I'm a web developer and can't make anymore the simplest web app - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@pistacchio/i-m-a-web-developer-and-i-ve-been-stuck-with-the-simplest-app-for-the-last-10-days-fb5c50917df#.jqqrn0k9a <comment><USER2> I have yet to see a "modern" JavaScript project that wasn't a witches brew of shitty decisions and dependency hell.

The last one I looked at, had an npm dependency tree like crab grass. No less than 9 copies of the same module, all different versions between 0.x and 6.x - and all that module does is parse query strings.

The best part was when the developer of said module release v6 changing all `var`s into `let`s and `const`s and then basically responded to people who filed bugs along the lines of "fuck you not my problem".

The last few years have seen both JavaScript and PHP gain community powered package management tools that actively encourage this type of behaviour, and until cool-kid developers understand that they need to actually be aware of the code they're relying on, nothing will change.

</comment><comment><USER3> This is so very, very silly. Yes, there are lots of options... just like development on any other platform or in any other language. If you allow yourself to be sidetracked by all the shiny things, of course you'll never get any real work done. And if decision paralysis is preventing you from even _starting_ the project... well, I'm sorry to say you may not have the stamina that's needed to see a project to it's full completion.

Really, it's just so simple- _Write the code that does the stuff._ That's it. Everything else is bullshit. Pick a framework at random. Don't write tests. Use vanilla javascript. Don't bother with a build tool. That's really all there is to it. Every other decision is premature- you likely do not know your requirements yet, much less understand the costs and benefits of gulp vs grunt. Don't even try. Just start writing. When the problem becomes apparent, _then_ cross that bridge. Yes, you will re-write a lot of code. Pull up your pants and get it done. Re-writing code is always better than never-writing code.

You don't need to collect all your tools before you begin. Just start your work.

<comment><USER4> > Yes, there are lots of options... just like development on any other > platform or in any other language.

Errr, not really.

Let's pick a platform/language: Java

Build => maven (majority)

Unit-Test => JUnit (majority), Mockito (helper) Version => don't care, anything from Java 5 and above are good enough

Framework => Spring Framework or JEE (all batteries included)

Keep in mind either Spring Framework or JEE do component libraries so one does not have to use everything in there and they can mix-and-match.

spring-tests component provides stub objects for a few important JEE/Spring objects in case if you need them.

Ok, let's try one more time with: Ruby

Build => gems + rake + bundler

Unit-Test => Test::Unit or Rspec

Version => 1.8.7 or above, not a big issue, (having said that Rails do influence the version uptake)

Framework => Rails, Sinatra

I like what I'm seeing from these two ecosystems: high-quality tools that help me be more productive without spending too much time in either selecting or setting things up.

<comment><USER5> Well if we just want to pick majorities than we can do the exact same thing in JS.

Build => npm + Gulp (optional) + Webpack

Unit-Test => Karma + Jasmine or Karma + Mocha + Sinon

Framework => React+Redux+Data (modular) or Angular (all batteries included)

Same deal. High quality tools. You are pretending that there aren't hundreds of frameworks for Ruby (Cuba, Brooklyn, Scorched, Hobbit). The only people overwhelmed by choices are people afraid to make one.

<comment><USER4> It's not that simple I think.

For example, in the framework front, you guys argued that React is way better than Angular. I don't even know what's going on with Ember.js, Vue.js (fine, I'll give that this one is very new and untested), Backbone+Marionette.

I don't see that kind of argument in the other communities.

Your build: why are you omitting Grunt? What about broccoli and bower? what about Yeoman? Bower is kind of a big deal for front-end dev.

There's no "majority" in the JS world unlike the other ecosystems.

Cuba? I heard Cuba _once_ in HN. Brooklyn and the rest? never heard.

There are bajillion newer Java "microservice" frameworks but the usage is just rounding error.

Also keep in mind that in other ecosystems, the major players are already established while in JS ecosystems, all of them are considered new/young. There is no _established_ players for each tool segment (except unit-testing where I think Mocha is better than Jasmine, unfortunately due to lack of exposure and whatnot, Jasmine is still lurking around)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> If the issue is really making the _simplest_ web app, the principal of YAGNI should be applied liberally.

Complex dependencies that add up-front development burden should be added only if, and only when, there is an expected benefit justifying the cost.

<comment><USER7> Amen! I wrote a handful of offline-cacheable HTML5 apps made simply with CSS, vanilla JS, and HTML. Nothing more! Don't write a single line or character you don't need in the final result.

I have 'app update fatigue' and often after I update an app I end up preferring previous versions I can no longer install or use again once they're 'updated away' and no longer current. My wants for what my phone or tablet can do are _really_ simple, but I just don't want to have to wait to update anything I've already taken time to save to be sure I'd have when I needed it.

So I wrote the following apps and they all have manifests and icons. I have plenty more pages I use that aren't as polished (like [http://staticresource.com/base64.html](http://staticresource.com/base64.html)) but this whole exercise has made me feel like I have some control back over my phone.

Doesn't matter iOS or Android, I can always run my crappy little apps equally as crappy everywhere, and I know they'll never need updating, needlessly waste my battery, include malware that's tracking me or spying on me, and they do much of what I would use the device for anyway! If I've learned anything it's that building your own tools is VERY worth it, and I should invest more time in learning how to do this and doing it :)

Sketch

\- View: [http://staticresource.com/sketch.html](http://staticresource.com/sketch.html)

\- Source: [http://staticresource.com/inspect?/sketch.html](http://staticresource.com/inspect?/sketch.html)

Sketch is a browser-based sketchbook! Draw with the mouse or your finger and export SVG by email or download.

\---

SpeedTest

\- View: [http://staticresource.com/speedtest.html](http://staticresource.com/speedtest.html)

\- Source: [http://staticresource.com/inspect?/speedtest.html](http://staticresource.com/inspect?/speedtest.html)

SpeedTest is for responsive web testing. Load a URL into the input and press Go or hit 'enter' to load a page into the window below. Pressing the buttons (or keyboard keys 1-0) will resize the window allowing you to quickly test sites at a variety of widths on desktop, and allow you to test sites at widths other than your device width on mobile.

\---

Reminders

\- View: [http://staticresource.com/reminders.html](http://staticresource.com/reminders.html)

\- Source: [http://staticresource.com/inspect?/reminders.html](http://staticresource.com/inspect?/reminders.html)

Reminders is a lightweight reminders app that uses localStorage. Helpful for grocery lists or to-do items.

\---

Encode/Decode

\- View: [http://staticresource.com/encode.html](http://staticresource.com/encode.html)

\- Source: [http://staticresource.com/inspect?/encode.html](http://staticresource.com/inspect?/encode.html)

Encode text by shifting its unicode character range. Decode by reverting the text back to the regular character range.

\---

Clock

\- View: [http://staticresource.com/clock.html](http://staticresource.com/clock.html)

\- Source: [http://staticresource.com/inspect?/clock.html](http://staticresource.com/inspect?/clock.html)

Analog clock made from JavaScript and CSS

\---

Snake

\- View: [http://staticresource.com/snake.html](http://staticresource.com/snake.html)

\- Source: [http://staticresource.com/inspect?/snake.html](http://staticresource.com/inspect?/snake.html)

Move the mouse or touch the screen to draw a rainbow snake on the screen

\---

Shuffle

\- View: [http://staticresource.com/shuffle.html](http://staticresource.com/shuffle.html)

\- Source: [http://staticresource.com/inspect?/shuffle.html](http://staticresource.com/inspect?/shuffle.html)

Tap the page to draw a new random card and roll a die (unlimited decks)

Virtual Deck of Cards

\- View: [http://staticresource.com/deck.html](http://staticresource.com/deck.html)

\- Source: [http://staticresource.com/inspect?/deck.html](http://staticresource.com/inspect?/deck.html)

1 deck of cards, shuffled,flippable, no rules, no dealing. You can play solitaire, it's just like a real deck of cards you have to deal it yourself :)

\---

Calc

\- View: [http://staticresource.com/calc.html](http://staticresource.com/calc.html)

\- Source: [http://staticresource.com/inspect?/calc.html](http://staticresource.com/inspect?/calc.html)

Calc is a very basic calculator to demonstrate how JavaScript can think about strings

\---

Piano

\- View: [http://staticresource.com/piano.html](http://staticresource.com/piano.html)

\- Source: [http://staticresource.com/inspect?/piano.html](http://staticresource.com/inspect?/piano.html)

Piano is a small synth with a piano keyboard, capable of generating square waves on the piano scale to make noise for tuning things, or sketch out a melody, or just to jam around when bored.

I also have my own personal web-based 'command line interface' called JOE that end up being my most-used website and app on whatever device I'm using. I use this to check the weather and USD at least once daily, plus many more times for other things: [http://staticresource.com/](http://staticresource.com/)

<comment><USER8> is there a reason you decided to list all of these apps unsolicited? nobody is going to read these

<comment><USER7> Yeah! A couple of years ago I thought JavaScript was hard, and I couldn't figure out how to do what I wanted. Somebody posted a teeny tiny code editor here on Hacker News and seeing the source code sparked something, and now I'm writing and releasing my own HTML apps and tools that help me and others.

I listed these here (with the source) to show how small and how LITTLE code you need. Each of these files are single-file apps - icon included! Many of these I either started or created on my iPad, showing that building HTML apps can be so simple that you can execute on the device itself.

I'm just putting it here hoping it can help somebody else. If that's no you, that's fine - but if it is I'm glad I took the time to write them out :)

<comment><USER9> I looked at them and bookmarked your comment listing them. Thanks for posting them.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> > Remember, this is a simple personal project, I mostly wanted to have fun, so > my mind was set to zero-tolerance mode. As soon as something annoyed me I > went away looking for something else to smoothen my experience

...

> Javascript mixed with HTML seems ugly after having tried React

I think these highlight the real problem. Because we are constantly bombarded by such cool tech, it is easy to notice that some aspect of something could be done in a better way. The key to success is to ignore those minor papercuts and just focus persisting on your own project.

