physical security that comes from their great construction for anything.

</comment><comment> chestnut-tree A good related article about locks from the BBC: _Is the traditional metal key becoming obsolete?_

[http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-29817520](http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-29817520)

I'm quite conservative when it comes to locks for the home and prefer the traditional mechanical lock and key. I like the Lockitron feature of recording when a lock is opened/closed but that could be integrated into a mechanical lock without requiring the lock itself to operate electronically.

I think this quote from the BBC article above sums up how I feel:

 _...what about wear and tear, asks Brian Morland of the History of Locks Museum in Bournemouth. He cannot foresee a time when mechanical locks won 't be part of our daily life. "You drop a key in water and it's okay. If you drop an electronic key (or smartphone) it will cause endless problems."_

<comment><AUTHOR> I'm glad you referenced that article with your concerns, I'm actually quoted it in, but I think it was a bit of a shallow examination of a very deep topic.

I have my sole passion on the line when it comes to the decline of purely mechanical locks. My heart is brass and pumps grease. I love locks. That said - folks who can't imagine a time when the majority of door locks are electromechanical might wind up on the wrong side of history.

One of the constant refrains when I first found locks was that electronic locks could never be used in remote places where access to power might be a problem. Then I learned about the Kaba Mas X-series of user-powered safe locks. To the drop-it-in-water concern, many people are already using phones that are fully submersible and all of those people can use their phones to open several of the locks in this article. Not to mention waterproof electronic fobs.

There are a ton of pitfalls, the worst of which I touch on in the section on Yale's Real Living lock. The electronic lock manufacturers need to look to the history of mechanical security engineering before they reintroduce long-since- solved flaws. However, these systems are becoming robust and consumer ready. There are amazing electromechanical locks meant to be used exclusively on shipping containers, holding up to some of the worst weather conditions you can subject your hardware to. The market may not be mature just yet, but it is deep into puberty and whatever comes next will convince many more skeptics.

In the meanwhile, you can find me in a library, reading 19th century engineering texts, pretending the world I love isn't changing just as I learned to love it...

<comment> chestnut-tree I realise my conservative attitude is somehwat contradictory given that many apartment blocks have an electronic entry system to the building for guests who ring the doorbell/press the buzzer. And yet, a mechanical lock for my front door still feels more re-assuring to me than an electronic one. But as you say, we're in the "early adopter" phase and perhaps it's just a matter of time before electromechanical locks become commonplace and accepted.

<comment><USER4> Don't electronic locks come with a backup key in case the battery goes dead? I have a Schlage Camelot and it does have a spare key, not sure if it's commonplace.

<comment><AUTHOR> Most do, only the Haven explicitly positions themselves as anti-key, but Yale offers a keyless experience and it is possible to go completely keyless with both Lockitron and August as well.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I've tried a few of these. Kevo, lockitron, and some RFID one from samsung (which was my favorite). The main problem for me, mentioned in the article, is that residential doors are often not well aligned. if you try to open the door while locked you can end up putting enough pressure on the deadbolt that the motor can't open it. Humans recognize this with mechanical locks and we automatically adjust.

The worst part of that, though, is when the smart lock tries to reset it self and try again. You end up standing there while it goes back and forth, and in the end it's a huge hassle.

Humans are good at adapting to new situations and dealing with ambiguity like misaligned doors. With my mechanical lock, I can get really good and really fast at opening it in all circumstances. but with the smart lock I'm subject to it's slow speed and inability to adapt to new situations. I can't make it go faster.

I'd rather doors be redesigned to be more like car doors.

</comment><comment><USER6> What a thorough and interesting review. I was wondering why all the attention is placed on the locks and have been thinking that, a la many apartment buildings in cities with their buzz-in door locks, why not approach the "smart lock" problem by using electric strikes? A drawback would be you would need to supply power to the door frame, but then you wouldn't have to deal with worrying about when the batteries run out of juice.

To put it another way, suppose that, planning ahead, I install an electric strike that allows me to "buzz in" people. Then what I would like to do is be able to "buzz in" using a smartphone app, say.

<comment><USER7> Lockitron is also working on controlling existing electronic strikes. [https://lockitron.com/store/buzzer](https://lockitron.com/store/buzzer)

<comment><USER8> They're not working on it as something new. That was their first product many years ago.

<comment><USER7> Interesting, i'd never heard about that until pretty recently. To be honest, when I think of Lokitron all I think of is the deadbolt product, and then mostly manufacturing/shipping delays.

<comment><USER8> Their first product was very similar to the deadbolt one but it was a retrofit electronics for someone else's mechanical deadbolt. It was also powered and had to be connected to Ethernet. I'm going by memory and could be a bit off on the details.

But yeah the deadbolt is a refinement of their earlier product. Which makes me a bit baffled about how badly executed it is the second time around.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Would love to have seen the Schlage locks included in the comparison - I think they're the front-runners. Perhaps I'm overlooking some terrible flaw?

<comment><USER10> They really know the hardware/manufacturing side. You'll get a good lock from them. It's standards based, and those standards (e.g. z-wave) take into account power requirements, meshes, and security. I worked on their web app, Nexia, some time ago, and because it's standards based you can also DIY with their locks and something like Mi Casa Verde.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Great Read. I see a ton of the GE Supra iBox Lockboxes. I hear they cost realtors a lot and they have no alternative. Perhaps for the VRBO or non- Realtor properties too.

This is a really stupid question, but will there be hybrid locks not for door/access but stuff we never thought could be locked in the old mechanical days? a pack of cigarettes? pill bottle? sleeve to a jacket? briefcase? mouse? baby child-proofing? an envelope?

<comment><AUTHOR> Not a stupid question at all. A dive through the patent record reveals a ton of amazing ideas for locking random objects up. in my conversations with Bob Swartz he has been fond of saying that locks are essentially latches, which is a great way to think of them. Here is a quick rundown of locks that have been patented that cover your examples:

Time Lock for Cigarettes: [https://www.google.com/patents/US2681560](https://www.google.com/patents/US2681560)

Combination lock for Pill Bottles: [https://www.google.com/patents/US3405828](https://www.google.com/patents/US3405828)

Ok, not a sleeve, but a mechanical lock for jacket pockets: [https://www.google.com/patents/US1138507](https://www.google.com/patents/US1138507)

and, of course, briefcases take a lot of locks, including very high security ones: [http://bagstogo.com.au/Secura-Case-15cm-Security- Briefcase-w...](http://bagstogo.com.au/Secura-Case-15cm-Security-Briefcase- with-Bi-Lock-Black.html)

And thanks for the kind words!

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> I loved this writeup, but was sorry to see the Sunnect digital deadbolt missing from the lineup ([http://www.sunnectlock.com/products.html](http://www.sunnectlock.com/products.html)).

I've had mine for 4+ years and have found it very reliable. It's keyless and non-networked, both of which I consider to be features. Aside from initial installation (which was a pain), no other complaints.

</comment><comment><USER13> Could the power/charging issue be handled by a rotatable handle/component that can charge up a battery if it goes flat and leaves you outside? A bit like the wind-up torches you see around the place?

Or would it require minutes and minutes of manpower to realistically charge?

<comment><USER14> Another idea to provide backup power is to have backup battery in the "key". The key wouldn't be need to be mechanical, but electronic, and could provide the juice for emergencies. Another option would be a "key" that acts as microUSB adapter to provide power from phone.

