Back endLab: create a no-code web/mobile app back end in minutes - <AUTHOR> I'm currently validating an idea for a new BaaS solution which will allow you to build and host a web app backend without writing a single line of code.
The app is called BackendLab and the landing page is here: https://www.backendlab.app/
The idea is that it allows you to define your database models by specifying what fields to include and BackendLab automatically creates a CRUD API which you can start using straight away.
You'll also have the option to implement additional REST methods which allow you to join together a number of pre-defined actions, e.g. integrations with various third party services, as well as applying permissions/authentication
At the moment I'm about 1-2 weeks away from launching the public beta. If anybody thinks that this could be of use to them, then please get in touch. I'm planning to make this free for life for the first 100 or so early adopters/beta testers.
Thanks for reading <comment><USER2> Interested, I've signed up to find out more. Are you worried about being swallowed up by the cloud providers, I've not checked recently but I'm sure they will be creating an equivalent soon. Firebase seems pretty popular but I'd prefer a relational db backed solution.</comment>


Tracking Clicks, Building a Clickmap with PHP and jQuery - <AUTHOR> http://css-tricks.com/tracking-clicks-building-a-clickmap-with-php-and-jquery/ <comment><USER2> Crazy Egg does a pretty good job at this <http://crazyegg.com/>

</comment><comment><USER3> Sounds like a fun little project!

</comment><comment><USER4> That sure is some ugly JS and (insecure) PHP scripting. But hey, what do you expect from a website called 'css-tricks'.

<comment><USER5> Another blog post that furthers bad security practices by actually showing you how write SQL-injection prone code. You don't even need to write it, just cut and paste the security hole right into your project!</comment></comment>


Some Startups Just Don't Need Starting - <AUTHOR> http://mashable.com/2008/07/20/ycombinator-startups/

<comment><USER2> 2008: You shouldn't try to build web-based Office alternatives because Google, Adobe, and Zoho are already doing it.

=

1998: You shouldn't try to build new search engines because Lycos, Excite, and Altavista are already doing it.

Any argument that proves it was a bad idea to start Google is probably a bad argument.

<comment><USER3> Ok, but Google didn't _just_ start a search engine to compete with Lycos. They struck oil with a new approach to search.

It's hard to say "any argument that proves it was a bad idea to start Excite" because, you know, Ferraris and hookers and coke and all that. A great idea.

But if you're taking on Microsoft, Google and Adobe, you'd better have an awesome idea, and you probably don't need the "this is a good market" encouragement.

My point is that you're both taking cheap shots.

<comment><USER2> Google didn't just "strike oil." The idea that they discovered a magical new algorithm that guaranteed their success is an urban legend. The main thing that made Google different from the portals was that they actually cared about doing search well. (When Google was started, their predecessors were trying hard to get people to stop calling them "search engines.") So there is plenty of room for a new startup to have the same sort of advantage over Google etc in web-based apps that Google did over preceding search engines.

<comment><USER3> My understanding is, Google didn't start as a "search engine that cared about doing search well". It started as a company to capitalize on Page and Brin's doctoral work. Their original plan was to be an arms dealer for other search engines. It was an idea first.

<comment><USER2> "search engine that cared about doing search well"

That quote is not a quote, is it?

Thomas, I'm done with this thread. I'm sure you mean well (at least, I'll give you the benefit of the doubt), but I've noticed before that arguing with you is exactly like arguing with a troll. The defining quality of both being finding oneself always saying "No, what I _said_ was...."

<comment><USER3> Duly noted.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Nobody reigns forever. Rome falls. The advantages of being small and agile can't be understated.

<comment><USER5> don't you mean they can't be overstated?

<comment><USER4> LOL. Yes. Typo attributable to lack of sleep. =)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I have to side with PG design. Most of Google's properties have a mediocre user experience at best. I'm not so sure it's their Achilles heel (at least for search) but it's definitely an area where a startup could crush them.

</comment><comment><USER7> Your analogy is weak at best, -- office suites aren't really an algorithmic problem ... Google beat out Lycos, Excite and Altavista because it created a better algorithm for indexing and organizing information. Office suites are about features -- lots of them, thus entering the market competitively requires man power not intelligence. Is there room for improvement... certainly. But it is incremental improvement. I just don't think its the type of area where some killer new idea can shake up the entire space.

</comment><comment><USER5> As always, history will judge whether these ideas are good or bad. Reading about it on a blog is not going to change my mind.

Worse, if it DOES change my mind, what have I gained? Nothing. I'd rather discover it was a bad idea because I tried it and failed, not because someone "told me so".

</comment><comment><USER8> Nice to see, someone agrees with me :)</comment>


Ask HN: Would you buy a foldable phone? - <AUTHOR> Foldable phones are going to hit the market. Do we really need such expensive foldable phones? <comment><USER3> No, for several reasons.

The main one is that I don't really see the need for such a large screen and it will likely be less convenient to carry in my pocket and hold in my hand.

Then there is the expensive price tag which, given I live in a city plagued by pickpockets, isn't appealing either.

Finally, as I only use my phone for Spotify, Facebook, Whatsapp, Netflix and taking photos, all of the stuff around improved gaming etc. doesn't appeal to me at all.

I guess some people will buy them - perhaps it could act as a replacement for a tablet? Filling the role of both tablet and phone.

But to be honest, it just seems like innovation for its own sake - <USER2> clutching at straws in an increasingly saturated market.