</comment><comment><USER11> Here is a great link from today. "JavaScript fatigue fatigue" [http://www.2ality.com/2016/02/js-fatigue- fatigue.html](http://www.2ality.com/2016/02/js-fatigue-fatigue.html)

> Don't try to know everything – it's impossible in modern web development.

<comment><USER12> I didn't get this whole "JavaScript fatigue" thing...

When I started web development. There already was a bunch of different stuff and no one tried to learn it all.

Pearl, PHP, .Net, ColdFusion, Java and what not...

<comment><USER6> I suspect that part of it was because there was a brief time when there appeared to be (at least, in certain important segments of the non-enterprise market) a consolidation around a fairly narrow set of frameworks, tools, and approaches in web development, and that time roughly corresponded with a point in time when web development itself was really taking off and drawing lots of people in -- this roughly corresponds with the height of Rails ascendancy for the server side.

As a result, there's a lot of people who started web development at a time when it may have seemed, if not _simpler_ , less diverse in terms of strongly- supported options -- and trending toward greater consolidation, rather than greater diversity. For those people, the current state of web development could legitimately be a surprising array of more-complicated-than-they-would- have-expected decisions, with lots of opportunities for analysis paralysis.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I'm getting really tired of these sort of posts/comments on how hard it is to make a "simple website" these days. If you want to make a website the old way no one is stopping you. Tools exist because no one wants to do it the old way because the old way sucks.

Which combination of tools should you use? Ember if you have no idea where to start - otherwise thing about the problem you have with other tools and find tools that solve those problems.

</comment><comment><USER14> I wonder how many people can rewrite the same article?

<comment><USER15> As long as there are yaks to shave.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> The title is misleading. Should be changed to "I'm a web developer and I realized that chasing after every new tech under the sun can be counterproductive".

I do agree that with the semi-recent "resurgence" of Javascript there's an abundance of frameworks and tools out there both for the client and server side making the selection of the "ecosystem" that would fit your needs challenging.

My take on this is stick to the basics until you realize that you need to look into something new. Client-side technology upgrades are reasonably simple as long as the client-server contract is defined up front (we doing old school gets/posts or ajax or wss etc?).

Server-side decisions are a little more tricky than that but once you commit to a definite decision on the server side tech, the specifics can be worked out down the road without affecting the client.

<comment><USER17> The content of the article is read rather like "I've been stuck with the simplest app for 10 days because I didn't really want to create one". If you want to create an app, you go and create one. If you want to play with a bunch of fancy frameworks, just don't call it "create an app", as apparently it isn't...

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> Two way binding is hard in react? I never noticed. My only react app so far is basically a giant form (I split it into 5 tabs based on categories so there wasn't too much on the page at a time), and I had zero problem doing so.

Granted the analysis paralysis wasn't so bad as react was much newer when I started, so I didn't even look at redux (though looking at it now, I'm still not sure what problem I was supposed to have that it solves).

As far as packing everything into a single file, I used make which would pipe cat through a minifier (or not minified with "make debug").

So ironically, I suppose all these new tools have made it harder to get started on React, which is perhaps the point of the article.

</comment><comment><USER19> How many more of these articles do I have to read?

How many more of these comments do you have to read?

</comment><comment><USER20> > I envisioned the opportunity to try out a few new things I've been reading > about online, refresh my web-dev tools and have some fun.

> The core of the problem is choice and the overwhelming abundance of tools to > choose from.

Excuse me, did you want to _try out a few new things_ , _refresh web-dev tools_ , _have some fun_ or start coding immediately?

Because, it looks like: I am chief-cooker and i can't cook simple meal. There are so much vegetables, juices, it looks like a game.

> I want a bread for my meal.

Leavened, Rye, Flatbread?

Uhhh, ohhh, it's too haaard, i wanted to try new things, but I'm seeking for best, standard choice.

<comment><USER21> > Excuse me, did you want to try out a few new things, refresh web-dev tools, > have some fun or start coding immediately?

These two things don't have to be mutually exclusive. In any other area of programming that I've tried recently, they're not — except for JS-based web development.

<comment><USER20> Tell us, in what area you've refreshed your dev tools and started coding immediately.

I remember I was trying to replace maven with gradle in Java -- it was fail because I wasn't able to add new repository to gradle. I'm still not sure how to it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> > I've already laid out my models, but React.js likes to mix models and states > and properties, so I had to rethink it

=> Redux

> this Gulp configuration file...

=> Webpack

This might be opinionated but for a personal SPA pet project without any legacy a good up to date stack has ES6/Babel, React, Redux, Webpack included. Curious what others prefer.

<comment><USER23> You just described his exact problem. He's confused by react so you tell him to use redux. He's intimidated by gulp so you tell him to use webpack.

It doesn't matter what he uses, he just wants to write code and everyone telling him to use some other marginally different tool is just contributing to the paralysis.

<comment><USER22> > He's confused by react so you tell him to use redux.

I meant React + Redux, Redux or Flux is the missing piece for React. He used _just_ React wondering how to manage the models, if he got a bit deeper in the React ecosystem he would have seen Redux or other Flux based frameworks. Besides, the React team and site explicitely states that some architecture such as Flux is required, so guess he just dipped just into React before he wrote his JS fatigue post.

> ...marginally different tool

Wouldn't agree with this. Tools/libs/frameworks are quite different and you can decide by comparing and having personal preferences. And the more choice the better tools. I don't know of any other ecosystem where such strong competition leads to so many innovations. Eg: Webpack, Redux and all the new kids on the block have significant learning curves but _do_ this investment and you learn new stuff every minute and afterwards you are enlightened (if you like tech) because you find always something which works 10x better/faster/easier/more elegant than existing solutions. If you just want to get a job done, then learning new stuff might be perceived as too time- consuming and sticking to learned stuff allegedly seems easier.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> ClojureScript. Just learn that; the ClojureScript community will keep it up with the times, and you can help out too at times. Yes, you'll have to debug a little under the hood, but your background should be sufficient for that.

</comment><comment><USER25> The solution is to use a boilerplate/generator. I've used one for every JS project I've started in the past two years.

The main benefit is that you get something that already has the whole development/test/build workflow set up, with your framework of choice. Then you can tweak things as necessary.

Since all of the processes should be able to be run through a small set of CLI commands, there isn't much mental overhead switching between projects.

</comment><comment><USER8> Seems like the author just has trouble making good choices.

<comment><USER26> I think you're right. At least build the thing _first_ and _then_ improve on it. Like, if you want to use TypeScript, try vanilla JS first, then rewrite it - not as hard with small projects.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> > Having worked mostly with C# in the last months, I remembered how cool it is > to have a statically typed language

Really? I used to work with Java. I sometimes miss type checking, but I don't miss the Java type system - is C# a lot better?

<comment><AUTHOR> I find C# to be better, but things are ok everywhere as long as they're kept easy. I think that function (param?: Array) is simply better than function (param) because the IDE can hint you that the function accepts a single parameter, that it is optional and warns you if you try to pass a string because it must be an Array.</comment></comment>


Let's Play "Un-Fuck This Startup" - <AUTHOR> http://www.erickarjaluoto.com/blog/lets-play-un-fuck-this-startup/ <comment><USER2> FYI: Your campnab link in the footnotes has a spurious encoded 'period'. ("[https://www%2Ccampnab.com/"](https://www%2Ccampnab.com/"))

Sorry for the trivial comment, this was an interesting enough article that ABSOLUTELY resonated with my side projects, that I was curious to follow the breadcrumb, ran into that, and wanted to bubble that up to the author somehow :)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for catching that. It's fixed. :-)</comment></comment>


How to Become a World-Class Team - <AUTHOR> https://medium.dave-bailey.com/how-to-become-a-world-class-team-932722be24c2#.kfrpzsut1 <comment><USER2> Awesome!</comment>


Developing on HEAD scales to Google - <AUTHOR> http://bentilly.blogspot.com/2010/02/developing-on-head-scales-to-google.html

<comment><USER2> > The primary argument against branching is the pain of merging later

Except that when I work on a feature branch on git, I constantly rebase on top of master to stay up to date and so I don't have to face a huge merge "later" but a few easy merges once in a while.

<comment><AUTHOR> That is a known best practice.

The problem comes when two people are developing stuff in two branches that conflicts. When the first merges in, the second now faces the huge painful merge.

<comment><USER3> Well, yeah. But that's not because of technology choice or development methodology, it's because simultaneous work by two developers on the same lines of code is _fundamentally a really hard problem_. It was hard before source control, it was hard with SCCS and RCS, and it's hard with git.

No matter which way you slice it, one of the two developers (maybe both) needs to sit down and figure out what the others' changes do and how they interact with his/her own. That's a wetware problem, not something you can fix with a tool.

<comment><AUTHOR> That's true. But if both developers are developing out of the same branch, and are checking in small patches at a time, they are more likely to notice the interaction as it is happening and actually talk to each other.

The more difficult problems come when each worked on it for 2 weeks, then they discover a month or two later that there is a conflict - after both have forgotten what they were doing and why they were doing it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> This is the only way I can work. I think it really keeps things clean+tidy and forces everyone to make sure the current HEAD is clean, works and compiles.

Branching just isn't a natural workflow for me.

</comment><comment><USER5> Sounds like continuous integration to me -- <http://martinfowler.com/articles/continuousIntegration.html>

Which is how I prefer to code.

Edit: "Work in Small Batches" is another great post on the subject by Eric Ries [http://www.startuplessonslearned.com/2009/02/work-in- small-b...](http://www.startuplessonslearned.com/2009/02/work-in-small- batches.html)

</comment><comment> brown9-2 The author doesn't seem to realize that working out of HEAD at Google might only "scale" so well because of the rigorous code review process. Without, I don't think it would be as possible.

<comment><USER6> I'm not sure how you reached this conclusion.