<comment><USER15> Providing power through the key makes it an attack surface (what if I supply 5kV? can I use it for power-analysis attacks? etc)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> I was hoping for more of a security testing/review of each of the locks. It's hard to find any real world tests that have been done on these locks to see how hard they are to physically compromise.

I have the Yale lock but without the keyhole on it and without the z-wave module in it. I chose this one because it was one of the few that avoided having an actual keyhole on it to lessen the chances of being picked or bumped. I'm still wondering how it stacks up to being hit with a hammer or any other physical attacks.

<comment><AUTHOR> Yeah, sorry to fall short of actual physical testing. There are some awesome researchers champing at the bit to get their hands on a collection of these locks, so expect blog posts, conference presentations and papers to start trickling out over the next year or so.

Personally, I'm very interested in your experience of living sans key. Do you live with anyone else? Was there any discussion or extended thought process before making the switch? Do you have an idea of what your ideal lock would be/do?

<comment><USER16> Living with no key is great. Just need to remember a 4-8 digit pin code. All I carry now is a key fob for my car. I live with my girlfriend and we each now have our own pin codes on the Yale lock, super easy to use and I've had installed now for 1 year and have not had to change the batteries yet. The auto locking feature is also nice so no one forgets to lock the door, it just locks after about a minute. If I'm expecting friends or a maid I can input a new code for them in 2 seconds right from the lock.

My ideal lock is pretty close to the Yale: \- Physically tough (not sure if the Yale lock is but it feels pretty hefty to me) \- No key hole \- 4+ digit pin codes \- Multiple pin codes \- Auto lock only when door is closed (the Yale does it based solely on time) \- Easy way to plug/unplug a z-wave or zigbee module. Although I don't see much benefit to having my lock hooked up to the internet. I can simply tell people my guest code that is programmed on the lock if I need to let someone in and I'd prefer not to open up another possible attack vector.

I also have a Samsung EZON 3120 which has been discontinued but I like that it locks only when the door is closed.Also when typing in a pin code it makes you hit two random numbers on the key pad before entering your pin code to make it harder for someone looking over your shoulder to figure out the code and/or leave fingerprints of your code on the touch pad.

<comment><USER17> I have one of the Yale locks in the UK and you can enter as many digits as you want before and after the actual combination and it will still work.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> @billyvg - I'm part of the team at August and sorry to hear you're not having the best experience. Auto Unlock is coming to Android soon and we are quickly fixing issues in the field as they come in. Many are new issues that are either specific to the user environment, manufacturing batches or didn't show up in QA/beta. If you wouldn't mind pinging me at email@example.com, would love to debug any issues your lock might have.

</comment><comment><USER19> Interesting read! Do you have any thoughts on the qKey system from the Dutch startup Ubiqu? [http://www.ubiqu.nl/](http://www.ubiqu.nl/)

<comment><AUTHOR> Oh, this is awesome! Thanks for the heads up and kind words . I don't, yet, have any thoughts, but 2 of the 3 mentors/teachers I mentioned at the top are Dutch, so I will be hitting them up for their insights. You can find them at:

Barry Wels: [https://twitter.com/barrywels](https://twitter.com/barrywels) Han Fey: [http://hanfeylocktechnologies.com/](http://hanfeylocktechnologies.com/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> There's also "smart with a somewhat traditional key" as in [http://www.iloq.com](http://www.iloq.com). Doesn't talk to your smartphone; actually, doesn't talk at all until a key is inserted. That removes many privacy/security concerns. Open question for me is how easy this is to crack and how reliable it will be (if you have a valid key, will you be able to get in, even after a few years of wear and tear?)

</comment><comment><USER21> I'm somewhat disenchanted with the prospects of keeping a house safe with the use of a lock. Even if the lock itself is perfectly safe, any sliding doors or windows are easy points of entry. And even if those aren't an option, many doors and frames are flimsy enough that a prybar or a ram will split them.

Sure, there are ways around all of these, but you'd end up feeling like you live in a prison...

<comment><USER22> There's also removing a couple of tiles from the roof.

<comment><AUTHOR> The rififcoup!

So named for the fabulous film Rififi, in which burglars rented an apartment, then drilled through the ceiling to the floor below. This was a direct reference to the French criminal anarchist Alexandre Marius Jacob who famously carried out just such an attack in the early 20th century. At his trial (for murder, among other things) he uttered one of my favorite quotes. He was asked what had become of him, he had traveled the world as a sailor, he was educated, how had he become a murderous anarchist. To which he replied:

"I have seen the world. It is not beautiful."

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Kwikset makes several deadbolts with keypads and keyZ-Wave support that I've been very pleased with. I'm a big fan of the quick rekeying feature most Kwikset locks have these days so I can always rekey just all my doors and give that key to someone (since putting Z-Wave enabled deadbolts on all my doors would be fairly expensive).

</comment><comment><USER24> > who want to bring a keyless hotel lock experience to the US

No thanks. Those keyless hotel locks fail too often when I use them to ever want them for my home. At least in the hotel, I can go back to the front desk and they'll fix it. I also don't care for the slowness of operating them vs a regular key.

</comment><comment><USER25> It would be more interesting to get a write up of your kickstarter fiasco. [https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/schuyler/lockpicks- by-o...](https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/schuyler/lockpicks-by-open- locksport)

</comment><comment><USER26> For anyone interested in this space, i recommend looking into ethereum, a bitcoin-like network. There's been lots of talk of "smart property" relating to blockchain technology, and imho, locks are the perfect starter use-case. I mean, locks are all about proving ownership, so what better arena to test the idea of using a cryptographic ledger of ownership. I've spent a little time considering how to port the lockitron api into an ethereum contract, and I don't expect it to be too difficult

<comment><USER27> "I mean, locks are all about proving ownership"

I don't think that's true at all. Locks serve two primary purposes:

1\. Access control 2\. Intrusion detection

Neither one is really about ownership, but about allowable use. And particularly neither one is about proving ownership.

<comment><USER26> > I don't think that's true at all.

Forgive me for saying, but this whole response seems like a confrontational HN-esque way of saying "What about intrusion detection?"

To which I'd say, "Great point! And you're right, that comes more easily for physical locks. Although I think we could do some interesting things with incrementing nonce's for successful and failed attempts to transact with a smart lock design."

<comment><USER27> I thought your original comment was misguided. I think there are cool and interesting things happening with blockchain technology that are related to ownership, and that are based on locks. But the fact that some new technology touches both doesn't mean that traditional locks do.

"Ownership" is a legal concept. A lock doesn't prove ownership in any way. The person with the keys to a car or a house isn't the owner of it. The person listed on the pink slip/deed is.

I started out saying that locks are just about access control, then remembered the old "locks keep honest people out" adage, and added "intrusion detection" to the list.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> It is stunning to me that these products exist and are going to be widely deployed.

Your front door lock should not talk on the network. It should not have "social features". It should not rely on electricity.

Your smoke detector should not be connecting to google servers. Your thermostat should not be connected to facebook.

Those are facts.

Either you instinctively understand those facts or you will learn them accompanied by much pain.

<comment><USER29> It's unfortunate you're being downvoted for pointing out something many programmers take for granted - that introducing unnecessary complexity to a security-oriented product makes it less safe by design.

<comment><USER30> I think they're being down-voted by listing some opinions and finishing with 'these are facts'.

Maybe networked door locks are a poor idea, maybe they're not. There's nowhere near enough of them in use right now for consumer risk to be assessed and determining 'facts' is a long way off. That kind of arrogance is obnoxious and should be down-voted. It doesn't add to the discussion, it doesn't add to anyone's understanding of the risks involved, it just acts to shut down conversation and is negative and damaging to the community.