<comment><AUTHOR> What if it comes budget friendly? would you recommend it?</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Resources for Software Engineering - <AUTHOR> Hi all. I'm a 2nd year CS student who is well-versed with the basics of CS. I have completed a couple of small projects, which included a Tic-Tac-Toe and a minimalist RPG.
Over the summer, I would like to focus on building larger and more complex software systems, and over the next semester, I would be teaching what I learn to the freshmen at my institute.
What resources(books/videos/tutorials) would you recommend to me? How useful would be books on Design Patterns, and Software Engineering? I found the Software Engineering Body of Knowledge online, but I'm not sure how relevant it would be at my current position. <comment><USER2> The biggest piece of advice I can gave you: develop everything! What I mean by that is just create lots of applications, and try to change their target so you aren't creating different versions of the same application. I admit I haven't looked at in recent years but I used to read: [http://www.dreamincode.net/](http://www.dreamincode.net/) a lot. You can search the forums for side project ideas if you are at a loss for your next project.

<comment><AUTHOR> While I understand the sentiment of learning by building, would it be appropriate to build a large software system in such a manner?</comment></comment>


Safeboot: Booting Linux Safely - <AUTHOR> https://safeboot.dev/ <comment><USER3> I really like the philosophical approach here, even if it's too finicky to put in practice today. I'm really sick of everything being made "secure", when in fact the "security" is for someone other than the legitimate user of the thing. Phones, laptops, physical security systems, cars, the list goes on.

There was a post here yesterday ([https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23149771](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23149771)) about the (in)security of Linux, but the primary purpose of an OS is utility, not merely security. The leadership of the Linux project made very smart analyses of what priorities come first. Despite there being billions of insecure old devices scattered about, running old kernels, I think the kernel authors made the right call.

The problem rests with the manufacturers who abandoned support for those devices _and_ left no escape route for users to update the kernels themselves. Most disgusting are these phone and car manufacturers, and apps, which have enabled wholesale spying on users for many years now. These devices are literal bugs, reporting realtime locations, conversations, and who knows what else to Big Brother.

Its a pleasure to see that some people still care enough to make the world a better place, in a way I can understand.

<comment><USER4> > _I 'm really sick of everything being made "secure", when in fact the > "security" is for someone other than the legitimate user of the thing._

It's less binary than that for me. Yes, the same technologies that keep _my_ data secure also act as a buttress against jailbreaking. But people who _want_ to jailbreak can simply choose less-secure devices, while I would personally not trade that security for greater hackability. There are other, lower-risk devices than phones and cars that I can use for that.

<comment><USER3> Apparently your threat model doesn't include governments and large corporations, who have done more enumerable harm (e.g. through the military- industrial-information complex) to people than small-time crooks ever have. Sometimes it seems more people want to live in prison (or a gilded cage), than in regular civilian life with all its attendant dangerous freedoms.

The point of the OP is that users can and deserve to have the reliability that cryptographically-secure boot systems provide, without the Big Brother backdoor.

<comment><USER4> I appreciate the conversation.

> _Apparently your threat model doesn 't include governments and large > corporations…_

It's a consideration for sure, and it's why I use Apple devices instead of Google-powered ones, don't use Facebook, use DuckDuckGo as my primary search engine, etc.

I'm not worried about Apple selling my information (for now, given their current business model) but my network provider is absolutely doing this regardless of device. Given that, what actionable recommendation is even possible?

<comment><USER3> It's a tough one, for sure.

Personally, I'm looking forward to a pinephone. I'm moving towards asynchronous communications, and leaving my phone at home, or in a "faraday pouch" (made of [0]) on airplane mode.

Networking is done through an elastic ip vpn that forwards to a known host, so web sites that I want to use, but I don't want to trigger the captchas and 3FA stuff, see the same user-agent and IP address. I also have many "disposable" phones, that I use on projects that require Google Hangouts or WeChat. Recently I had to upgrade my daily driver phone, and I haven't installed Lineage yet. It's a slog, so I can totally understand why people would simply accept what's readily on offer.

At a basic level, my thinking is that "is this better for me?". That is, how are these capabilities[1] going to be used, in my favour, or against me? Since I have previously been dragged into a large investigation (regarding someone else operating under a false identity), and have had to get various clearances from various governments to work on projects (which is more common than I would naively think), the approach that I take is to appear unremarkable.

In the past, when leaving countries that require exit visas (like China, Israel), I was shocked at how much information they had on me, and revealed in the course of the exit interview. But I have to assume that Anglo countries, if anything, have more advanced technical means at their disposal, but decline to use them unless the target is juicy enough. So the reasonable approach is to do my best to make my pattern "normal" and "unappealing" \-- maximizing my benefit from these tools, and minimizing the risks of false associations and accusations.

[0] [https://www.sparkfun.com/products/retired/10056](https://www.sparkfun.com/products/retired/10056)

[1] [https://www.theverge.com/2013/8/1/4580718/fbi-can- remotely-a...](https://www.theverge.com/2013/8/1/4580718/fbi-can-remotely- activate-android-and-laptop-microphones-reports-wsj)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Slightly unrelated:

I currently have a custom platform key, packet everything I need for booting into a single image (signed with the custom platform key) and everything else is in a fully encrypted partition (lvm2 on dmcrypt). "Decryption key" is inserted via keyboard on boot, which is not to everyone's liking but is what I want.

It's not really hard to setup (on arch Linux) and works like a charm. ;-)

Through the drawback is that the initRamFs is only protected by the signature/secure boot but not encrypted and combining it with some other boot related setup can be less straight forward then under a "boring" setup.

I.e. some of the thinks this project promises are already possible now, just not streamlined. Which is why it's nice to have such a project.

<comment><AUTHOR> That was exactly my motivation: there are tons of guides for setting up UEFI SecureBoot platform keys, yubikey tokens, TPM disk encryption, dmverity, etc, but all of them seemed to involve "type hundreds of commands with no mistakes and hope that your system still boots afterwards". It felt to me that each program represented a low-level library function that needed to be linked into a high-level tool to handle the common cases for most users.