The author writes, "Guido's talk describes many elements of what makes it scale...The second piece is an enforced policy of having every single patch go through a code review process before you check anything in...And beyond that you have people paying attention to best practices such as consistent style, good unit testing, so on and so forth. (All of which are reinforced in the code review process.)"

I think he makes it clear that the reason developing from HEAD has worked at Google is because they have lots of processes to ensure success.

<comment><AUTHOR> Exactly. There is an entire package of tools and development process which, combined, makes things work out. The fact that you need an entire package, and the difficulty of adopting multiple simultaneous changes to change how you work is one of the primary reasons that I do not recommend that organizations all rush out and adopt Google's strategy. There really is an all or nothing thing here.

As an illustration of the dragons that wait, what happens if someone adopts all of the tools and practices, _but_ the product manager is still able to put real schedule pressure on developers. I guarantee that in the rush to finish features that anyone who holds up implementation with, "This code is crap and there is no way I'm approving it" will come under pressure to accept the crap code. And as soon as you cross that line, the entire strategy falls apart because, even though in theory you're following a good process, in practice you just lost a critical underpinning.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I've always thought the branch/no branch argument rested on a false dichotomy. How is an uncommitted patch in any way distinguishable from a branch? One could easily envision a case where it was easier to merge a branch than to merge a patch where two programmers are simultaneously working on the same HEAD code. Any working copy of the code is in effect a branch.</comment>


You Can Rent a Dad in Japan - <AUTHOR> https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-08-24/you-can-rent-a-dad-in-japan <comment><AUTHOR> Finally, an Uber for a Dad!</comment>


Ask HN: What are the best job postings you've seen? - <AUTHOR>

Trying to find good examples that people enjoy of job listings.  What entices you as an engineer and designer?  What details do you care about most?  My hope is that there's enough opinion here that it influences job postings to be better (enough startups pay attention to HN). <comment><USER2> Love a little humor. Companies that are honest about who they are and what they look for. A good example of this is the hiring page from Stackoverflow (<http://stackoverflow.com/about/hiring>) and Carsonified (<http://carsonified.com/jobs/>).

It's also important to identify the culture and energy within the company. Employees should get a good feel for how they will interact with other coworkers and what their day-to-day activities might include. (Mustache Mondays anyone?)

<comment><USER3> The description for the "Sidekick to the CEO" role is brilliant.

I'd argue that being able to identify with the culture of the company is the most important thing in a good job ad. IMO the reason stackoverflow and carsonified have good job ads is because they have a culture of humor and honesty, rather than because they set out to write an humorous and honest job ad.

It's semantics I know, but a humorous job ad for a boring company wouldn't imo be a good job ad since it would be misleading

I really like the ads SEOmoz put out e.g. <http://seattle.craigslist.org/see/web/2120238166.html> (disclaimer - I'm a global associate of SEOmoz)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> This is probably obvious, but I tend to pay more attention to job listings that describe "what's in it for me" as opposed to "what's in it for them". For examples of the former, see most companies that post to niche job sites like 37signals, GitHub, etc. For examples of the latter, see, you know, Dice.com.

</comment><comment><USER5> The Rapportive jobs page got a bit of buzz (disclaimer: I designed it so I'm probably biased):

<http://rapportive.com/jobs>

<comment><USER6> I love the way the Rapportive job page is laid out. Makes it very easy to decide (as a potential applicant) if it's the right fit for you. (disclaimer: I work next door to you guys...)

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> I don't know if this lead to anything.

<http://lesswrong.com/lw/2q5/lws_first_job_ad/></comment>


MySQL man pages silently relicensed away from GPL - <AUTHOR> https://blog.mariadb.org/mysql-man-pages-silently-relicensed-away-from-gpl/ <comment><USER2> Given the environment, you probably already know that there's a great talk called 'Fork Yeah! The Rise and Development of illumos' at [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zRN7XLCRhc](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zRN7XLCRhc) .

The reason why it's relevant here is that this is not the first time that Oracle has closed-sourced an open-source project bought up from Sun. Oracle seems almost paraconsistent towards open-source in a very interesting way: they seem to view the GPL as a good way to get other companies to help them out without cheating (e.g. OpenJDK), but if they're going to do most of the development in-house _anyway_ it seems they're much more willing to close the source (OpenSolaris, now apparently MySQL).

Could anyone comment on whether there's a larger pattern that I'm missing there? And are there other open-source technologies which were obtained from the Sun buyout which are also in danger which we should know about?

<comment><USER3> Sun Grid Engine used to be open source, but now Oracle Grid Engine isn't. But what's far worse, in my opinion as a user, is that Oracle made many of the existing documentation and community support resources hosted by Sun disappear.

<comment><USER4> If it makes you feel any better, most of the big companies I work with are moving full-stop from Solaris on SPARC to Linux on x86-64.

People who make the purchasing decisions are finally fed up with Oracle's incompetence and utter contempt for the rest of the industry. It's a shame, but I won't really miss Sun when they're finally, mercifully put to death. I hate Oracle for what they did to that company and I wish nothing but ill toward them.

<comment><USER5> The problem with wishing the company death is that we _know_ what it will do in the final times. It'll become another SCO generally making life inconvenient for everyone for many years before we finally see the back of it.

<comment><USER6> What do you suggest? They are making life inconvenient for everyone now and will continue to do so. Sometimes you just have to suck it up and put up with a one time pain and get it over with.

<comment><USER5> Ideal world (i.e. never going to happen): let evil people keep buying their stuff and getting screwed by them, but keep the rest of us out of it!

<comment><USER6> Didn't the financial crisis teach you that we can't be kept out of it?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> If they hold all the copyright on the documentation, they're free to do as they please. It was always expected that Oracle would kill the project.

MariaDB is a fork of MySQL started by the founder of MySQL after the Oracle acquisition. This is good news for them because it gives people more reason to use the fork.

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

<comment><USER8> I wonder if that statement is actually true. Has not a single distro made fixes to the man pages throughout the years? Not a single Debian patch with spell fixes or corrections gone upstream?

<comment><USER9> Many projects require copyright assignment in case they want to relicense. I wonder if they did that here?

<comment><USER10> Yes, and this whole debacle is a great reminder of precisely why people should be so leery of Canonical demanding copyright assignment for their GPL projects.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I used to work for Oracle. Something I heard several times around different parts of the company was that Larry believed that open source was a good way to build products, not businesses. He was more than happy to take advantage of open source, but not willing to contribute to it. Oracle's attitude toward open source was one of many reasons I left, and one of the reasons I gave for why I was leaving.

<comment><USER12> It would be ironic if you typed that on a mac or iphone.

<comment><USER13> That's... not very fair. Apple contributes a fair amount to many random open source projects and also runs a number of important ones (Webkit, Clang, LLVM, ...)

The kernel to OS X/iOS is open source but this is not of any serious utility as far as I know :P

<comment><USER14> Aaaand the AppStore basically destroys Open Source since it doesn't allow distribution of GPL programs. If that's not FOSS hostile, I don't know what is...

<comment><USER15> Make your own GPL app store. People can sideload all they want on their own devices if they're really interested.

Besides, the iOS App store is pretty crappy anyways.

<comment><USER16> Isn't restricting the use of open source software to those who are "really interested" part way to destroying it?

<comment><USER15> I guess I'm just a pragmatist, and I don't believe in forcing Apple to do anything with their own properties. If they want to conduct their business in a way that is unethical but legal, so be it.

While we might bemoan the walled garden model that Apple has picked and most people's seeming readiness to go along with it, you might be surprised at how many people would be interested in a store specifically "curated" towards GPL apps.

<comment><USER16> You can simultaneously believe that something is justifiable/natural and that it is destroying open source. I think the majority of people would not jailbreak to use such a store, thus limiting the potential audience and reducing the incentive for developers to release to it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> So who holds the copyright on these man pages? Did MySQL get copyright assignments from all contributers before Oracle bought them? If not, how do they have the authority to relicense the content?

<comment><USER18> I'm sure it even matters. GPL is copyleft. Doesn't that mean that they can not relicense the same or derived work under a more restrictive license?

<comment><USER19> Not being able to relicense under a more restrictive license is actually the main element of copyleft.

With an MIT or BSD licensed work, you can add more restrictive conditions, e.g. make a derived work proprietary, or add a "noncommercial use only" clause to your derived work, or whatever else you want. But with a GPL-licensed work, you cannot add additional conditions to the derived work, i.e. you must give all downstream reusers the same permissions you received. That's what's sometimes referred to as the "viral" property.

Unless, as here, you are the owner of the copyrights, in which case you can apply any license you want to the work.

<comment><USER20> > Not being able to relicense under a more restrictive license is actually the > main element of copyleft.

Not being able to relicense under a license not acceptable to the authors of the particular copyleft license at issue is a main element of copyleft, but copyleft licenses often allow redistributing under more restrictive licenses that remain acceptable to the copyleft license author (e.g., the FSF encourages the use of "or any later version" language in GPL licenses, and GPLv3 is in many respects more restrictive than GPLv2; further, GPLv3 allows relicensing with specified kinds of additional terms that may in some ways be more restrictive.)

<comment><USER7> Some more examples: the LGPL is copyleft and you can convert it to the GPL. Sometimes the GPL comes with a special exception, which can also be removed. AGPLv3 is more restrictive than GPLv3, and again you can convert GPLv3 to AGPLv3.

If you consider what developers are allowed to do with a piece of software, the main element of copyleft is actually not being able to relicense under a _less_ restrictive license on the spectrum of FOSS licenses. The least restrictive "license" of all is no license, no copyright, i.e. public domain (in the US).

Because you can convert MIT/BSD to a closed source license, but you cannot convert GPL to a closed source license, in this sense the GPL is more restrictive than MIT/BSD. You can convert MIT/BSD to GPL (less to more) but not GPL to MIT/BSD (more to less).

I understand that closed source licenses are the most restrictive of all, this is just an alternative perspective on software freedom with regard to developers.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Well they are Oracle. Perhaps they will rename it to 'TheirSQL' :-)

<comment><USER22> I know, I'm kind of a party pooper, but My, Maria and Max are the names of Monty's children. Do you see the pattern? MySQL, MariaDB, MaxDB.