Looking at similar advances in car locking technology - where 'keyless entry' or 'keyless go' is a common high-end car feature, suggests that it might actually be possible to have this balance of convenience and security.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> Mo,

Having recently purchased a home, and piled rocks, loose stones, bricks and the like next to my window laden front entryway door, what lock do you recommend I purchase?

Bear in mind, I don't want anything that my neighbors will understand, or industry experts will look down on. As a technophile, I want to walk only the bleedingiest of edges, employ the most futuristic of tech, and employ the bare minimum of common sense.

In fact, if it could be expensive enough be the target of break-in, so much the better!

love, shmoo

<comment><AUTHOR> Heh, if you want to go absolutely bonkers you could go with a lockitron/august/Haven on the interior, multi-point locking system in the door, an Abloy Protec 2 or EVVA MCS for your primary lock, and a Drumm Geminy Shield over that. (the Drumm shield is a lock to protect your lock.)

Remarkably, you could probably make it all happen for just north of 1k, or less if you are willing to do much of the labor yourself. Of course you'll have to wait for your smart lock to arrive, but you can rely on the mechanical locks in the meanwhile.

And any mechanical security enthusiast you invite over will be absolutely floored by your setup.</comment></comment>


Show HN: Donate your CPU time for Charity - <AUTHOR> https://www.helpforgood.io/ <comment><USER2> More like: donate money to charity through your electricity bill, by using it to power an inefficient method of mining Bitcoin. Unless someone else is paying your bills, you'd do better by donating directly.

<comment><AUTHOR> Hello, yes of course you're always do better by donating to Charities/NGOs directly. The whole intention is to use this tool just as an additional way to help.</comment></comment>


Oral History Interview with Steve Jobs - <AUTHOR> http://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/comphist/sj1.html

<comment><USER2> I had never come across this interview before. Thanks for sharing!

The section about education is especially interesting. Fixing education would fix so many parts of society. Amazing to read Steve Jobs' insight on this. He doesn't want to throw technology at the problem, but recognizes it needs more human touch. Amazing.</comment>


Show HN: JSON Query: A tool to query JSON data structures - aggregator-ios http://satishmaha.com/JSONQuery/ <comment><AUTHOR> For those that prefer a command line tool, jq has been around for a while and works very well. I can't count how many times jq let me hack together a bunch of commands I normally would have had to write a small program for. e.g small script that pushes the latest semver tag from a github repo to a geckoboard text widget: [https://gist.github.com/jdc0589/67df901f71d96b7649b4](https://gist.github.com/jdc0589/67df901f71d96b7649b4)

[http://stedolan.github.io/jq/](http://stedolan.github.io/jq/)

</comment><comment><USER2> Is this a GUI for jq?

</comment><comment><USER3> The video looks like you are combining keys?

You could just do this with [http://jsonunroller.appspot.com/](http://jsonunroller.appspot.com/) and grep.

<comment><USER4> or you could do it with `curl`, output it to sublime and type `json pretty` (json plugin installed) :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Why such tools are more common on OS X?

</comment><comment><USER6> XPath for JSON? Who would have thought of that! Now add namespaces and you reinvented XML 10 years later

<comment><USER7> Except that, with certain caveats, XML has a slightly nicer syntax for text- heavy documents, and JSON is slightly nicer for hardcore data representation. For example, I'd much rather have a web page in HTML than JSON, but I'd rather have a config file in the latter.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Cool tool, nice work!

</comment><comment><USER9> This changes everything. Good job

<comment><USER10> How? jq is already very usable.

[https://stedolan.github.io/jq/](https://stedolan.github.io/jq/)</comment></comment>


Show HN:  My weekend project - minimotivation.com - <AUTHOR> http://minimotivation.com

<comment><AUTHOR> FYI - I created this simple site for myself. I use it as my homepage to get a little motivational reminder every time I open a new tab.

I thought it might be useful for startup founders, entrepreneurs, freelancers, or anyone who works alone.

<comment><USER3> Looks like fortune for the web. Are you using fortune as a backend, or for quotes?

<comment><AUTHOR> No, I had actually never heard of fortune, but I will look into it now :)

I am currently just hand selecting the content and storing it in a database. Nothing fancy.

<comment><USER3> > I had actually never heard of fortune

A long, long time ago in this galaxy, this was the first program to run when a user logged in/opened a new terminal. Not on every system of course.

<comment><USER4> Still does on all my systems.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Make it so that I can click the content instead of scrolling down to click a small link lost in a corner.

<comment><USER6> Funny, I didn't even notice that link until several F5s later. Nevertheless, yours is a good suggestion.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Reminded me of fortune , so I typed it into a terminal and got:

Q: What's the difference between an Irish wedding and an Irish wake?

A: One less drunk.

On St. Patrick's day of all days :)

</comment><comment><USER8> Awesome site, I absolutely love it. The only problem is that there isn't enough quotes, I think you should add a lot more.

I collect quotes and have quite a collection of good ones. Here are my favorite quotes, a lot of them would fit great on minimotivation.com:

<http://kristofferr.com/sitater.html>

<comment><AUTHOR> Great list! I will be adding several of those to minimotivation.com. Thanks.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Looks great! Would be really fun to add this to a monitor or picture-frame which would auto-refresh every so often.

One suggestion: Add attribution to the XKCD images and don't steal their bandwidth. I got this one as a motivation earlier: <http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/dreams.png>

<comment><AUTHOR> Added the attribution and link to XKCD.

I don't consider it "stealing their bandwidth" though, as XKCD explicitly allows hotlinking - <http://xkcd.com/license.html>

<comment><USER9> Awesome, I had no idea that XKCD encouraged people to do that - major props to them!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I like it. Thanks! A way to link to a specific quote/video/etc would be great for sharing with others.

<comment><AUTHOR> I was thinking about adding a permalink. I'll do that now. Thanks.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> I wrote a similar thing into our project management system here at work. Whenever we receive notifications about a project or something, a little small quote like the ones you're publishing are added to the end of the e-mail...

It would have been nice to add that feature by using your site and grabbing a quote instead of having to find the quotes myself and creating the code (even though it was just roughly an hour).

So maybe make an API for it with one command: "Get". You could return a json object or xml or whatever. {"quote":"blablabla", "author": "Henry the Third"}

It seems like an overkill, though :-)

</comment><comment><USER12> This video just came up:

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dDnrLv6z-mM&feature=playe...](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dDnrLv6z-mM&feature=player_embedded)

It blew me away.

</comment><comment><USER13> Nice! Is there a way to suggest quotes?

<comment><AUTHOR> Not yet, but I'd like to add it.

Until then, feel free to post suggestions here!

<comment><USER14> I've always been a fan of Seneca, the Roman philosopher and Stoic.

Here's a great collection of quotes: <http://www.quotationspage.com/quotes/Seneca>

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Great, don't take any suggestions from here. The app looks perfect, but it would have been fantastic if you had an API interface :)

No seriously, the app is minimalistic and well-done.

</comment><comment><USER16> Cool, looks similar to something I made last month :-)

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1128574> <http://github.com/jmhobbs/consume-less-create-more> <http://www.consumelesscreatemore.com/>

</comment><comment><USER17> have you thought about automatically updating the quotes every 10-15 seconds?

</comment><comment><USER18> The text is way too big for me to easily read it.