Regarding /boot being in the clear -- the initramfs and kernel shouldn't contain any secrets, so having them unencrypted isn't a big drawback. Signed is much more important so that an adversary with write access to the disk can't swap out the kernel.

One advantage to using the TPM for unsealing the disk encryption key is that it helps protect against attacks that re-write the firmware. If an adversary can reflash the platform key (via either a local SPI flash programmer or some code execution that gives them write access to the NVRAM region of the flash), then you can't tell that the PK has been changed and that the kernel to which you are inputting the password is no longer trustworthy. Since the secret is sealed with (among other things) the hash of the UEFI SecureBoot configuration, the TPM will not unseal it if the PK, KEK or db are changed.

If you want to take it to another level, TPM TOTP can be used to validate that the password dialog is even valid before you type in the password. I think we can integrate that fairly easily into the initramfs for the next version of safeboot.

<comment><USER6> There's a way to encrypt the boot partition and have GRUB ask you for the boot partition key, but you're limited to LUKS1, and the decryption process is slow as molasses, since it's implemented inefficiency directly in the GRUB code, because the Kernel's faster code isn't loaded yet. It's also probably full of side channel leaks. Signing the kernel and ramdisk is probably the better option...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> > fTPM tampering is out of scope since the ME is the root of all trust in the > system

I'm wondering about this assumption. Hasn't the ME previously been shown to be fairly straightforward to exploit?

<comment><USER5> I think they refer more to the "technical" term "root of trust" then to weather or not persons trust it/it has had security vulnerabilities.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> If you're interested in this kind of thing, Invisible Things Lab are really worth checking out [https://theinvisiblethings.blogspot.com/2009/10/evil-maid- go...](https://theinvisiblethings.blogspot.com/2009/10/evil-maid-goes-after- truecrypt.html)

</comment><comment><USER9> So what about this:

\- Copy GRUB, bootlines for your system, your kernel and initrd to a WORM media like a bootable CD-ROM.

\- Boot using CD-ROM.

\- When boot completes, remove the CD-ROM.

Now you can't attack my boot kernel or boot process because I've just physically separated it from the system and taken it with me. Even if it was there, the media is read only so you can't modify it.

If I need to upgrade, I need to burn a new CD. CDs are cheap.

Using actual CDs would be impractical for many users, but a parallel could be implemented on a system with micro-SD card readers supporting removeable media and a physical read/write or connection switch. Which, if we're talking about physical switches for camera and mic, why not boot files?

<comment><USER10> Hmmm.

This implies that you have set your boot order to CD-ROM first, so anyone can - say - boot their own system on your machine from CD and either access your data or make a dd-copy of your disk and look at it later.

You need also to password protect your BIOS so that first device in boot order is hard disk and settings cannot be changed (without BIOS password).

Depending on the BIOS this change in booting order could be possible at boot time (providing the password) or a reboot would be needed.

<comment><USER11> > You need also to password protect your BIOS so that first device in boot > order is hard disk and settings cannot be changed (without BIOS password).

You also have to make sure your BIOS can't be reset by removing the battery, doesn't have some administrative bypass or even a reset jumper. I've even seen a BIOS that reset to default boot settings when you remove all disks - <USER2> then gleefully boots from any attached USB disk.

<comment><USER10> Yes, and additionally we will also need a machanically safe case, as - even if the boot order is set to hard disk, it is not modifiable (without password) and the BIOS resists removing power and battery, noone would prevent you to detach the hard disk and either replace it with your own or more simply steal the hard disk and have a look at its data without hurries.

Security is tough.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Does anyone know if anything similar is possible with Windows? I am interested in the idea of signing the bootloader with your own keys to prevent other system images from being used on the system. It seems like such a system would provide much better anti-theft guarantees than existing solutions like CompuTrace/Lojack.

<comment><USER13> Isn't that what Bitlocker and Secure Boot do essentially?

[https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows- hardware/design/dev...](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows- hardware/design/device-experiences/oem-secure-boot)

<comment><USER12> In its typical configuration, Secure Boot can't provide any anti-theft guarantees because an attacker could just replace the contents of the disk with a new Windows installation and the workstation would be usable for them.

Secure Boot as it is configured by Windows only prevents malware from inserting itself into the boot process, since all Windows installations use the same signature. Bitlocker only prevents attackers from accessing the data on the disk, not from using the workstation in general.

<comment><USER14> Hmmm, is it theoretically possible to sign the Windows bootloader (?) with your own custom keys to ensure that someone couldn't just fire up a stock Windows image? Though I'm not sure what sort of management challenges that would present if Microsoft ever decided to update their bootloader.

Looking at the Microsoft documentation, doing this with SecureBoot could be pretty complicated: [https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows- hardware/drivers/br...](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows- hardware/drivers/bringup/boot-and-uefi)

<comment><USER12> I havent tested personally but this seems to suggest that you can't re-sign the bootloader: [https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/previous- versions/windows/i...](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/previous- versions/windows/it- pro/windows-8.1-and-8/dn747883\(v=win.10\)?redirectedfrom=MSDN)

> "Windows boot components: BootMgr, WinLoad, Windows Kernel Startup. Windows > boot components verify the signature on each component. Any non-trusted > components will not be loaded and instead will trigger Secure Boot > remediation."

Plus, you would need to add some kind of check to verify that it's actually booting your image, or else the attacker could just copy your bootloader files.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I had originally hoped to enroll signing keys in the firmware of my X1 carbon until I read this post[1] on reddit claiming it has the potential to brick the laptop, and so far I haven't found an official statement from Lenovo claiming otherwise.