<comment><USER23> Are you sure Mongo wasn't one of them? :-)

<comment><USER24> No, he rode off into the sunset after sheriff Bart freed him from Hedley Lamarr

<comment><USER25> That poor horse.

<comment><USER24> It was a donkey! ;)

Speaking of beasts of burden, I've been atop my elephant (Postgres) for about 3+ years now and I feel it's harder and harder to deal with idiosyncrasies of MySQL.

MariaDB is better, much better. And at work, when we do have clients already on InnoDB, the first choice for upgrades is to move them off MySQL onto MariaDB. All fresh work starts with Postgres. Being BSD licensed, docs and all, it's the least painful legally and technically.

[http://www.postgresql.org/about/licence/](http://www.postgresql.org/about/licence/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Oracle is killing MySQL. On purpose. This has been going on for a while, and they're not doing it because they're stupid, it's in their best interests.

Thankfully Maria is such a nice clean replacement.

<comment><USER27> So Oracle acquired Sun to stifle MySQL develop for fear that it would encroach on their own DB.

However, by blatantly damaging the product, more and more users moved (and continue to move) to better alternatives. Thus damaging the company's reputation.

However, MySQL is hardly a competitor to Oracle. Oracle 11g is meant for use at completely different type of company. I don't get it.

Time to donate to Apache. Sound familiar?

<comment><USER28> I have used MySQL and Oracle and I have found MySQL to be more reliable, more performant, easier to configure, and easier to develop against.

I believe that in 80-90+% of the cases where Oracle is deployed, it is only still being used because business executives are out of touch and don't want to admit that the massive investments they committed their companies to are no longer required.

<comment><USER29> MySQL's query optimizer is a joke compared to Oracle's. If you don't do joins and just use it as a key-value store, that doesn't matter. MySQL also doesn't enforce most SQL constraints like "can't store a string in an int field" etc.

<comment><USER28> Wow, that's interesting if the SQL constraints are all completely ignored.. seems doubtful.

My experience with Oracle's query optimization was that it was non-intuitive to configure to work correctly especially with the way that the optimizer statistics config works.

MySQL will do quite useful query optimization (for joins) if you have appropriate indexes. So I think that in 80% of cases that is what matters in both Oracle and MySQL -- creating appropriate indexes.

Honestly I don't think you know what MySQL is capable of.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> Is this even legal? they released the previous documentation under GPL v2 which has a clause stating any modified versions have to be released under the same license. This new documentation is clearly just a modification of the previous documentation. It would be interesting if it came of they did not have the right to do this. If even even one line of the documentation was written by someone else and they did not get a transfer of copyright they could get sued for doing this.

<comment><USER31> The copyright owner can license under whatever license they like. As many have said even before it was sold to Sun all contributions needed a copyright assignment before they were accepted (so they could sell the option to make closed source modifications amongst other things) so Oracle can now license as they wish.

What they can't do is revoke the existing GPL licenses so you can still develop and modify the old docs.

Having said that this is Oracle and you should probably just run for the hills (MariaDB) before Oracle make it hard to make it fully compatible with future version of MySQL by doing something else.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> According to mysql bug 69512 [1] this particular issue was the result of a build process error and was not intentional.

[1]: [http://bugs.mysql.com/bug.php?id=69512](http://bugs.mysql.com/bug.php?id=69512)

<comment><USER33> This is indeed the given explanation, but why on earth was there a separate set of man pages with incorrect copyright headers?

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> And just in case they hadn't made their point, section 38 from the pastebin is particularly friendly:

"This documentation is NOT distributed under a GPL license."

</comment><comment><USER35> I have been really thinking about switching my DBs from MySQL to MariaDB. Wondering if someone could help me out with a few questions..

Is it a really a drop-in replacement? Any gotchas I need to be aware off? How does MariaDB compare with MySQL performance and memory wise? Did anyone face any issues with replication?

Thank you in advance.

<comment><USER36> > How does MariaDB compare with MySQL performance

Slower last time _I_ tested with _my app_ on _my HW_. But you should test _now_ with _your app_ now on _your HW_ of course to be sure :)

What I have heard is if you have lots of CPUs MariaDB doesn't scale up as well. If you scale out, that might not matter.

<comment><USER37> Why would this be so? MariaDB started from _the same source tree_ that MySQL had. In order for performance to drop, a Maria developer would have to _intentionally commit changes that lower performance._

<comment><USER38> We're not talking about performance loss but a relative performance difference. It's at least possible that MySQL might've introduced performance gains that MariaDB didn't get. I have no idea whether this is the case.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> What is Wordpress going to do if MySQL goes closed source? Switch to MariaDB, or finally start supporting more databases, such as PostgreSQL?

<comment><USER40> MariaDB certainly seems like the path of least resistance in this case.

<comment><USER6> Which means Monty has screwed everyone again. He should have let MySQL die in Oracle's cradle so the open source world could move over to a better database: PostgreSQL.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER41> I'm already using LibreOffice. Is there a fork of VirtualBox that I should be aware of too? If I actually used any databases, I'd be switching MySQL for MariaDB right now.

<comment><USER42> There's no free fork of VirtualBox, though various Linux distributions do clean up the upstream source themselves. However, KVM has gotten quite good these days; you might give it a try.

<comment><USER43> Unfortunately, I can't run KVM on my Windows workstation... :(

<comment><USER44> Windows 8 comes with Hyper-V.

<comment><USER45> The nice thing about VirtualBox and VMWare is they're both cross-platform, meaning images for them will boot on different types of systems. That's what makes Vagrant ([http://vagrantup.com/](http://vagrantup.com/)) so flexible and useful on teams with mixed environments.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER46> I wouldn't grab the torches and pitchforks unless/until it's clear they're relicensing to a non-free license. The GPL is written to apply to code; it doesn't make much sense to apply it to documentation.

<comment><USER47> The license they moved to is right there in the blog post, with a relevant snippet from the text-

>This software and related documentation are provided under a license agreement containing restrictions on use and disclosure and are protected by intellectual property laws. Except as expressly permitted in your license agreement or allowed by law, you may not use, copy, reproduce, translate, broadcast, modify, license, transmit, distribute, exhibit, perform, publish, or display any part, in any form, or by any means. Reverse engineering, disassembly, or decompilation of this software, unless required by law for interoperability, is prohibited.

I'm not sure how much clearer they could be that it's not a free license.

<comment><USER37> > ...are provided under a license agreement...

How do you know that specific license isn't the GPL?

That blurb restates common law. It does not interfere with the specific license that the documentation was covered under, it's just there to remind people.

<comment><USER48> Indeed. But there's a further blurb below that which specifically states that the manpage is not under the GPL and that restricts redistribution and modification.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER49> Has Oracle has eroded credibility for being a good steward for any open source technology at this point? My question is how long before @Mitchellh leads an effort to fork VirtualBox to allow Vagrant to have a reliable future?

</comment><comment><USER50> It's kind of sad seeing something digging it's own grave like that.

<comment><USER51> I've long moved to Postgres and never want to go back, but I am glad to see just how thoroughly the MySQL community up and moved on to MariaDB. Linux distros are now shipping with it as the default "MySQL".

That represents a very good effort to take an open project and keep it open. Two thumbs up for the community. Now, if we can just talk about silently munging data instead of giving proper errors...

</comment></comment><comment><USER52> It was a bug. Corrected. [http://bugs.mysql.com/bug.php?id=69512](http://bugs.mysql.com/bug.php?id=69512)

</comment><comment><USER6> If you're going to switch away from MySQL anyway, I would suggest taking the hit and moving to PostgreSQL.

</comment><comment><USER53> Switch to MariaDB but don't even think you will remove MySQL experience from your CV. As most of the CV is processed automatically you could lost few point simple because lazy HR people don't care about what's happening in the IT world.

<comment><USER54> On the other hand, taking things like MySQL and PHP off your resume will lead to working with the kind of people who don't like to use MySQL or PHP. Not a bad thing. Avoiding working for a company where an HR department screens your resume instead of a hiring manager is another plus.

</comment></comment><comment><USER55> Hmm, so there's a bunch of hosted MySQL providers. How long before they become MariaDB hosted providers?

Oracle, your engineers know exactly what will happen. Why don't you?

<comment><USER56> > Oracle, your engineers know exactly what will happen. Why don't you?

I think Oracle knows what they're doing. Oracle likes paying customers and I suspect that they don't make much, if anything, on MySQL users. I've been using MySQL for years and I've never knowingly paid Oracle a dime.

<comment><USER57> Why do you think they acquired MySQL in the first place?

<comment><USER58> A nice side effect of acquiring Sun, nothing more

<comment><USER59> Why did they buy MySQL engine providers Innobase and Sleepycat a few years earlier?

<comment><USER60> AFAIK Oracle didn't really have an offering in the embedded DB market before that. So at least that sort of makes sense. MySQL doesn't compete with Oracle's database, so buying it to kill it doesn't make sense.

<comment><USER59> That could explain Sleepycat, but not Innobase which was platform-specific to MySQL

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER61> Viva Maria!

</comment><comment><USER62> I am _more_ interested in using MySQL for my next project now.

I know that this is not a popular opinion, but I disagree with the philosophy behind the GPL. While I think that sharing is fine (and for that there are the BSD and MIT licenses, among many others), I believe that it is very often better for both developers (and users) if users pay for the software they use. (And yes, I have heard the pro-GPL argument about how you can charge for support, but I know that's bogus in practice.)

I am _not_ saying the GPL should be outlawed or anything like that. I'm just saying that it's not a moral ideal (the actual moral ideal is _you_ making a sustainable living off of the code _you_ write), and it's practically speaking a bad idea in many cases.

<comment><USER63> What do you find preferable about BSD and MIT licenses in this respect?