<comment><USER11> It would be great to be able to adjust the font size...?

<comment><AUTHOR> Probably not the solution you are looking for, but you can always use your browser to zoom out or make the text smaller.

<comment><USER11> You're right, I forgot that firefox remembers the zoom level for each page and when I go to another page/link in the same tab, the zoom level goes normal again. Good job FF.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Nice concept and i like the simple execution.

the font size does require me to "move my eyes" a lot to read longer phrases. i like how completely simple and to the point it is though.

it would be neat to let users submit their own inspirational nuggets - <USER2> you would probably have to review them to avoid misuse.

</comment><comment><USER20> Love the simple, clean design without any distractions. Great idea too. Are you manually adding the quotes/vidoes?

If it's possible to do it in a very subtle manner (footer?), maybe a small tweet icon would be nice (for quotes add the quote to tweet, for videos add the video link)

<comment><AUTHOR> Yes, I am manually adding the content.

I like the idea of integrating with twitter, facebook, buzz, etc. I will be looking into it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> Nice. And added to my little inspiration collection :)

<http://inspiry.tumblr.com/post/454443506/minimotivation>

And of course thanks to HN for most the content there.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks! And nice collection.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> This is just brilliant! Great work! I think you should be able to click the quote to go to the next one rather than having to go to the bottom of the page and click refresh. Other than that I loved it!

</comment><comment><USER23> Cool. Mind sharing the list of quotes you use as a single file? :)

<comment><AUTHOR> You can see all the quotes here - <http://www.minimotivation.com/quotes.php>

Would you like to see it in a different format?

<comment><USER14> How about a simple voting mechanism which will display more popular quotes more frequently?

<comment><USER24> I like the idea of voting to show how much people like a certain item, but if you use it to influence the rotation, in the long run you'll keep seeing the same content over and over.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> I like the site, nice and simple.

My only question is where do the quotes come from? I hit f5 too fast before noticing one of the quotes was by "Heywood Jablowme"

</comment><comment><USER26> Is there any possibility of having a distinct URL for each quote, so I could pass it along? Of course, if you plan to tie into Twitter, etc, you'd want that, no?

</comment><comment><USER11> Good job!

I've set it as my startup page in FF. It's a good way to start work/browsing.

</comment><comment><USER27> Make this into a chrome extension as an addition to the default "new tab" page :)

<comment><USER27> annd you've inspired me towards a new idea, hooray!

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> Yes, simple and straight to the point. Good going matey

</comment><comment><USER29> I like it. What about Star Trek quotes ? :p

</comment><comment><USER30> Hey good job, really like it!

</comment><comment><USER31> Thanks! My new homepage :)

<comment><USER31> Also, please don't stop adding to the collection. I'm a serious fan.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks! I really appreciate the encouragement. I plan to keep adding to the collection. If you have any suggestions, feel free to post them here. Cheers.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> Refresh the page? Why not use jQuery Ajax function to call the server side script.

</comment><comment><USER5> Let users submit their own quotes.

</comment><comment><USER33> Nice.

</comment><comment><USER34> +1</comment>


Amazon Holiday Delivery Woes: Send In the Drones - <AUTHOR> http://techland.time.com/2013/12/26/amazon-holiday-delivery-woes-send-in-the-drones/#ixzz2oufnQJvj

<comment><USER2> There aught to be drones. Maybe next year.</comment>


Coding is the new cursive writing – and we have to embrace it - <AUTHOR> https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/coding-is-the-new-cursive-writing-and-we-have-to-embrace-it/article35776671/ <comment><USER2> It was going well until the author implicitly conflated "learning to code" with "learning HTML." This is the narrative that needs to be fixed.

There's three kinds of coding:

1\. Systems

2\. Applications

3\. Analytics/Problem-Solving

There's no need to teach everyone how to do systems or applications programming. Zero. Zilch. Nada. What they _do_ need to learn is how to solve problems, create graphs and charts, etc. That potentially involves learning Python, R, Fortran, Matlab, spreadsheets, etc. Essentially we need to introduce them to the idea that your computer is the best programmable calculator ever created and that you can chuck your Texas Instruments calculator and solve much more kinds of problems of much higher complexity.

Thing is schools have already started going down this path for document creation. Kids today know all about word processors, presentation software, image & video capture and manipulation, and so forth. Now we just need to introduce them to another set of tools for STEM-related problem-solving and then we're all set.

<comment><USER3> It doesn't even have to go as far as writing code, which can be a real bottleneck for some people.

Visual programming is getting larger by the day, and it's a much smaller step for people to take.

It lets you focus more on the actual logic of the things, which is what I think is most important when teaching programming.

There's no point in teaching people how to work with javascript libraries, memory management or any kind of specific programming if that's not what interests them.

It should be as much surface-programming as is possible, and still letting them create cool stuff.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> It is unlikely to go the way of cursive writing though given that cursive writing is no longer taught in a large number of schools in the United States.</comment>


Slackware Live Edition - vezzy-fnord http://alien.slackbook.org/blog/slackware-live-edition/ <comment><AUTHOR> Slackware was my first experience with Linux. So long ago now, I am 31 now but was 12 when I was first shown Linux and I was hooked from there. Like most I have been around the block with many different Linux distros over the years, even a scary few years doing stage 1 Gentoo. I will always be fond of Slack though. Patrick and his work will always have a very special place in my life, I do not doubt I would have gone into technology anyway (seems to be in my DNA) but Patrick and Slackware was such a huge part of what I first remember of truly learning.

Sorry this post is a little off-topic, it is Sunday afternoon and I guess I am feeling sentimental or something ;)

<comment><USER2> I was "a bit" older when I picked up a copy of Slackware back in '95\. I was working doing C development on a number of *nix and other platforms (most of which are gone now), and needed something better for working from home than a 16 bit compiler on MS-DOS.

Slackware felt MUCH more powerful than the SCO x86 OS we had at work, and having a desktop GUI was just gravy, rather than worrying about anything being "ready for the desktop".

<comment><USER2> Delicious irony 20 years later: the mobile era. Apple, yet again, makes really good devices. However, the most numerous devices are now Linux/Android. Now we have to ask "Is _Microsoft_ ready for mobile", but it's too late, and the answer is "nobody cares".

God, it feels so good to watch Linux kick the crap out of MS, after all those years of putting up with their slow/buggy OS's and development torment-ware.

<comment><USER3> Well yes but my Android phone (Nexus 4) really feels like Windows 98 though : security is an illusion and it crashes (reboot) for no apparent reason (I believe it doesn't like to be put in Airplane Mode while I sleep).

Let's not talk about my desktop Linux experience which is not stellar either.

Honestly if it weren't for the telemetry updates I'd be a happy Windows user.

I didn't mention Apple since I can't afford what they think people should pay for their devices.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Eric Hameleers is a awesome. As a Slackware user his blogs and tips have been helping me for years.

"we are well equipped to keep systemd out of our distro for a while" Win!

This certainly isn't the first live Slackware though. Slax is how I first came to really experiment with Linux internals. It was a cool little tiny distro on a live USB. I was able to take stuff apart and build my own kernel etc without borking my real machine. I made several derivatives and even re-wrote the "live scripts" when the author took a hiatus around 2010. I learned so much from Slax.