[1] [https://www.reddit.com/r/thinkpad/comments/epadb5/psa_dont_i...](https://www.reddit.com/r/thinkpad/comments/epadb5/psa_dont_install_custom_secure_boot_keys_on_x1/feig0js/)

</comment><comment><USER16> Sounds like what the T2 chip does on MacOS, which I also found interesting:

[https://duo.com/labs/research/secure-boot-in-the-era-of- the-...](https://duo.com/labs/research/secure-boot-in-the-era-of-the-t2)

</comment><comment><USER17> Anyone interested in this might like keylime.dev - its open source remote boot attestation platform.

</comment><comment><USER18> If every Linux user would boycott AMD to release their source, then we could have libreboot: [https://libreboot.org/amd- libre.html](https://libreboot.org/amd-libre.html)

ME vs PSP isn't much of a choice. Of course POWER might be an option eventually, but isn't for most of us currently.

<comment><USER19> Boycott AMD, and obviously Intel [0]. Doesn't really leave a lot of options.

[0] [https://libreboot.org/faq.html#intel](https://libreboot.org/faq.html#intel)

<comment><USER20> Well there is POWER[0], not that it's a very affordable choice, the cheapest motherboard + cpu costing $1,732.07

[0][https://www.raptorcs.com/content/BK1B01/intro.html](https://www.raptorcs.com/content/BK1B01/intro.html)

<comment> yjftsjthsd-h Is ARM an option? I know in practice _many_ ARM systems rely on blobs, but it's not clear to me that that's universal.

<comment><USER21> There is nothing like "ARM" in the market.

There is CPU/SoC X by Y, built on top of a license from ARM.

So you would have to boycott N companies instead of just AMD & Intel :( And even more so, since all their customers are EOM that are happy to sign NDAs.

<comment><USER22> Decent blob scarce arm option: [https://libre.computer/](https://libre.computer/)</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Los Angeles and the 'great American streetcar scandal' - <AUTHOR> http://www.theguardian.com/cities/2016/apr/25/story-cities-los-angeles-great-american-streetcar-scandal <comment><USER3> One thing that the article doesn't mention but was still an important factor in the streetcars' demise: the need to replace the capital stock. Things like tracks and trains don't last forever, and eventually you have to replace them completely rather than just doing normal maintenance, but that only happens every few decades. If you spread out the replacement, it's not so bad, but I suspect many streetcar companies didn't bother doing that through the 20s since they were still relatively new (and 30 years counts as "relatively new" for tracks). But then the Depression hit and funds became hard to come by, followed by WWII which led to a surge in ridership but a shortage of materials. By the end of the war, not only were streetcars facing increasing competition from cars driving on new highways, the systems were also physically worn out and needed to be totally replaced. Indeed, this is exactly what happened to the Pacific Electric's Long Beach line, just with a gap of 29 years between closing the old line and opening the shiny new one in exactly the same place.

<comment><USER4> Today you have streetcars ("trams") in more than 200 European cities and they have also needed replacements and been upgraded from time to time. So why did streetcars thrive in most of Europe, but barely survived in America? We had depressions and world wars in Europe too.

<comment><USER3> That has more to do with what happened after the war: America was doing quite well and had piles of money to spend on roads and cars and suburban houses, while most of Europe was pretty devastated and had to spend everything just on rebuilding, without much left over for things like cars and highways, and so focused their investments on public transport. Even so, a huge number of European cities did end up abandoning their streetcar systems, either because the city was small enough that buses were deemed adequate or because it was big enough to have a metro system. The other big exception to the general trend was the Communist countries where public transport was encouraged over private automobiles for a range of reasons. But even in many of the ex-USSR countries, there has been a similar trend of streetcar infrastructure wearing out and getting abandoned rather than replaced.

<comment><AUTHOR> UK was a financial wreck at the end of the war, yet still fully committed to internal combustion. We did irreparable damage to the rail network, abolished all tram networks except one, and built huge car-centered networks (spaghetti junction in Birmingham being the most people unfriendly example I know of, especially the residential streets in the shadow of the raised roadways).

All it took was a look across the sea to the Netherlands we'd see integrated bus/rail/tram terminals and some degree of planning and intelligence still being applied to transport. We got to sit breathing traffic fumes.

That makes me think it was more about politics and policies than money.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> The big mistake was in assuming a public transport system could be profitable. Almost none are. Many of the best public transport systems in the world barely scrape by and are continually at risk of collapse. The benefits to businesses, improved mental health of passengers, reduction in pollution and traffic are all external benefits to the community which are not accounted for in the transportation systems budget. Some governments recognize this and so continue to subsidize their transportation systems. Countries like the US which demand that _everything_ be run like a corporation will continue to fail to realize any benefit removed a step of two away from this quarter's profits.

<comment><USER6> > The benefits to businesses,

Businesses, especially consumers, are helped more by the mobility of a car than public transport

>improved mental health of passengers

1\. This is not an external benefit. This, if true, should mostly be reflected in people's willingness to take public transport. Of course, people taking public transport are in my experience usually of the most dubious mental health. So that's concerning.

> reduction in pollution and traffic

Fair points.

Traffic is by far the best case for running public transit at a loss, IMO. Though it must be weighed against spending that money on more freeways.

There are benefits, though not as many as you are listing, and we should be weary of running them at too much of a deficit.

In general the idea of running things as a business is not to say they should be run at a profit, it's to say they should be run efficiently like a free competitive market typically does.

<comment><USER7> _This is not an external benefit. This, if true, should mostly be reflected in people 's willingness to take public transport. Of course, people taking public transport are in my experience usually of the most dubious mental health. So that's concerning._

What you'll find is that people use public transit in cities where its convenience outweighs the convenience of a car. In cities where that is untrue, only those who can't afford a car use public transit.