<comment><USER64> My employer's legal department loves BSD and MIT licenses because it's easier to sell software that way. When we need to update or add a new library or application, BSD/MIT licensed software get approved much more quickly. For example, we need to update the snmp package but we can't get it through legal because the license for many of the modules changed to GPLv3. A new python module would really make some things easier, but we can't get it through legal (GPL again).

<comment><USER8> I must ask, have your employer ever purchased a proprietary application/module to use in any product? In a logical world, those kind of deals should have a ever worse time going through the legal department than GPL.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


My Email to Paypal - <AUTHOR>

I write this to Paypal after having trouble while changing my password. I don't think they'll take it seriously but maybe someone here may find it interesting..
My email:
<comment></comment><comment></comment><comment></comment><comment></comment><comment>- Hi, I've changed my password recently, that's ok. The reason I'm writing not about unresolved issue, it's about UX design on password change page. You want to make user to write password without paste. I want to paste it, why do you care? What is the benefit of writing it  for the matter of security? I don't name one but maybe you think of something I didn't think. Let me tell you something you obviously couldn't think while designing page;
 I USE PASSWORD MANAGER! and I WANTED TO MAKE MY PASSWORD MORE SECURE BY GENERATING 20 CHARS LONG PASSWORD. HOW CAN I TYPE IT WITHOUT MAKING MISTAKE ?
This was my issue. I solved but not by typing. I open the developer console and inspect your password field. Just change the values by the following code;
document.querySelector( '#pwdID' ).value = 'MY_LONG_PASSWORD'; document.querySelector( '#retype_password' ).value = 'MY_LONG_PASSWORD';
I didn't make any mistake and successfully changed my password. I solved my issue but I'm a developer and I can find this solution. What about a user who is not a developer but assume he/she uses password manager like me, what can he/she do in that situation?
(
While answering (or just reading) this, please open the same page and type this in that both field without making mistake =ntRKL<@O;<p1[13c%\5
)
Thanks </comment><comment></comment><comment></comment><comment></comment><comment></comment><comment>-
This is the screenshot for contact form if anyone is wondering:
http://imgur.com/yNp0RDI </comment><comment><USER2> I hope this isn't your paypal password :P

       =ntRKL<@O;<p1[13c%\5 )

<comment><AUTHOR> nope :) ( I tried to make this one as complex as possible with KeePassX )

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> The only time that I thing (note the _I_ ) is legit to restrict pasting is on an email confirmation field (only on confirmation).

Nowadays your email is more important than your password, and an email is usually rather simple to type.

</comment><comment><USER4> Interesting content,yet the tone could be improved. Thanks for sharing!

For example, "Let me tell you something you obviously couldn't think while designing page" comes off as condescending.

</comment><comment><USER5> I really hope you don't treat everyone who makes mistakes like this. While the content is definitely interesting you're being quite demeaning.

<comment><AUTHOR> I don't treat anyone like this but I thought maybe they take it seriously if it's written like this.( not justify it.. ) I don't think anyone at Paypal offend from this. I didn't mean it while writing actually. If it's too much, forgive me for not being native english speaker. Anyway, not allowing to paste seems not ok for a giant tech company Paypal. In my country banks have similar stupid forms and ways to "protect" people I don't think it's helping but to day I didn't complain any of them. Because I know almost nobody take it contact forms like this seriously. For this case I wanted to make it interesting, maybe it'll get to somebody there.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Thanks for sharing this!</comment>


Ford to Stop Selling Every Car in North America but the Mustang and Focus Active - <AUTHOR> https://techcrunch.com/2018/04/25/ford-to-stop-selling-every-car-in-north-america-but-the-mustang-and-focus-active/ <comment><USER2> This refers to sedans and coupes, excluding crossovers, trucks, SUVs, and commercial vehicles. But it does appear they will create new "silhouettes" between cars and crossovers. From the Press Release [1]:

> _Building a winning portfolio and focusing on products and markets where > Ford can win. For example, by 2020, almost 90 percent of the Ford portfolio > in North America will be trucks, utilities and commercial vehicles. Given > declining consumer demand and product profitability, the company will not > invest in next generations of traditional Ford sedans for North America. > Over the next few years, the Ford car portfolio in North America will > transition to two vehicles – the best-selling Mustang and the all-new Focus > Active crossover coming out next year. The company is also exploring new > "white space" vehicle silhouettes that combine the best attributes of cars > and utilities, such as higher ride height, space and versatility._

[1] [https://media.ford.com/content/dam/fordmedia/North%20America...](https://media.ford.com/content/dam/fordmedia/North%20America/US/2018/04/25/1q18-financials.pdf)

EDIT: The press release from which all this interest is coming may only refer to Ford North America's development goals. Ford Europe is almost a different company and is responsible for most (all?) of the Focus and Fiesta's development. Perhaps Ford NA will stop bringing new sedans/coupes to market (excepting Mustang and Active) and simply import the smaller vehicles.

<comment><USER3> Ford basically makes all of their money on the F-series pickups, and the Escape/Explorer/Expedition SUV series.

One thing I've never quite understood is how Ford has managed to maintain a stranglehold on the police department market for my entire lifetime. Crown Victorias were ubiquitous until just a few years ago, and now seem to be universally replaced with Explorers. Outside of a few state highway patrol units that use Mustangs or Dodge Chargers.

<comment><USER4> > Crown Victorias were ubiquitous until just a few years ago

these were also in one form or another the standard for any sort of livery - taxis were very often Crown Victorias, sedan-style limos used lincon continentals which were basically the same car only the luxury version..

not an expert, but personally I think this is basically a lineage of domestically produced V8 sedans going back to the dawn of automotive times; the large installed base and relatively decent reliability / price / passenger size meant they had a good balance of functionality and lots of of parts, trained mechanics, etc. around. they were also the standard issue car of retired americans :B

probably plus union influence.

IIRC the last plant making the basic chassis (winsor ontario) for these was restructured out of existence as a result of the gov't intervention following the 2008 crisis.

<comment><USER5> > taxis were very often Crown Victorias,

Retired Crown Victorias were commonly used as taxis because they were inexpensive when purchased at auctions. When I first started driving for the taxi company (2012), they still had a few Crown Vics with police-style lights on the A-pillar [0].

[0] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pillar_(car)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pillar_\(car\))

The Prius is a much better taxi than the Crown Victoria. Easier for old people to get into, hatchback, etc.

<comment><USER6> > Prius is a much better taxi than the Crown Victoria. .

Prius has one of the lowest operating costs of any car out there. Not just because of the good gas mileage but also the service and maintenance costs are really low.

<comment><USER7> Until you need to replace the batteries

<comment><USER6> Battery is warrantied for 10 years, 150,000 miles.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Didn't the US auto industry make this same mistake before? Gas was ~$1/gallon in the 90s, so they neglected everything to focus on the (truck-based) SUVs that were then popular and profitable. Then gas prices went up and they were totally unprepared.

<comment><USER9> A 2018 F-150 with EcoBoost will essentially get the same MPG as a 2018 Ford Taurus. I suspect the Focus Active will be their high efficiency vehicle and they'll continue to increase the MPG on SUVs and certain trucks.

I'm in the market for an SUV or crew cab truck for weekend road trips (I walk to work) and have been impressed with the 2015+ F-150s. If I actually did commute every day I could just buy a 10 year old Honda or Toyota and have the best of both worlds.

<comment><USER10> But how does that mileage compare to a Taurus with Ecoboost (I don't even know what that is -- a fuel efficient engine or a hybrid drivetrain?) -- surely any technology that improves gas mileage in a 5000lb, 80" wide x 78" high truck would do even more to improve mileage in a 4000 lb 76" wide x 60" high sedan?

Comparing an efficient truck to an inefficient car seems like an unfair comparison unless your goal is to justify buying the truck.

<comment><USER11> Ecoboost is Ford's name for using smaller displacement turbo engines to replace larger naturally aspirated ones. My experience with these types of cars is that with typical real drivers they do not deliver anywhere near the EPA fuel economy numbers, because they're essentially designed to make the turbo never spool up in the EPA tests. You can get the EPA numbers if you drive very slowly though.

<comment><USER12> I have a 1.6 EcoBoost Mondeo, it gets pretty close to the published economy numbers and I don't drive particularly slowly.

<comment><USER11> The Mondeo is apparently the UK version of what's known as the Fusion in the US, maybe the UK has more accurate fuel economy testing than the US. Or everyone I know who complains about not getting EPA numbers just has a lead foot.

<comment><USER13> Everyone you know has a lead foot. Everyone has a lead foot.

It's not hard to get EPA numbers on any car I've driven.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I'll miss the Focus RS hot hatch the most. Fords sedan/hatchback line wasn't something that stood out but MAN the RS hot hatch was a brilliant car.

With the Subaru WRX STI hatchback gone and the Focus RS gone - is the VW GTI the only good hot hatch left on the market?

<comment><USER15> The loss of the hatchback on the WRX continues to confuse the hell out of me.

I'll also miss the Fiesta ST. I liked the idea of a cheap, entry level track car.

<comment> X-Istence Even Subaru retailers and corporate that I've spoken to as a Subaru ambassador are still not sure why the hatch was discontinued and it is still one fo the most requested things from Subaru.

A WRX hatchback would be amazing

<comment><USER16> Doesn't the Crosstrek fill this role?

<comment><USER17> Crosstrek is just a jacked up Impreza hatch. People want the turbo 2.5L engine in a hot hatch instead.

<comment> X-Istence Nah, the 2.5L engine days are done. The new engine design is much better, only 2.0L, and can do much higher numbers than what Subaru has tuned them for. The power comes on quicker so it's got the same 0-60 as the 2.5L in the STI due to turbo design. the EJ25 has served its time, it is time to retire it.

Also, Subaru STI has already been using the 2.0 DIT engine for the WRX STI in Japan. See the WRX STI S208: [https://www.caranddriver.com/news/wing-swap-jdm- subaru-wrx-s...](https://www.caranddriver.com/news/wing-swap-jdm-subaru-wrx- sti-s208-special-edition-is-6000-miles-out-of-reach)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> It's a real shame that the station wagon died out. I firmly believe they are the optimum type of car.