<comment><USER5> Ahh you beat me to it (it being praising Eric Hameleers) :P Slackware is a better operating system thanks to Eric. Native Steam, multilib, leave it to Eric to make these things simple for others to use. I owe the man more beers than I can afford. :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> i tried many times to convince myself that i can live without automatic package dependencies but failed

i love the legacy of slackware, the brand but its more of an emotional thing

at the end, i use kubuntu, ubuntu based distros have access to ppa(s) which really make life a lot easier for linux on the desktop

hopefully one day slackware will give up and add automatic management for package dependencies but until that day, its too hardcore, i dont have that kind of time

<comment><USER7> I moved from Slackware to Kubuntu too, but as I recall Slack had something - maybe slackpkg - that did dependency installation. I jumped ship for the breadth of packages available and automatic kernel module compilation (I forget what it's called at the moment; recompiling nvidia video modules was getting to be a pain and I needed to keep the family computer online consistently).

<comment><USER8> slackpkg doesn't do dependencies.

slapt-get ([http://software.jaos.org/](http://software.jaos.org/)) does, but it needs repo that has dependency metadata. Official repos don't have it. If a repository doesn't have dependency metadata then slapt-get doesn't resolve deps for that set of packages.

Some other repos (AlienBob's for instance) do have dependency metadata, which assume that you did a full Slackware install, so only dependencies that aren't part of Slackware are listed.

There is also slapt-src (same URL) that automates installing stuff from [http://slackbuilds.org/](http://slackbuilds.org/), and it resolves dependencies. It's not fullproof, but is good enough (for me, at least).

There's a new repo on [http://slackonly.com/](http://slackonly.com/) which offers binary packages built from scripts on slackbuilds, and it looks like it has dependency metadata. I can't vouch for the quality of those packages, I haven't used it yet.

UPDATE: After skimming through PACKAGES.TXT for a few minutes, I'm not confident that slackonly repo has all dep. metadata correct, but hopefully they'll get better with it soon.

<comment><USER7> Ah, you're right it was slapt-get that I used; it convinced me that apt-get was really good, part of the reason I moved despite up to then being more familiar with compiling my own (yay for checkinstall) or using yum.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> How does Slackware compare to ArchLinux? They both seem to be very barebones and force you to learn more about Linux, but ArchLinux seems much more popular from what I gather.

<comment><USER10> The Arch docs are superior (best that I've encountered in the Linux world) but Slackware is worth it to me to stay away from systemd.

<comment><USER11> Out of curiosity, why don't you like systemd?

<comment><USER10> It felt too restrictive to me. Things were changing without me asking for them and that was preventing me from learning. One of the most egregious problems was forcing the change from text logs to journalctl binary logs.

<comment><USER12> > Things were changing without me asking for them and that was preventing me > from learning.

systemd has extensive documentation, both in manpages and in higher-level documents explaining how all the pieces fit together. I've generally found it far more straightforward to learn about than the components it replaces.

> One of the most egregious problems was forcing the change from text logs to > journalctl binary logs.

You can keep a syslog implementation like rsyslog installed, and you'll continue to have text logs too. And journalctl outputs plain text.

<comment><USER13> You can also make rsyslog work on windows, doesn't mean it's supported or encouraged..

people seem to have this analogue of "you can configure away the bad bits" but in the end the bad bits are orthogonal to it's design and 'bypassing' them or hacking around them should not be encouraged- it should be able to be done by default.

<comment><USER12> > people seem to have this analogue of "you can configure away the bad bits"

Where in my comment did I imply that the journal was "bad"? The journal is _awesome_. But if you have some workflow designed around syslog, such as a log analyzer or statistics package that you don't want to tweak, text logging still works just fine.

<comment><USER14> "bad" is just a metaphor in this context

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Slackware is what made me love computers, and love being a learner.

</comment><comment><USER16> Does Slackware have notable practical applications?

<comment><USER4> It's simple so it's somewhat easy to take apart and re-purpose. I was able to use it to build an internet enabled kiosk for instance without a lot of extra weight. It's super stable also so it make a good server. Lack of package management means you won't find it in the standard VM distro line up though.

As for other uses... using it to reply to this comment right now.

<comment> vezzy-fnord _Lack of package management_

There is no lack of package management. There is a lack of automatic dependency resolution without third-party additions. This is nowhere near as debilitating as often presented by outside observers who have never tried the distribution.

YMMV, but I've ran into circular dependencies and conflicts in addition to configuration updates rendering systems unbootable multiple times on distros like Debian with their non-transactional resolution heuristics that make your life easier, until they don't. Slackware's spartan package management has not failed me once, it's rock solid no matter how much you thrash your file system hierarchy. In addition, when I want to install SlackBuilds, I have never used a more convenient package manager than sbopkg before. Dependencies can be cleanly recorded and built with queuefiles.

<comment><USER17> > I have never used a more convenient package manager than sbopkg before. > Dependencies can be cleanly recorded and built with queuefiles.

[http://idlemoor.github.io/slackrepo/index.html](http://idlemoor.github.io/slackrepo/index.html)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> mu</comment>


What happened to Zimbabwe - <AUTHOR> http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2008/09/zimbabwe200809?printable=true&currentPage=all <comment><USER2> I find this article interesting in that part of what's necessary for successful start-up industry is freedom of which Zimbabwe has none. As a person of African descent and a Latin American living in the U.S. I am constantly struck by leaders who do not understand the world economy or simply dont care. A country like Zimbabwe, if they were to invest in their youth in say OLPC for instance or sending x number of students to study Computer Science or Engineering abroad; they would see an untold benefit societally in 15 to 25 years. Unfortunately we cant account for human greed and corruption which drives the Mugabes of the the world.

<comment><USER3> The problem is that giving kids laptops does not make them smarter. OLPCs are not magical teachers.

Also, especially in Zimbabwe, if you invest in sending children abroad to study, they will probably never come back. One of their biggest problems for the future is the mass exodus of intelligent, educated people from the country.

<comment><USER2> I of course was referring to some system where if I pay for your education you come back and work in the country fro x number of years. It cant just be a system where the government pays for the education of a few hundred or thousand people and they move to New York or London. There have to be other factors whereby the government and private industry make it attractive for people to come back and start technology start-ups.

<comment><USER3> I see this as a knee-jerk solution, but once these educated children see the western world, they will not want to stay in Zimbabwe; to force them to stay is tantamount to indentured servitude.

I've been thinking about possible solutions for Zimbabwe, but there aren't many. The first step is to remove Robert Mugabe from power and, probably with international help, instill some sort of civility and credibility in the government there by appointing a just governor. But there are no protections against what happened to Mugabe happening to the new president/ruler. Absolute power corrupts absolutely, as Orwell said.

In the short term, Zimbabwe is kind of screwed. They have a hyperintelligent criminal dictator, a mass exodus of their most intelligent and rich people, and inflation so high that conducting business is impossible. And the government there doesn't seem to be doing anything drastic to fix these problems.

It's sad. More than ten million people live there in extreme poverty. And just ten years ago, it had some of the highest standards of living in all of Africa.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> The problem with Zimbabwe is that it's not Rhodesia.

<comment><USER2> Anything is better than European colonialism...

<comment><AUTHOR> _Anything?_

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Nothing to do with hackers.

<comment><USER6> I think we're all a little tired of the off-topic police. +1 for giving it a rest.

"Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes more than hacking and startups. If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the answer might be: anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity."

I'd argue that we should simply flag accounts as hackers, thereby, by definition, greenlighting anything they post, except I wouldn't be one of them.

<comment><USER7> > I think we're all a little tired of the off-topic police.

Do you think I should submit this link?