Which is to say that public transit isn't somehow magically better than auto travel by virtue of some fixed aspect of public transit.

It's better when it's better, which may sound like a tautology, but is actually just kind of an obvious truth, evidence for which is available all over the world.

<comment><USER8> I'm not sure it's _just_ convenience but rather some combination of convenience, cost, and just preference. But your basic point stands. The vast majority of people will use public transit when it works better for them personally given their other options on a given day. This tends to most commonly occur in cities that have relatively good transit systems (for the trip in question) and congestion that makes the same trip by car relatively unpleasant/slow.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> The loss of the Pacific Electric system was tragic. LA is currently spending many billions to re-build what was lost, but we're doing a good job so far:

\- The Expo light rail line is scheduled to open 5/20\. This is the first rail line to go from downtown to the ocean since Pacific Electric.

\- The Purple line (HRT)--formerly the "subway to the sea" until budget cuts caused it to be trucated to West LA--is the first east/west fully-underground subway to go from downtown to the west side.

\- Metro's R2 plan[1] will invest $120B to construct new rail lines such as the Sepulveda Pass tunnel (bypass the infamous 405 freeway), West Hollywood light rail (one of the most walkable, transit-friendly areas in greater LA), direct rail access to LAX and more.

It's an exciting time to be an Angeleno. I have no doubt that--if these projects aren't cancelled--it will be transformational for our city.

1\. [http://thesource.metro.net/2016/03/18/metros-bold-plan-to- tr...](http://thesource.metro.net/2016/03/18/metros-bold-plan-to-transform- transportation/)

</comment><comment><USER10> One factor that this article doesn't mention is that many streetcar companies were locked into contracts that prevented them from raising fares above 5¢. National City Lines didn't come in until well after problems had already started. (Pulling that from here: [http://www.vox.com/2015/5/7/8562007/streetcar-history- demise](http://www.vox.com/2015/5/7/8562007/streetcar-history-demise) )

<comment><USER11> Was it physically easy to raise prices by a penny?

IIRC, there was an account of an issue with Coca-Cola's vending machines and them not wanting to raise prices and finding all kinds of convoluted workarounds, including asking the treasury to issue a 7.5 cent coin.

<comment><USER12> There are Coke signs attached to buildings that to this day advertise 5 cent cola.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Recently Paul Krugman in NY Times made an insightful point I think: The most efficient transportation system in the world, is the ELEVATOR.

So just build taller buildings in a small area like Manhattan, there is plenty of space up there, it is cheaper that way and no need for roads and automobiles to move from one floor to another.

Living in a city is more humanistic anyway because there are more humans around you. There is no reason not to grow food in the sky-scrapers too. The only reason it is not done more is the zoning laws, which should be changed.

<comment><USER14> We tried this - most urban centers in America are designed around elevators (and little else), and they've largely been failures that have been defined by blight, decay, and crime.

"Just build tall buildings" is a necessary but insufficient condition for an effective city. Manhattan works not just because it builds up (in fact many parts of it are limited to 6-story buildings) but because it has mastered the complexities of creating livable, workable spaces.

The other downtowns across America saw Manhattan, and took only "build tall buildings" away as a lesson, and they are for the most part deserted, ill- occupied spaces. Simple density and height is not the most important factor - it's not even among the top-10. "Manhattanization" became a dirty word across the country not because Manhattan is bad, but because so many places copied it thoughtlessly and incompetently.

A study of what makes New York City tick that examines Midtown over long- standing neighborhoods like Greenwich Village, the Upper West Side, and even more outlying ones like Harlem and Washington Heights, is doomed to fail, because you're seeing a complex, functional city and the only lesson you're seemingly taking away is "density = good", despite nearly every other urban center in the US being evidence otherwise.

tl;dr: Density is a necessary component of a functional city, but you don't need Midtown Manhattan-level density, and having density is not enough. High- density failed urban spaces are a dime a dozen.

[edit] Side note: elevators _aren 't_ actually very efficient at high density. They are _great_ for low-mid buildings because they add a lot of floor area and don't occupy much space themselves.

For very tall skyscrapers it inverts - the number of elevators needed to properly serve the building starts increasing dramatically, eating up valuable floor space. There is a level at which you _lose overall floor space_ for each floor you add to the building.

Some of the supertall skyscrapers currently in existence/being built are in fact taller than they economically should be - and this is subsidized by pride, ego, government, rich benefactors, or some combination of the above.

Tall skyscrapers make all kinds of optimizations to minimize this - destination-based elevators (where you punch in your destination before getting in) are popular, as are express elevators segmenting certain floors, but all of these grant modest gains in elevator capacity at best, and in modern times skyscraper heights are limited not by materials or architectural engineering but by this function of elevators vs. floor space.

<comment><USER3> It doesn't help that most cities outside Manhattan have parking requirements and often quite high ones, to the point where the parking for an office building takes up as much floor space as the offices themselves. And since elevators can't really transport cars very efficiently, your 100 story building will need to be surrounded by 10 10-story parking garages (or, more typically, you'll have a 30 story building with lots of surface parking around). If you factor in all the surface parking, you don't end up with very much density in the end.

<comment><USER14> > _" If you factor in all the surface parking, you don't end up with very much > density in the end."_

More important than the reduction in density (which IMO for the most is not actually particularly bad), is the disruption in the street graph that parking lots represent.

Parking lots are awful places that are psychologically destructive on top of being literally hazardous to pedestrians. A parking lot is a good way to make sure you remove any trace of pedestrian travel in the area, and they represent black holes in the street.

One thing I alluded to in the earlier post is that _graph connectivity_ is tremendously more important than density. If the street graph is disconnected (or just too difficult or hazardous to traverse), people will stop doing so, and there goes your urban life.