You get the roominess of a sedan for your passengers, with a large storage area in the back, some station wagons rivaling a van.

<comment><USER19> I really miss the wagon, too.

It was made illegal by the fuel economy standards, since its a car.

An SUV is a light truck, so it has different standards applied.

That's why there aren't any large cars anymore, and the SUV market is the luxury and family market.

<comment><USER20> Interestingly, that's what Subaru and others learned long ago, make the backseat floor flat, and it's an SUV. Subaru made a lot of money by skirting fuel economy standards before it became popular.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> >Ford sees 90 percent of its North America portfolio in trucks, utilities and commercial vehicles.

They mean "cars" to be interpreted as "small cars" like the taurus.

Or maybe they mean it to be interpreted as "vehicles", and this is clickbait.

<comment><USER22> ~2 ton Ford Taurus a small car ;----)

<comment><USER23> It has a small interior. When I tried Ford sedans at a dealer last summer, the Taurus had the least head room. The others were bad too; it seems modern cars have shrunk. I had a Taurus from the 1980s and it was fine.

<comment><USER24> > The others were bad too; it seems modern cars have shrunk.

Modern _American_ cars. To my untrained eyes, it looks like a common design language in American cars is to lower the roof and sometimes simultaneously raising the body (exemplified by the Chrysler 300). This leads to very limited fields of views - rear windows are almost vestigial at this point. After driving a Charger, being in a Prius feels like you're driving an all-glass car with panoramic views.

<comment><USER25> I agree with you up until you posit the Prius as a counter example. It caught my eye that you mention rear windows in particular - do you really think a Prius has good visibility behind? I test drove the new Honda Clarity and it similarly has questionable rear visibility because of the aerodynamic hatchback shape's rear windows.

One car that is commonly cited as an example of good visibility is a Subaru Forester, although I haven't driven one to see.

Something I noticed while driving a 30 year old car with _spectacularly_ good visibility is that one factor is the skinny A and B-pillars compared to modern cars. I imagine that might be related to (lack of) rollover protection, not to mention airbags.

<comment><USER24> > do you really think a Prius has good visibility behind?

No, I wouldn't say it has good rear visibility, objectively. However, my statement was explicitly comparative, and I think the Prius has _better_ all- round visibility than a Dodge Charger.

<comment><USER25> I haven't driven a Charger, so maybe you're right. Based on test driving both the current generation Prius and the last one, and looking at the Charger, it would surprise me though.

The most annoying thing about my 2016 Honda Accord coupe is the massive A- and B-pillar blind spots. It's got one of the rare all-around 5 star ratings for crash tests, including rollover, and has lots of airbags, so of course you can't have everything. I don't think I ever notice any issue with the rear window.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> I am surprised that Ford didn't mention their electrification plan their internal "Team Edison"[1] is working on.

Contrary to many have believed, the fuel efficiency doesn't really matter for bigger and heavier SUV segments after electrification of their fleet. Tesla Model X proved that all-electric (aka BEV) SUV is a viable product.

[1]: [https://electrek.co/2018/03/15/ford-upcoming-electric- vehicl...](https://electrek.co/2018/03/15/ford-upcoming-electric-vehicles- charging-experience/)

</comment><comment><USER27> Rip Fiesta, and Focus ST. Yeah the Fiesta was already on the ax, but the Focus ST wasn't as much of a loser on the books.

<comment><USER28> I think the problem with the focus is that the margins are essentially zero?

<comment><USER27> Problem with the focus was the transmission worked better as a boat anchor on the automatics. It was dangerous and never got a formal recall.

<comment><USER29> And if you're wondering how dangerous Ford thought it was: After a nice letter from my lawyer, they offered to buy back my 5 year old Focus SE for essentially full price. (Plus covering lawyer costs)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> This is very disappointing. I really love the Fusion hybrid (close to 50 MPG on mine, very smooth ride and good low-end off-the-line torque due to the electric).

I was really hoping they would do a plug-in version that got more than 21 miles on a charge in the next 10 years (when I'll be due for another car).

<comment><USER31> Any reason you wouldn't go with an all electric vehicle at that point?

<comment><USER32> Cost? Hybrids are ballpark $10K cheaper than electric.

For example the Ford Fusion Hybrid starts at $25,390 and Prius V at $26,675, the only fully electric vehicle at that price point is the Smart ForTwo electric drive, but the ForTwo Electric has a terrible 58 mile range, only two seats, missing quality of life features, and arguably poor fit & finish (similar to a $13K new car level). A good electric vehicle, like the Bolt, is in the mid $30s ($34-36K ish).

A plug-in hybrid offers a good compromise between features and cost. You'll get similar mileage to a ForTwo Electric (50 miles on electric) but with fewer of the compromises (unlimited gas range after that, more features, nicer finish, four seats, etc).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> We know that trucks are fundamentally more dangerous to pedestrians than cars.

This is an unfortunate step backward in terms of road safety.

<comment><USER34> But they are safer for the occupants, which are the people buying the cars. I think the focus for a lot of AI like safety systems should be for the bigger vehicles, which can be harder to control in a number of situations.

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> The Obama era fleet efficiency standards don't bode well when looking at big heavy trucks. If they could put their efforts primarily behind one car, they could come out ahead on profitability.

Doing so would greatly reduce the supply chain complexity, part variety (though shared parts across models has gotten much better in the last decade), inventory costs, etc. This would help service shops, suppliers, and their logistics.

It will be interesting to see how this develops.

Disclosure: I work for a Tier 1 supplier.

</comment><comment><USER36> I find it interesting to think about this as a branding decision. Ford has never established a strong brand identity for trucks. Sure, the F150 has a strong identity. But it's just one model within the F-series...necessary because it's not the E-series or a car. Even with this new strategy, the same branding drag will continue. A car, the Mustang, will still be the brand icon because it has a consistent profile not a jumble of ride heights and cab sizes and bed lengths.

I think Fiat Chrysler made a good branding move by spinning off trucks and vans into the Ram Truck badge. It's a good branding move because the brands reflect a natural market segmentation. Most people are out "shopping for either a sedan or a pickup truck" at the point they walk into a show room with their checkbook. Ram and Chrysler brands are backed by distinct marketing persona sets. On the other hand, after this move the Ford brand will still be lumping those separate personas into a single set.

<comment><USER37> Ford has never established s strong brand identity with trucks?! In what universe? The Ford F series truck is the best selling _vehicle_ in America (yes, including cars) and has been for many years. A picture of one is at the top of the Wikipedia page for "pickup truck". Chevy and Ram have been chasing Ford for decades. They're the Coca-Cola of trucks.

<comment><USER36> My comment used the phrase "for trucks" not "with trucks." My apologies for the confusion.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> I suppose not having Mazda around anymore for sedan platform/engine sharing really hurt Ford.

<comment><USER39> Can you expand on this? In what way is Mazda not around anymore?

<comment><USER38> Ford used to own ~30% of Mazda before selling the shares back to Japanese entities. Because of that, they were able to share engines and platforms. For example, the Mazda 3 and Ford Focus shared the Ford C1 platform and Mazda MZR engine. The Mazda 6 and Ford Fusion shared the Mazda G platform and MZR/Duratec engines. The Mazda 2 and Ford Fiesta shared the Mazda D platform.

Since the breakup, Mazda has moved onto their newer Skyactiv engine/platforms, but lost access to the Ford Duratec V6 and C1-platform (the current Mazda3 sits on top of a Miata derived platform I believe). Ford is still using the older MZR designs as a basis for their EcoBoost I4 engines, but lost access to the Mazda G and D platforms underpinning the Fusion/Fiesta (and the Volvo derived D3 platform for the Taurus). I guess they decided to discontinue those lines instead of developing a new platform/engine for them. The C1 platform was a joint Mazda/Volvo/Ford venture, Ford may have decided that it's too expensive to develop an update to it on their own.

Once you remove all vehicles that use the MZR-I4s and non-Ford platforms, the only car you're left with is the Mustang.

<comment><USER40>
      The Mazda 6 and Ford Fusion shared the Mazda G platform

The Mazda 6 platform of the early-mid 1990s was shared with the Ford Probe; the MX6-LS was the same as the Probe GT underneath. (Ford didn't even have a 24V V-6 of its own at the time.)

<comment><USER38> The platform sharing definitely went several generations back, but the sedan platforms were almost always developed more by Mazda than Ford.

My understanding of the Ford V6 from the 1990s is that it's some Mazda/Porsche design. But the current generation of Ford V6s are pure Ford designs.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER41> I read this as "We can't compete where we're not protected by the chicken tax[1]. See you later."

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

<comment><USER42> Only applies to pickups, and basically every manufacturer has assemblies in the US now, negating the advantage.

You see a lot of Tundras in Texas because they're made there, for example

</comment></comment><comment><USER43> My understanding from this article is that Ford will continue to sell SUVs, Trucks and Crossovers. They are only decreasing the size of their "Sedan" portfolio. Basically they are discontinuing those vehicules : Fiesta, Focus, Fusion, C-Max and Taurus. They are keeping everything else (including F-150, Mustang, Explorer, Escape, Bronco) as well as adding a new "Ford Active" car.

<comment><USER44> And even then they're only discontinuing in America. They just launched a new Fiesta in Europe.

</comment></comment><comment><USER45> This makes me sad... I really have grown to like my 2012 Ford Focus and always imagined I'd buy another one, maybe an RS, someday.

</comment><comment><USER46> I've enjoyed driving a rented a CMAX hybrid on a few occasions, great mileage and convinced me to switch to electric. Only downside is nav/entertainment system froze and rebooted while driving. I understand they've switched to QNX from Windows Embedded in newer iterations.

</comment><comment><USER47> Given how ubiquitous some of the cars Ford has stopped making such as the Crown Victoria are e.g fleets, police, taxis, it's incredible to think it's not financially worth it. Would be interesting to see the in-depth financials involved.