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaiah_Berlin>

(I read it today to satisfy my intellectual curiosity.)

<comment><USER8> I'm interested in Isaiah Berlin too, but I wouldn't submit that link. It's not particularly good. It probably wouldn't get many hackers interested in Isaiah Berlin. But if you felt the article was particularly good, I don't see why you shouldn't go ahead and post it. It would be within the HN guidelines to do so.

It's impossible to follow the guidelines precisely, because good hackers aren't all interested in the same things. For any post outside the safety zone of, say, programming, startups, math and maybe physics, there will be some good hackers who aren't interested. But it doesn't follow that others won't like it a lot. The trouble with the "off-topic police" is that they're trying to speak for all hackers about what's not interesting. _Le HN c 'est moi._

Edit: How about this? Do you think I should submit it? [http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121858701285435131.html](http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121858701285435131.html)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Zimbabwe is War 2.0. You know how things moved online? Well, Zimbabwe is what happens when a media and economic war is waged against a country. The war is between Britain and Zimbabwe, and the REALLY sad part is that all of you have been convinced by the one-sided propaganda you read. How many of you who think you know the entire story have actually ever read the Zimbabwean side of things?

It's war 2.0 folks, and you don't even realise it. Africa has a completely different perspective on the Zimbabwe conflict, but in your freedom to read whatever they provide for you to read, you have no other sources of information.

<comment><USER10> I was in Zimbabwe in September of last year. This article matches very closely with our impressions of the political climate of the country and seems consistent with the opinions of the Zimbabweans we talked to -- at least, those who were willing to talk openly about politics. Certainly there's an economic war going on, but it seems a civil war, where any semblance of a functioning economy has long since been manipulated into uselessness by Mugabe's hand. I carry my own biases to be sure, but it was hard not to draw this conclusion from what we saw last year and the terrible decline since then.

Zimbabwe's current situation is complex, charged, and forged out of decades of conflict among groups inside and outside the country. I can't argue outright there isn't another broad perspective on what's happening, but I'd like to read about it for myself. Please post links.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Which companies have 4-day workweeks? - <AUTHOR>

Hey HN, I'm interested in companies that follow a 4-day workweek (with normal work hours--not compressed).
IIRC here are two:
- 37Signals
- Treehouse
Know of any others? <comment><USER2> 37signals doesn't have a four day workweek. They tried it and found it wasn't quite enough time to do everything they wanted to do in a week.

<comment><USER3> The most recent update I can find from them (May 2012) said that they still have 4-day workweeks half the year, May-October: [http://37signals.com/svn/posts/3186-workplace- experiments-a-...](http://37signals.com/svn/posts/3186-workplace-experiments- a-month-to-yourself)

Have they gotten rid of it entirely since then?

<comment><USER2> Ah, yes, you are right that they still have it around. The first time they did it, they were hoping that it would work year-round and they had to get rid of that idea. I'm glad they are able to make it work periodically, though.</comment></comment></comment>


Peach just released a web version of their app - <AUTHOR> https://peachwww.com/ <comment><USER2> I find it very interesting how they're naming each major functionality with an associated word of it in either the domain name or in its extension

i.e.

* Mobile landing page: [http://peach.cool](http://peach.cool)

* Webapp: [https://peachwww.com](https://peachwww.com)

* API: [https://v1.peachapi.com/](https://v1.peachapi.com/)</comment>


Ask HN: How to Commercialize "Internal" Products? - <AUTHOR> Hi, I have been in a technical leadership role with a product (15yrs old) for 9+ yrs. I'm presently leading ~10 devs and report to a B level manager. We don't have clear mgmt and engg leadership tracks, so I fill in a lot of shoes currently.
Over the yrs there have been always interest from research group to commercialize our product. Our owner always thought that it was too customized for our environment and didn't think it could be productized. Recently executive mgmt has decided on commercializing it. Owner isn't interested in this and think that it has very little chance of success(given the avg success of start ups being pretty low). So, the mgmt has decided to spun off a different subsidiary.
The owner wants us to play no part in the new subsidiary. He thinks the new product will be a different fork and existing product as a enhanced (ahem heavily customized) version.
None of us can move to new subsidiary, only my manager has been moved over there.
Now I'm tasked with completely managing this team more of mgmt and less of technical leadership role). The team feels let down and think that the product could have been bootstrapped internally with the same team. It would have given a opportunity for us to learn new tech and possibly grow in career of the product were to be successful.
- What is a successful strategy in commercializing internal products like this?
- If you are an C-level executive, have made these kinds of decisions? What is the basis of it? When would you choose a different team ( beside technical skill)?
- If you are in my position, how do you work with fellow members who feel let down morally? And the product owner.
-  Should I explore better alternatives of technical leadership roles like architect/staff engineer elsewhere? Suggestions? <comment><USER2> Start with lean canvas.</comment>


Facebook Employees Rally Around Foxes And Earn a Certified Wildlife Habitat - <AUTHOR> http://blog.nwf.org/2013/06/facebook-employees-rally-around-foxes-and-earn-a-certified-wildlife-habitat/

<comment><USER2> If you have an interest in foxes I can recommend a couple of fox books you might like:

"The Sprite, The Story of Red Fox" . This was last published in 1926 but it is available used on Amazon. It's the true story of a pet fox.

"Red fox: The Catlike Canine"</comment>


Meet the Carousing,Harmonica-Playing Texan Who Won Nobel for Cancer Breakthrough - <AUTHOR> https://www.wired.com/story/meet-jim-allison-the-texan-who-just-won-a-nobel-cancer-breakthrough/ <comment><AUTHOR> Nobody could even say for certain that such a such a (missing piece of the cancer-immunity puzzle) piece existed. And certainly nobody would have guessed that it would be discovered by a hard-living, harmonica-playing Texan who hadn't even been looking for it.</comment>


Everyme (YC S11) Has A New Project: Origami, Private Sharing For Families - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2012/09/20/everyme-origami/

<comment><USER2> How does YC W12 Family Leaf feel about this?

<comment><USER3> We feel alright! There's been a number of well-funded, well-run companies entering our space recently.

<comment><USER4> Gotcha. So you're offering similar services in an accommodating market.

My personal opinion is that niche social networks are the way to go, so if you guys feel you can compete than power to you!

Good luck!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> This is a weird article, making it seem like the plan is to sunset Everyme - which would discourage uptake. It seems like they would have been better to emphasize how easy it is to maintain both apps.

Though since this is the consumer space, most of your customers probably aren't reading techcrunch.

</comment><comment><USER6> In April 2012 this Techcrunch article on Everyme said they have 24,000 users and 200,000 circles

<http://techcrunch.com/2012/04/12/everyme-200k/>

But from the sound of this latest Techcrunch article they are switching up, maybe the activity dropped off forcing them to change

</comment><comment><USER7> No screenshots. Just fluff.</comment>


Dallas Startup Employs Dozens of Robots to Mow Lawns - <AUTHOR> http://dfw.cbslocal.com/2017/04/06/robots-take-over-tedious-chore-mowing-lawns/ <comment><USER2> For years I've wondered about the feasibility of this but the thing that always held me back was the liability of having a spinning blade running around people's property effectively unsupervised.

A bit dramatic but a serious question: what happens when one of these sucks up a poodle or maims a child?

<comment><AUTHOR> Autonomous robots with spinning blades. What could go wrong?