Small American towns (that resisted the suburban blight of the 50s) have very low density but manage to be extremely livable and functional by virtue of being well connected. Density is truly a red herring - livable, walkable spaces can be created at most densities short of completely rural.

Some New Urbanist developments have moved towards a model where the buildings directly face the street with parking lot "courtyards" in the middle - <USER2> model works. It's still heavily dependent on car culture, which is unfortunate, but is tremendous more functional than the suburban American status quo that is the opposite arrangement, where parking lots face streets and there might as well be a cavernous canyon between the sidewalk and the building (if there even is a sidewalk).

<comment><USER3> Absolutely. One thing that I've noticed personally (and that studies confirm) is that the distance I am willing to walk depends a great deal on what walking is like: whether it's interesting, safe, etc. Parking lots are thus a double whammy, because the both push actual destinations apart, and reduce the distance that people are willing to walk. And if nobody's walking anywhere anyway, why bother building tall buildings in expensive city centers instead of cheaper ones in suburban office parks?

Since you mention New Urbanism, have you heard of the Old Urbanist movement? New Urbanism is an attempt to return to 19th century American patterns, while the Old Urbanists advocate going back to an even older pattern of low-rise and mid-rise buildings on really narrow streets, which is a pattern that has worked well for millenia, and indeed still works well in places like Japan. The narrower streets mean there can be more of them for the same usage of land area, which can mean a much better connected network at a pedestrian scale.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I've just (re)watched with my sons the movie "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?".

SPOILER ALERT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

In the end, the detective said the villain must be a cartoon, because just a cartoon would have the stupid idea of replacing the efficient and cheap L.A. public transport system, and to build highways.

</comment><comment><USER16> lol.. missed a link? [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_streetcar_consp...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_streetcar_conspiracy)

</comment><comment><USER17> Modern urban planners can take a lesson from this. People abandoned light rail in Los Angeles because they preferred their cars. A car provides anytime, anywhere, personal door-to-door transportation versus the fixed-time, fixed- place, mass transit system that only takes you part way like fixed rail. Light rail will die a similar death in U.S. cities, especially when self-driving cars decrease traffic by a significant amount in the near future.

<comment><USER18> I am not sure self-driving cars will reduce traffic. My expectation is that they will increase traffic. By a lot probably. And commutes will get even longer.

<comment><USER19> You're assuming car ownership will remain in place as it is now. If vehicles are shared instead of fully owned, you can be more efficient. Think of how many trips are simply transporting a car. For example, let's say I need to pick up a friend from the airport. I would waste a one-way trip going to the airport. I didn't need to go to the airport. The only reason it was necessary for me to go is that I needed to get a car to my friend.

If my fried could have just summoned the nearest self driving car, an entire one way trip wouldn't ever occurred.

<comment><USER18> If it becomes popular to share cars then this may work. Looking at reality I have my doubts though. If people wanted to share cars you would see neighbors sharing cars for example. In the US many families or friends not even share cars. When I go out with people it ends up with seven people going in 4 cars or similar.

A self driving car takes the pain out of driving so unless society changes a lot we will see more cars driving around (often empty) and people will have longer commutes while sleeping their car.

<comment><USER20> Sharing a vehicle is not fun when the other driver could: 1. wreck it, 2. not return it promptly, 3. trash it. A self-driving car solves problem 1, partially solves 2, and does nothing for 3.

<comment><USER18> I guess a self driving shared car needs also to be self cleaning. that may work.

<comment><USER21> Put together a amalgam self-driving Sanisette [1] and you implement an even more ridiculous aspect of _Idiocracy_ than its La-Z-Boy with a built-in toilet [2]. And while I make a joke about it now, someones in the future are going to convince a line of VCs to incrementally enable people eventually gaming/Facebooking in VR while hurtling down the freeway doing Number Two, and get handsome exits on each step towards that, and it will all be counted as a net economic benefit in the end. I'm either kidding, or will have checked out well before that ever becomes mainstream.

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

[2] [http://www.eatmedaily.com/wordpress/wp- content/uploads/2009/...](http://www.eatmedaily.com/wordpress/wp- content/uploads/2009/05/idiocracy-chair1.jpg)</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Saudis suspected of phone spying campaign in US - <AUTHOR> https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/29/revealed-saudis-suspected-of-phone-spying-campaign-in-us <comment><USER2> In addition to letting you read someone's location, SS7 lets you intercept their SMS messages. This is used by, for instance, criminal groups to intercept 2fa codes or go through SMS-based password reset flows and log into peoples' bank accounts:

[https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/mbzvxv/criminals- hackers-...](https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/mbzvxv/criminals-hackers- ss7-uk-banks-metro-bank)

<comment><USER3> Almost everyone have a smartphone. Bank app is much more secure than SMS, because HTTPS allows to encrypt information all the way from bank server to the end device. It's possible to create a much more pleasant UI with single touch rather than typing that OTP. And it's even possible to create more secure solution by requiring fingerprint.

And if Apple and Google would implement some kind of universal solution, every website could utilize this technology making 2FA more secure and usable.

It's kind of strange that we're still using SMS so widely.

Also SMS is not that cheap, while push is free.

Sure, SMS is fine as a fallback option, just like voice call is fine as a fallback option for SMS, but that's about it.

<comment><USER4> Are there any US consumer bank accounts that can be configured for 2FA other than SMS?

In the brokerage space, Robinhood accepts TOTP and Fidelity accepts Symantec VIP (proprietary TOTP-alike). But I don't know of any checking or savings accounts that can be protected this way.