</comment><comment><USER48> Not too surprising to me as the only popular American brand cars I see are muscle cars (Mustang, Challenger, and Charger). Thought that might be just a California thing, but looks like Ford thinks it is the trend for all of N. America.

<comment><USER49> Some of that might be the fact that Japanese and Korean automakers don't compete in that space. From anecdotal experience in North Carolina, plenty of folks would buy, say, a new Fusion over an Accord, whether out of brand loyalty ("I'd rather push my Ford than drive a Chevy" shirts are real and worn by actual live people), "patriotism", or a desire for a softer ride. There are still more Accords or Camrys, though.

<comment><USER50> _Japanese and Korean automakers don 't compete in that space_

My Hyundai Genesis Coupe sits in that segment too, at least in terms of features of the car. Demographically it's miles away, as you note.

<comment><USER25> Traditionally, the much maligned V-6 Mustang sold more than the V-8 version. I don't think that's the case any more (even if you replace V-6 with turbo 4). Of course, modern V-6's make as much power as the V-8s of a few decades ago.

So I would say the various V-6 coupes compete in the space the Mustang _used_ to be in, but now Ford has ceded that. On the other hand, Honda has quit making V-6 coupes, and I don't think Toyota does either these days.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER51> I wonder where electric cars fit into this decision. Could it be that Ford anticipates not being able to be competitive in the electric market?

</comment><comment><USER19> Make sense since it's basically illegal to sell large luxury cars anymore, and light trucks are the new luxury vehicle.

<comment><USER25> It's basically illegal to sell large luxury cars?

What about the: -Toyota Avalon -Lexus ES -Lexus GS -Lexus LS -Audi A6 -Audi A7 -Audi A8 -BMW 5 series -BMW 6 series -BMW 7 series -Nissan Maxima -Hyundai Genesis G90 -Tesla Model S -Mercedes CLS class -Mercedes E class -Mercedes S class -Cadillac CT6 -Cadillac CTS -Cadillac XTS -Lincoln Continental -Acura RLX -Porsche Panamera -Jaguar XJ -Maserati Quattroporte -Infiniti Q70

</comment></comment><comment><USER52> Sounds like a rare intelligent move from the legacy car industry.

</comment><comment><USER53> Aren't they rolling out a new Ford Ranger??

<comment><USER54> Ranger is a truck. Ford isn't cutting down on the number of truck models they sell.

<comment><USER55> Indeed, they are focusing on their core competencies ala Jack Welch/GE

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER56> That sounds like an Apple move.

</comment><comment><USER57> Title is misleading and borderline clickbait -- they use 'car' to mean sedan. Ford will still sell SUVs and trucks.

<comment><USER58> When talking vehicle categories, a truck is not a car.

<comment><USER57> In common parlance it is. When I google 'cars for sale', trucks and SUVs come up.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER59> Please stop selling the Mustang soon, people just buy them to make lots of noise and set off other people's car alarms :'(

<comment><USER60> Might want to ban any kind of aftermarket exhaust system and saws as well (in case people decide to just chop off their exhausts). /s</comment></comment>


The Backwards Brain Bicycle – Smarter Every Day 133 - <AUTHOR> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MFzDaBzBlL0

<comment><USER2> I experimented with this back as a teen. It's easy to simulate. Just switch your hands. Left hand goes on the right handle bar and the other with the other.

Do not do this while in motion. You will fall. At least I did. It was deathly frightening. A good jolt of respect for all the work going on behind the scenes to make bodies work together correctly.

<comment><USER3> You can see people trying to do that just to rise across the stage. It may be similar, but I'm pretty sure the mechanics are just different enough.</comment></comment>


Motor which runs without energy source - <AUTHOR> http://www.bsmhturk.com

<comment><USER2> Blither.</comment>


The New ID Theft: Millions of Credit Applicants Who Don't Exist - <AUTHOR> https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-new-id-theft-thousands-of-credit-applicants-who-dont-exist-1520350404 <comment><USER2> > Mr. Lyles secured credit cards often using fictional names and numbers the > Social Security Administration hadn't yet assigned.

So, the credit reporting companies cannot verify if the SSN is real or not? That sounds like the worst identity verification system.

<comment><USER3> SSNs aren't supposed to be used for identification. That said the Social Security Administration does have a site that allows for validating SSNs. It appears to be geared toward employers verifying SSNs for employment (and therefor tax purposes), the terms may preclude using it for credit reporting purposes.

[https://www.ssa.gov/employer/ssnv.htm](https://www.ssa.gov/employer/ssnv.htm)

The root problem here is that they're using a public number which was never designed for identification purposes and has no security. The solution would be a national ID, or expansion of the US Passport with in-built security measures. Although that goes over like a lead balloon whenever it's brought up.

<comment><USER4> So only issue credit cards to people with a passport, and give them a statement credit to cover the application fee (premium annual fee cards already cover the cost of precheck/global entry, this isn't a stretch). It's even possible the finance industry could negotiate with the US government a lower rate for passports at scale, thereby turning it into a defacto national ID system.

This is just finance industry whining that their system sucks and they want to offload the costs onto the government to manage the fraud.

EDIT: "In January, Accenture PLC listed synthetic-identity fraud as one of the biggest threats facing banks in 2018, saying it would be "costing banks billions of dollars and countless hours as they chase down people who don't even exist."

That pays for a lot of passports!

Disclaimer: Am in finance industry, but not credit issuance.

<comment><USER5> Lawful permanent residents and other residents of the US who are not eligible for a US passport may also want to avail themselves of the benefits of a credit card. Fewer than half of US Citizens have a passport, and they may all want a credit card as well.

<comment><USER3> Lawful permanent residents also have a green-card or other immigration related ID number which can serve the same purpose. They likely also possess a foreign passport which could be used in the same way.

Less than half of the eligible population of the US votes also. That doesn't mean that it's a bad idea, just that it's not taken advantage of.

EDIT: a word.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I commend the people doing this. Credit card companies and banks have been pushing the burden of identity theft onto the consumer for way too long, a burden that clearly is the bank's fault in every single case. Maybe now they'll start to take fraud seriously. I hope more shadow id theft happens until the banks start doing their duty and protecting customers. The more money they lose, the better it is for everyone else. Thank you, synthetic id "thieves."

<comment><USER7> You should be able to sue banks if they fraudulently extend credit to someone else in your name. It's not your fault that their identity verification methods are terrible.

<comment><USER6> How is this not already possible?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> [http://archive.is/LdEX8](http://archive.is/LdEX8)

<comment><USER9> I wish I had an option to blacklist all paywalled sites (from my list only, of course).

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Two super interesting things about this kind of fraud which make it especially tricky to catch and deal with:

1\. Unlike with ID theft, there's no consumer victim. With ID theft, eventually the victim will find out about it, (by getting a call from a collections agent or seeing the trade on their credit report). They'll then contact the lender or the bureau, and contest the validity of the loan. The end result is that the lender gets a stream of loans that are labeled as identity theft losses. Since there's no consumer victim with synthetic fraud, though, lenders don't get this stream of labeled data and have a hard time knowing which of their losses are synthetic fraud (and which are just ordinary credit losses).

2\. Synthetic fraud cuts right through typical ID theft prevention systems. ID theft prevention is about checking whether the applicant is the same as the identity they're using to apply for credit. So you check if the email the applicant uses matches the identity, (e.g. don't want firstname.lastname@example.com used as the email for Jane Smith), you check the phone number, you check if the applicant can complete KBA (knowledge based authentication, e.g. questions about previous addresses), you check the billing address, and so forth. But synthetic identities have their own aged phone numbers, emails, addresses, and credit histories, and so all of these verifications go through without any flags raised. Essentially the ID theft prevention system was checking whether the applicant is the same as the identity that they're using, but with synthetic fraud the applicant _created_ the identity.

Source: my startup focuses heavily on preventing synthetic fraud for lenders, (PM me for details).

<comment><USER11> I know you're not asking for my advice, but you're pushing the dirt around here.

You're not solving the problem of ID Theft, you're just making it more likely that the criminals who are going to do it are going to use it are going to use ID's of real people.

Congrats and all for figuring it out how to do it, and for developing a market around it. But to me, encouraging banks to continue to make loans with just a web site or app seems like a really bad idea.

Edited to add:

Data is not a person. A person is a person.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> Open question for hacker news denizens: why don't the three main credit bureaus let you register your SSN, and get alerts in an app whenever someone tries to take out a loan? I'd sign up for that in a heartbeat.

Hit me up with the unintended downsides :-)

<comment><USER4> Credit Karma does this for free.

[https://www.creditkarma.com/credit- monitoring](https://www.creditkarma.com/credit-monitoring)

<comment><USER13> They sell your data so they can sell you loans and credit cards, though.

<comment><USER4> My understanding is they don't sell your data, but they do use it to recommend you financial products they make a commission from. I'm happy to be proven wrong.

<comment><USER14> That's what "selling your data" means anymore.

<comment><USER15> No, as long as they do not give it out to third parties. It is the same way Facebook does not sell your data, yet makes money from it.

<comment><USER13> It's still selling the data.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> I'm surprised that this is seemingly a new phenomenon. The article states that it really picked up in 2012.

I remember there was a program for the Commodore 64 that would pull random information from a data array to create fake identities, complete with addresses and ZIP codes.

</comment><comment><USER17> Paywall uhhhhhg

<comment><USER18> Please see [https://news.ycombinator.com/newsfaq.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsfaq.html) and [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10178989](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10178989) and don't do this here.</comment></comment>


Mug: A New JavaScript compiler for the JVM - <AUTHOR> http://timcameronryan.com/post/2684769192/mug-javascript-compiler-for-the-jvm

<comment><USER2> Pro tip: Go straight for ECMAScript 5, don't waste your time on 3. With CL- JavaScript (<http://marijnhaverbeke.nl/cl-javascript>) we also thought 3 would be easier, but now we regret our decision:

\- The ECMA5 document is (slightly) easier to read.