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Great business service</comment>


Show HN: Suto – Expert advice on products via SMS - <AUTHOR> http://asksuto.com/ <comment><USER2> Cool idea! I just submitted a question and I'm waiting for an answer :)

Just wanted to provide some feedback. On the screen that says "Thanks for texting Suto! You'll get a response shortly.", there is a section that says "Here are some other questions being answered now:"

It's blank!

That makes it seem like no one is using it, or something is broken. I really like the idea of having some examples, there, though. Maybe just switch to some good examples rather than a feed?

<comment><AUTHOR> Hey!

Thanks for the feedback, I just realized that the feed is still there on mobile. We were supposed to take it out (mainly because we wanted to give some more relevant examples instead).

Hope you enjoy the answer that's about to come your way!

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Hey HN - I'm one of the creators of Suto. I created it because I needed to buy a projector and spent hours researching the best projectors and still couldn't make a decision. I finally asked my friend who knows a lot about projectors, and he gave me a super simple answer. So I thought it would be cool to have a friend like that for everything.

Would love to hear your feedback on Suto's helpfulness/experience, or any questions you have!

</comment><comment><USER3> This is an awesome solution to a pretty painful problem for me. The way I buy something is I typically spend 90% of my time researching and deciding what to buy and just 10% on actually finding the best place to buy it and pulling the trigger. Most millennials I know do the same and spend a lot of time on researching products, which is definitely time consuming. Pretty cool to see a viable solution here. Giving it a try now!

<comment><USER4> Why not look at product review ratings or narrow down the product based on the features you want? Is it that you don't know what features are important? I'm interested because I also do work with product search

<comment><AUTHOR> A lot of times, folks who don't know much about a certain industry just don't know what to look for. It's also a rather lengthy process.

I'm super interested to hear what / how you do product search! Feel free to shoot me an email at firstname.lastname@example.com if you're up for a quick chat!</comment></comment></comment>


Why treating diabetes keeps getting more expensive - <AUTHOR> https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/10/31/why-insulin-prices-have-kept-rising-for-95-years/ <comment><USER2> As a type-1 diabetic of 17 years now, I can confirm that the price of Insulin has been steadily rising over the years.

I can also state that the majority of my medical expenses go to insulin pump supplies, not insulin itself. On average, I'm paying roughly $250/mo out of pocket, after 90% insurance coverage for the whole diabetic kit-and-kaboodle. I would be quite troubled if I were to lose my job and/or medical insurance. Thinking about the future, it's definitely a fear of being in a circumstance where I will be without supplies for any amount of time.

As another commenter noted, and got down-voted instantly, a large cause of the insulin usage increase (and therefore pump increases) is due to a dramatic increase in the diagnosis of type 2 diabetics.

Depending on where you're treated, many type-1 diabetics are given a rather thorough crash course on the disease (and it's symptom-based-cousin, type-2, for comparison). In my opinion at least, I don't feel like many type-2 diabetics are given as much information, or are potentially more reluctant to absorb it.

It's a broad generalization, but not necessarily inaccurate, to state that most type-2 patients rely on medicines to treat their symptoms and will not adjust their diets even under the worst case scenario. Type-2 in many ways can have it's symptoms reduced/resolved by something akin to a keto diet. That said, sugar _is_ ridiculously hard to quit.

<comment><USER3> I think the reason the other comment about the effect of increased type-2 diagnosis on price was downvoted was that it stated a simple and direct causation between growing demand and prices.

I agree that type-2 patients should receive better orientation in terms of dietary treatment, but this growth in demand could (should?) also lead to an economy of scale, especially for pump supplies, and a price drop. I have the impression that it is not the free market (through demand growth) that is increasing the prices, but rather a lack of free market (through cartel).

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> "I don't think it takes a cynic such as myself to see most of these drugs are being developed to preserve patent protection," said David Nathan, a Harvard Medical School professor. "The truth is they are marginally different, and the clinical benefits of them over the older drugs have been zero." -- quote from article

And there you have it. I have seen this myself. One year ago, the insulin I was on was removed from the pharmacy, and coverage by my insurance company was also voided. My only choice, I was told, was to switch to a new insulin (which - as article states - was only marginally better, if at all), but which had a fresh patent and thus ensures new profits for another 20 years to come.

And so the wheel keeps churning. Patients are not given a choice, because we are not humans. We are merely a commodity to pharmaceutical companies' profits and shareholder value.

<comment><USER5> I always thought that when patents expire, a generics company will duplicate the drug (or treatment mechanism) and the prices will plummet to close to marginal cost due to competition. I get the impression that this happens in Europe, given the generic options that I am encouraged to choose when I'm picking up a prescription at the pharmacy. They are invariably cheaper.

What is different for diabetes, or the United States, to cause this to not be an option? Seems almost like a human rights violation, or at least deeply unethical.

<comment><USER6> Generics still require FDA approval, which costs on the order of single digit $millions to obtain. Plus you've got to set up the plant to create the drug, which costs more $. Would you invest $millions in a product when a competitor (who probably already has plant capacity from when they made the drug while it was under patent) could come in and undercut you at a moments notice?

Obviously not - so the system ends up in a metastable state where one monopoly producer can charge high prices for a drug & no competitor will enter the market because they know the producer can and will undercut them the moment they try and do so.

This one of the reasons why the health care system in the US is completely borked.

<comment><USER7> Only true for rare and ultra-rare diseases.

<comment><USER6> As far as I'm aware, all generic manufacturers must prove what the FDA calls bioequivalence: [https://www.fda.gov/Drugs/DevelopmentApprovalProcess/HowDrug...](https://www.fda.gov/Drugs/DevelopmentApprovalProcess/HowDrugsareDevelopedandApproved/ApprovalApplications/AbbreviatedNewDrugApplicationANDAGenerics/default.htm)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> From the article:

> There have been few efforts to create a cheaper insulin. Walmart, for > instance, sells Novo Nordisk's human insulin under the name ReliOn for $25 a > vial. Eli Lilly is expected to release the first copycat insulin analog, a > chemically altered form of insulin, at the end of this year.

You can buy this product right now, it is the same formulation you would have taken if you were diabetic in the 1990s. [https://www.walmart.com/ip/Pharmacy- Relion-Humulin-Insulin/1...](https://www.walmart.com/ip/Pharmacy-Relion- Humulin-Insulin/167672445)

I am amazed by how many diabetics and GPs don't know this exists.

<comment><USER9> As the husband of a type-1 wife, I just wanted to add that there is a difference in insulin that isn't just long-acting or short-acting. Different people can react differently to different insulins. My wife used the ReliOn brand for both for a while, and even though the short-acting was fine, the long-acting was way too inconsistent (some very non-deterministic lows and highs). Switching to Levemir long-acting smoothed those out.

That said, nothing inherently wrong with the ReliOn brand if that's all one can afford. My wife forgot her short-acting insulin for a long weekend trip one time and it was nice to know what we could simply buy some insulin out of pocket and not get gouged to death.

> am amazed by how many diabetics and GPs don't know this exists.

I've noticed that GPs don't know enough about diabetes, one needs a specialist to really get control of it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Whats up with those US prices, Humalog more than $250 per vial? In Europe (Finland) non-subsidized price is $34.

<comment><USER11> Drug pricing in the US is complicated. Humalog list price has doubled in the last few years, but the rebates have increased faster and the average net price is actually going down. The average discount is 75%!

[https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-06-29/the- crazy...](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-06-29/the-crazy-math- behind-drug-prices)

<comment><USER12> I am not sure that it is complicated so much as, they gouge anyone they can in the US.