<comment><USER5> FYI, you can use this utility to get the Symantec TOTP code into a standard TOTP program like Authy or Google Authenticator:

[https://github.com/dlenski/python- vipaccess](https://github.com/dlenski/python-vipaccess)

<comment><USER4> Woah, interesting! I thought TOTP used a shared secret rather than asymmetric encryption. The only thing I had to give Fidelity was the credential ID. Is that enough to generate or verify codes? It does that require key material that only Symantec has?

<comment><USER5> This blog post explains how it works:

[https://www.cyrozap.com/2014/09/29/reversing-the-symantec- vi...](https://www.cyrozap.com/2014/09/29/reversing-the-symantec-vip-access- provisioning-protocol/)

But yes, the original author extracted a pair of shared secrets from the Symantec executable.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Get in line Saudis, there are a lot of people doing phone spying campaigns in the US.

</comment><comment><USER7> Looks like as long as the victims stop using their Saudi Sim cards, they won't be able to be tracked because this relies on roaming.

Saudi carriers might mysteriously offer "special exclusive roaming deals" so they can keep tracking

</comment><comment><USER8> how granular is ss7 psl data? if it's decades old i suspect it isn't gps coords or anything (not diminishing the seriousness of this; mostly curious about whether this is something the rest of us should be worrying about)

<comment><USER9> "how granular is ss7 psl data?"

It's not based on physical distance or geography - it is based on the cell "tower".

Basically, SS7 will tell you which cellular base station the mobile handset is registered on.

There are easily accessible, public lookups of the location of all of those "cell towers".

<comment><USER10> I use a micro/femto cell at home because of poor reception from the big towers. If they had access to those records, they could locate me to the street address (needed for E-911 service) now that I'm under a stay-home order.

<comment><USER11> Doesn't WiFi calling render microcells irrelevant?

<comment><USER10> Most likely. But I don't have a phone with that service, so this is what I've got. ;)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Oddly specific use-case. This only tracks the location of folks with Saudi sim-cards using roaming in the US. Even then, only down to the tower. Now that the guardian has blown the lid off, I expect this is largely worthless for them now.

</comment><comment><USER13> What is the issue here? Does the US not spy on pretty much every other country and its people?

<comment><USER14> They probably don't like that very much either.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> _Only_ the Saudis?

</comment><comment><USER16> Why the heck are the Saudi's still considered 'allies' of the US. Besides the long-running terrorism concerns, there's the murder of Khashoggi, them spying not just on their own citizens but also on US ones, and they are currently waging a war against our domestic oil producers. With 'friends' like that who needs enemies?

<comment><USER11> Because a) oil and b) Trump properties making his kids (and himself of course) billions.

<comment><USER17> The relationship with Saudi's didn't start with Trump's presidency.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Meanwhile, everyone else is tracking movements for Coronavirus, so if we get a response, I expect them to say the same thing.

<comment><USER19> It might be hard to sell the idea that you're tracking people in another country for that. The data is on a miniscule number of peope in the US and you're missing a lot of data you'd need for a reasonable analysis.

All of which is to say yeah, they're probably going to.

<comment><USER20> Is that not the point of the 5 eyes?

As long as other countries spy on our citizens, and share the data with our government, there is no problem!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> This is rather a "man bites dog" title ;)

Edit: It's also hardly worth reporting, or at least, with the sense of outrage that I get from it. I mean, anyone who cared would realize that the Saudis would track and snoop on cellphone users, no matter where they were. And so nobody who cared about that would use their Saudi phone. They'd just buy a phone at Walmart or wherever.

<comment><USER15> > _anyone who cared would realize that the Saudis would track and snoop on > cellphone users, no matter where they were. And so nobody who cared about > that would use their Saudi phone. They 'd just buy a phone at Walmart or > wherever._

That's a very victim blame-y take.

Most people are not HN readers and have no idea what SS7 is.

Even if they know about cell tower tracking they'd probably expect that info would not be handed over by the USA to KSA.

<comment><USER21> OK, so I'm not Saudi, and perhaps I'm way off base here. But I find it hard to imagine that Saudis -- or at least Saudis who'd be traveling in the US -- wouldn't assume that their government is tracking and monitoring them. Indeed, I'd expect that awareness to be _more_ common in Saudi Arabia than in the US, because the US at least pretends to honor human rights.

Also, an expectation of surveillance doesn't depend on understanding the technology.

<comment><USER15> >OK, so I'm not Saudi, and perhaps I'm way off base here. But I find it hard to imagine that Saudis -- or at least Saudis who'd be traveling in the US -- wouldn't assume that their government is tracking and monitoring them.

Yes, "they should expect they will have their human rights violated on US soil and it's on them to buy a burner" is off base.

Anyone legally in the United States (including tourists) gets constitutional protections.

You can expect whatever you want but illegal spying on US soil by an authoritarian regime is absolutely a news story.

Every embassy is a spy outpost, but they usually leave people who aren't at least semi-public figures alone.

Then again, maybe everyone is abusing SS7 and KSA is just who got caught with their hand in the cookie jar.

<comment><USER21> > Yes, "they should expect they will have their human rights violated on US > soil and it's on them to buy a burner" is off base.

If that's the case, Saudi censorship is more effective than I'd imagined.

> Anyone legally in the United States (including tourists) gets constitutional > protections.

In theory, yes. In practice, it's prudent to assume that the NSA sees everything.

> Then again, maybe everyone is abusing SS7 and KSA is just who got caught > with their hand in the cookie jar.

That's my default assumption.

<comment><USER21> It'd be cool to know what Saudis generally believe about their government's surveillance policies. Anyone have any links?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> This isn't spying and the US would not be the only country involved.

Carriers track their own subscribers' locations no matter which network they are on. Inter-carrier roaming agreements require this ability. So it appears the Saudis has a new use for it.