\- Most 'extra' ECMA5 features can be added later, piecemeal, so initial development doesn't have to be more complicated.

\- People will want ECMA5 eventually anyway.

\- It is a waste of time to work through two ugly standards when one would have sufficed.

</comment><comment><USER3> Isn't Oracle also working on a new JS implementation on the JVM? I saw a job posting a while back.

Found it:

<http://robilad.livejournal.com/71787.html>

</comment><comment><USER4> Awesome. Question: I was under the impression (perhaps mistakenly) that it would be impossible (or very hard) to statically compile a highly dynamic language like Javascript. Yes, No? Are there shortcuts Mug takes or disallowed coding styles?

How would Mug handle the following RuPyScript pseudocode:

for i in 1..10; eval "def function$i; print 'I'm $i'; end"; end

<comment><USER5> I think, by definition, eval () will be impossible in a statically compiled environment.

<comment><USER4> Right, right, but then how useful would Mug be if the dynamic stuff in JS can't be used?

<comment><USER6> Munging strings and then eval()ing them is the _worst_ way to write dynamic code. Hopefully its not common in most js libraries.

Missing eval() is a feature.

<comment><USER7> As a follow up in case anyone is curious about the why behind this assertion, consider a line of code like this

        eval("myObject."+functionName+"()")

Not only does it make it difficult to track down the calls to this method, it is now impossible to minify this chunk of code, something that is very commonly done in javascript. This is why javascript includes things like apply() and accessing members of an object in multiple ways (obj.attribute == obj['attribute'], for user-defined values of attribute).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Interesting benchmark idea: run JavaScript benchmark suites through Mug then GWT, compare to original.

<comment><USER9> I'm guessing that Mug produces bytecode very different from that which you would normally want to run through GWT, and therefore might not be a very representative benchmark.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> This is very exciting. Will be interesting to benchmark and see what the performance is like. It would be great if you dynamically compile JS to java classes at runtime (store procedures in JS etc).

</comment><comment><USER11> Why is all the content flushed to the right? It's making it hard to read the content and actually get a sense for what Mug is all about.

<comment><USER12> Seriously? There's only 4 paragraphs total. How hard can it be? It's strange that it would make it hard to read. Typographic manuals usually suggest roughly 60 characters per line, favoring narrow columns over wide columns.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Why haven't processor manufacturers been sued yet? - <AUTHOR> Why haven't Intel, AMD, and other processor manufacturers been sued for preventing processor owners from securing the processors they own?
These processors are effectively running two complex operating systems of which only one can be updated and secured by the processor's owner. Owners are not allowed to update or secure the other operating system themselves leaving them vulnerable and susceptible to malicious software and actors. Unless the manufacturer is incentivised to prevent this by releasing an update, owners will be stuck with a defective device that they can not fix.
Why haven't the EFF and similar groups taken action yet?
Why are processor manufacturer even allowed to do this? <comment><USER2> The use case "Owners are not allowed to update or secure the other operating system themselves" maps out across a number of industries and products. Car owners do not have access to certain firmware, airlines cannot patch airplane software to their liking.

Most hardware products are sold as is, without implicit guarantees, with market forces (stock market included) being the ultimate arbiter.

With that said, there's probably a hungry law firm willing to do a headline- grabbing class-action suit based on "neglectful behavior", "truth in advertising" or other potentially lucrative routes, so I am guessing they're working on their customer acquisition strategy at the moment.

<comment><AUTHOR> Cars and planes (and even radio transmission equipment) pose a high risk on public safety. They aren't restricted because owners don't have the right to control these devices, they are restricted because public safety is at risk otherwise.

Processors don't fall into that class of devices. In fact, I'm willing to argue that not allowing owners to patch their devices is a public hazard (ddos botnets, mass identity theft, etc).

<comment><USER2> Is there a precedent of someone buying a closed-source product, suing for being unable to update it, winning the case in court and being awarded damages?

<comment><AUTHOR> Hopefully, this would be it. But rather than damages, the courts would rule that access to one's own device is protected by a fundamental right.

<comment><USER2> If this wasn't hashed out in a much cheaper lawsuit with a smaller target (e.g., someone suing a remote-controlled toy car manufacturer for inability to update firmware on consumer end), chances of this being fought for precedent sake against Intel ($200+ billion market cap, $17 billion in the bank account alone), which hires lawyers by the dozen, are pretty slim.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> For one thing, to sue for damages, you have to show actual, quantifiable damages.

<comment><AUTHOR> What about suing for full control over a product you own?

<comment><USER4> What about buying a product implies that the manufacturer is legally required to allow consumers full control over it?

<comment><AUTHOR> The fact that they are required to allow owners access is what I hope the lawsuit would address.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


How Google Plans to Take Over TV - <AUTHOR> http://www.technologyreview.com/blog/editors/22202/ <comment><USER2> _The TV Ads interface already lets you select target shows based on audience age and gender information, which is in turn based on data from a partnership with Nielsen. But Desai told me about a partnership that will take this farther. A satellite-TV company called Echostar, working with credit-reporting company Equifax, will cross-reference shows watched (using its own data from set-top boxes) with income and buying habits (using Equifax's data)._

I love the eighties: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aBd7bHFnO4Y>

</comment><comment><USER3> I'm certainly no expert on TV advertising, but it seems to be a much harder market to break into than the web. The cost of producing ads is much higher, and the ROI is harder to measure. And there are big, established players who have the infrastructure & relationships that Google doesn't yet. Plus, Microsoft has had MSNBC for years, and it doesn't seem to have helped them in TV advertising.

</comment><comment><USER4> I still haven't figured out how Google Plans to get this working on terrestrial cable. The cable industry already has the Canoe project to get a similar infrastructure in place. They're going to have a hard time getting a cable co like Comcast or TimeWarner to allow them to sell their ad spots, maybe from the content providers themselves but they don't get any localization that way.

Hard row to sow.</comment>


Ask HN: Who has never had a personal Facebook account - <AUTHOR> <comment><USER2> No FB account in any form, ever.

No Instagram account.

No Twitter account.

I have a LinkedIn account from 15 years ago that I never use. LinkedIn never "worked" for me. Because of that, I never bothered with any of the other "social media".

</comment><comment><USER3> +1 Almost every day of every week I read (online) news items regarding the way that FB `handles' its `clients' privacy and/or data and I'm grateful not to be included!

<comment><USER4> Don't worry, given their tendency to stalk non-users through embedded Like buttons and their app analytics SDKs I'm sure they still have you in the form of a shadow profile.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> I have made a few 'fake' ones, but lord knows the data they got was real. Never had one under my legal name.

</comment><comment><USER6> Had an Orkut account once. It proved to be more than enough :)

</comment><comment><USER7> I have never had a personal Facebook account. I technically have one but I only have it for Tinder and other such places that required a Facebook login. I have hundreds of "friends" but don't know any of them. I never post or read the feed.</comment>


How to : find the best consultant/contractor? - <AUTHOR>

Following some bad encounters with our current consultant, I'm trying to see if I can find to replace him. Usually I would ask around and see if anyone knows someone for the job, but as we are working on some very specific and not so spread out tool, I thought about using a website.<p>Do you guys know any good consulting/contracting platform ? <comment><USER2> You are far better off using your network, if you don't have a network to reach out and find a key technical person find out if someone else you know does. If you would like to take it offline you can email me, I help a lot of organizations find that key technical person, I don't do it as a service it's more for the karma and to promote my business should a company ever need my services.

</comment><comment><USER3> linkedin works pretty well = search for the skill set you need, and it will show you connections that are close to you - then you can get a reference from your direct connections who know them. That's been the most effective way I've found.</comment>


Serve HN: A way to show and discuss technology for social good on HN.  - <AUTHOR>

I consider myself to be pretty new to HN. Over the last few months I've learned and benefited greatly from members of this community. I respect the mores for posts (i.e. do not direct link when you want feedback on your concept) and I have contributed to a few conversations too.
I say all this because I am noticing a trend. Social enterprises and non-profit tech companies models get short shrift. We embrace MVPs, ask great questions but we don't really lift up the MANY of us who use their time, talent and treasure to directly impact social problems. Some members, like myself, have dedicated entire projects to social entrepreneurship and non-profits. Don't believe me-here are a few y have missed these posts you may have missed related to the subject-
http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=197228
http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1915997
http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2378934
I don't consider myself a homer, who thinks slapping a label of social enterprise onto a business makes their founders, product or business model 'good' or deserving of your support. Google Docs, online tuts and cheap computers have done more good in my life than any NGO. I feel pretty fortunate for that, but I also realize my perspective and experience is not the norm. So with some of the brightest minds in the world, right here, maybe we can do the 'possible' to  keep those of us working in the space in mind?
Here is what I propose-instead of losing threads related to non-profit and social entrepreneurial world on HN, lets use 'Serve HN:' as a standard way to identify posts.
Folks wanting feedback, support et al for non-profit and technology for social good startups, blogs, MVPs, etc could tag posts in this manner.
Thoughts from the community? <comment><USER2> OK, I'll bite. The tough part is that this is Hacker News, not Start-up News, much less Idealist News, etc. This probably isn't the right forum for evaluating a social/community ventures. Many people here have a deep understanding of how to start a business and make money, but not everyone knows how to address gaps in society (for lack of a better way of putting it).

Hacker News is many things to many people (I'm not in the start-up world right now myself) but it can't be everything to everyone.

Please don't take this or the (lack of) responses in some threads as a snub to the many ideas for improving society - I'm sure many of us have had and continue to have ideas for improving the world around us.

As for the title tag idea, hmm. Sure, why not give it a shot? I don't know that it hurts. Just know this may not be the best forum.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the insight. And I agree with you. HN is a stream of consciousness. I read a post describing a project 'Coders who Care' and said to myself -'I almost missed this and its pretty awesome'...I figured there were others who were doing similar things or felt the same way and wanted to test the waters - thanks for the feedback.</comment></comment>