Not complicated at all, insulin keeps people alive and our shareholders need a return on their investment.

<comment><USER11> They gouge anyone they can, but the fact is that they cannot do it as well as before with the "old" products because their sales are going down (in dollars, despite an increase in volumes). And the "new" products are often not good enough to justify higher prices.

Edit: By the way, we're not talking about insulin (which has been keeping people alive since the 20's) but about insulin analogues developed in the 90's.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Interesting, the response in the UK has been to address this by attempting to pump money into programmes to to try and prevent type 2 diabetes or at least reduce its growth. Still too early to see how these efforts will be.

<comment><USER14> The UK is the second-fattest country in Europe after Malta, and obesity (BMI > 30.0) puts you at risk for type-2 diabetes. It's a public health issue.

Interestingly, the other thing that's a risk factor is lack of sleep. Huge commutes put you at risk for type-2 diabetes. Who'd have thought?

<comment><USER15> > obesity (BMI > 30.0) puts you at risk

BMI>23 if you are South asian

[https://www.diabetes.co.uk/south-asian/](https://www.diabetes.co.uk/south- asian/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Dr Fung's article [1] is a good complement to this one and explains how the market for insulin has been deliberately increased. As other commentators mentioned, once you can have carbs with insulin, why bother changing and looking for an alternative? Dr Fung treats patients with fasting protocols, where compliance is harder, but costs lower. FTA I just learned that Dr Banting is famous for both insulin and the original (proto) Atkins diet.

[1] [https://medium.com/@drjasonfung/the-diabetes- payroll-291649d...](https://medium.com/@drjasonfung/the-diabetes- payroll-291649d0e0d2)

</comment><comment><USER17> Insulin is just like when you have performance problem in a monolithic app and you throw more hardware at it, but at some point you can't upgrade your server anymore.

Not sure if there's much you can do while diabetic, but cut bread-like and sugary foods, these spike your insulin the most and your body becomes insulin resistant and so you need more and more insulin, more that you can make.

<comment><USER2> As a type-1 diabetic, your body no longer produces any insulin at all. This means even without eating any carbohydrates, your blood glucose rates will elevate every hour until you eventually succumb into a coma and shortly after, perish. I use about 34 units of insulin per day, excluding any carbohydrates -- this largely depends on body type as well, some people use much more.

A type-2 diabetic on the other hand, depending on how far their disease has progressed, could potentially ween themselves off insulin entirely if they were to completely abandon carbohydrates. These diets are _extremely_ hard to maintain, especially indefinitely, however.

<comment><USER17> Yes, sorry, I was thinking at type-2 diabetes, I have a relative with type-2 and doctor told her to cut alcohol, sugar, carbs, etc, type-1 is entirely different, the immune system attacks the pancreas.

<comment><USER18> Thanks for the apology, but you got me quite irritated with your first comment. It was like saying to a paraplegic in a wheelchair to man up and hit the gym because there is only so much you can do with a wheelchair... Dreadful.

<comment><USER2> Just to add a bit of a positive spin on this: even type-1 diabetics could take measures to both improve their health and reduce the amount of insulin they require.

I consider myself moderately overweight at this point (maybe 10-15kg). If I lost weight, I could reduce the baseline amount of insulin I need every day, thus reducing the amount of insulin overall that I need to pay for.

I also fully acknowledge that, upon getting an insulin pump (16 years ago), I instantly became aware that I had much more freedom to eat _what I want, when I wanted_ and thus, put little effort to cutting back on sugar outside of switching to diet drinks. If I were to switch to a low-carb diet, or no carb (which is admittedly very hard, I've tried), I could further reduce my insulin costs.

Personally (keep in mind these numbers depend highly on each individual), if I got my weight down 10kg, and ate < 100g of carbohydrates per day, I could theoretically only require ~35-40 units of insulin per day. At 40 units, I would only need ~1.35 vials of insulin per month. Ballparking, I'd say my current rate is likely around 2 vials per month.

<comment><USER18> You still need to have carbs in your diet, it wouldn't be healthy otherwise. Especially if you practice a sport.

I eat whatever I want (mostly pasta usually) and I need 20 units a day at most. (100 units/ml dosage).

<comment><USER19> There's no dietary or metabolic need for carbohydrate. The human body can survive and thrive perfectly well with only fat and protein as macronutrients. Practically speaking, doing that is challenging and complicated because most foods are a mix of all three macronutrients.

<comment><USER18> But do you need sugar? Or you don't need either sugar nor carbs? It seems strange to me. EDIT: it seems that if you use only your fat, you'll end up producing too much Ketones which leads to Ketoacidosis. Doesn't sound good.

<comment><USER20> No, ketosis doesn't lead to ketoacidosis unless you completely neglect to manage your insulin.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> I wonder if there is open-source equivalent in pharmacology

<comment><USER22> [http://openinsulin.org/](http://openinsulin.org/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> I am not sure if any of these programs are still around, but older, generic forms of insulin are available for free or greatly reduced price at many pharmacies to qualified applicants.

[http://www.needymeds.org/](http://www.needymeds.org/) Is a non-profit group that helps provide free/low cost meds.

Many pharmacies listed offer free/reduced price insulin. [http://www.freediabetestestsupplies.com/free-diabetes- medica...](http://www.freediabetestestsupplies.com/free-diabetes- medications/4506/)

</comment><comment><USER24> The title should be updated to reflect that this article is from 2016.

</comment><comment><USER25> > Why treating diabetes keeps getting more expensive

Because there's a "type 2" diabetes epidemic, and instead of doctors telling people to stop eating for a while, they sell them insulin.

<comment><USER26> > and instead of doctors telling people to stop eating for a while

People won't stop eating (and especially drinking) high-sugar stuff unless they're on their deathbed. The stuff is addictive as hell.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> i reread the china study. chapter 8 is diabetes. it claims animal protein, not carbs, causes diabetes.

</comment><comment><USER28> Number of people suffering from diabetes has risen exponentially, demand goes up, so do the prices.

It's going to stabilize as years go on.

<comment><USER29> Demand has gone up it hasn't risen exponentially. The manufacturers have colluded to raise the price. There is no reason for it to ever come down.

<comment><USER28> We live in the age of globalization and capitalism. There's bunch of cheap stuff coming from all over the world. Collusion on that scale is not possible.

There's just more people suffering from diabetes T2 than ever before. Someone is just profiting off of large demand.

<comment><USER26> > There's bunch of cheap stuff coming from all over the world.

Said cheap stuff from everywhere cannot be legally mass-imported into Western countries (and that for good reason).

> Collusion on that scale is not possible

Oh it certainly is. The "old" insulin may be produced as a generic but the new varieties (as described by the article) are patented by a few companies.

In addition insulin production is extremely expensive compared to simple pill pressing as you need bioreactors and GMOs to produce it. Many generics vendors opt out of that complexity.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: How would you solve the Windows Phone app gap? - <AUTHOR> <comment><USER2> I am not a big fan of apps and it seems these days, developers and users hate apps too even if they don't know it.

Something better in 2018 would be a personal assistant who is always in your pocket and has a holistic view of your life.

I don't think the blocker for Windows Phone is a lack of apps, it is that Verizon and AT&T absolutely refuse to certify new Windows Phones for their networks.

</comment><comment><USER3> Since Microsoft appears to phasing out Windows Phone...or rather Windows 10 Mobile, I don't see that there's much reason in trying. As much as I wanted Windows Phone to succeed, it's a dying ecosystem.</comment>