The increased focus on SS7 security actually increases reliance on inter- carrier PSI. PSI is sent to the last known serving MSC to retrieve the number of minutes since last network contact. This info is used to enable a velocity check against a network attached request coming from a new country. It's this type of check that combats SMS interception.

<comment><USER23> I assume MSC is this: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_switching_centre_server](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_switching_centre_server).

What is PSI? Edit: thanks!

<comment><USER24> From the article: "Provide Subscriber Information SS7 message"</comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: $PS1 Bash Prompt Generator and Reference - <AUTHOR> http://omar.github.com/ps1gen

<comment><AUTHOR> The issue with the color drop down has been fixed.</comment>


World's largest model railway exhibit in a Google Street View - <AUTHOR> http://www.google.com/maps/about/behind-the-scenes/streetview/treks/miniatur-wunderland/ <comment><AUTHOR> Google in cooperation with Ubilabs created a Google Street View experience of the world's largest model railway exhibit, the Hamburg Miniatur Wunderland.</comment>


Ask HN: Please review my startup, CashBase (personal finances) - <AUTHOR>

http://www.cashbasehq.com
CashBase is a personal finance app for people who hate personal finance apps.
It's a side-project, started as a web application, but since December we have an iPhone app and the Android app is on it's way, ETA 1 month.
We launched it (almost completely) silently in June 2010 and now have over 2,000 users. The app is completely free (web + iPhone) because we have yet to find a good business model. But we're using this time to improve the product, connect with our users and figure out how to make money.
What features do you consider would be worth having in a Premium paid subscription and for how much (per month)?
We'd love to find out what you think about CashBase!
Thanks :). <comment><USER2> Would there be a way to connect with a bank account (that way transactions would be added automatically).

I don't know if banks allow you into that or not for security purposes.

Nice design, and love the video. The ease of use seems to be key with the service.

<comment><AUTHOR> Yes, there is, through the same 3rd-party service that Mint and InDinero use: Yodlee.com. However, they have a high set up fee and we're not willing to make that investment, yet. Until we do, we'll soon let users import bank statements exported from their existing internet banking apps.

We're focusing on making data-entry as painless as possible, indeed.

Thanks!

<comment><USER3> or you could just talk OFX directly to the bank sites like ms money, quicken/quickbooks, and ibank do. it's what i'm doing for corduroy (<http://corduroysite.com/>).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Clickable: <http://www.cashbasehq.com></comment>


How to Review a Novel - <AUTHOR> https://lithub.com/how-to-review-a-novel/ <comment><USER2> One of my favorites is Stephen King's NYT review of Donna Tartt's 'The Goldfinch': [https://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/13/books/review/donna- tartts...](https://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/13/books/review/donna-tartts- goldfinch.html)

<comment><USER3> I like his Harry Potter review: [https://ew.com/article/2007/08/10/stephen- king-last-word-har...](https://ew.com/article/2007/08/10/stephen-king-last- word-harry-potter/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Since I'm not a novelist, professional critic, or a great writer, I can't do any of these things. When I try, it comes off as forced, at best. Instead, if I write a review, I just try to say in plain English what about the book appealed to me, if I liked it, or what didn't work for me, if I didn't.

</comment><comment><USER5> If amazon is any indication, this is how you review a novel:

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

1 star!

Worst vacuum cleaner ever. Wouldn't get dirt out of anything

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

3 stars

Insert in depth literary analysis commenting on grammar, boring plot, and flat characterization.

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

5 stars!

Kindly find book is best book every!

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

<comment><USER6> Have you seen Hudson Hongo's _Least Helpful_ site? Features the worst/funniest Amazon reviews. (He's the guy behind _Literally Unbelievable_ , about people online who think _Onion_ headlines are real)

[https://leasthelpful.tumblr.com/](https://leasthelpful.tumblr.com/)

[https://literallyunbelievable.tumblr.com/](https://literallyunbelievable.tumblr.com/)</comment></comment>


My year of buying nothing – six months in - <AUTHOR> http://www.theguardian.com/money/2016/jun/02/my-year-of-buying-nothing-six-months-in <comment><USER2> Isn't this the classic _first world problem_? I stopped reading at _only spending on food and bills_ b/c I see no challenge since that is how millions live for decades, not a mere half a year.

<comment><USER3> Yeah, presumably "bills" is a nice, vague term for anything that would actually change her life, like medical stuff and climate control. Sounds like she's only cutting out optional expenses.

I guess going vegan and/or gluten-free isn't cool anymore. Now you need a different reason to tell everyone you're better than them in some way that only matters to you.

<comment><USER4> Why the cynicism? I don't get a "holier than thou" vibe from this article at all. To me, it reads as a simple progress report about one person's trial in embracing something other than consumerism to fill emptiness. I think this individual should be congratulated for even trying.

<comment><USER3> Okay, I re-read it and the cynicism must have been a reaction to the self- aggrandizing click-bait nonsense. I got nerd sniped when I started pondering the challenge of going a whole year without buying anything. Like, maybe you grow your own food and sleep on couches?

I went from "this person wants to share what they learned" to "this person is using gimmicks to get my attention". Kind of like how people will want to talk about being vegan or gluten-free but I quickly realize they don't know what amino acids or Celiac disease are.

So, literally "cynicism" as in "distrusting or disparaging the motives of others". If the article lead with something like "how it feels to go 6 months without spending money on entertainment" I wouldn't doubt her motives.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: Anyone running a SaaS based on machine learning? - <AUTHOR> <comment><USER2> Im trying, is a service for acounting people we get data from the local IRS then we use machine learning to predict the best way to classify it and type it again on the original system but already classified.

</comment><comment><USER3> We're using some ML for our cloud security platform.

</comment><comment><USER4> "simplify user analysis, engagement, retention and support" We are a product development company which has worked on several projects in the last 5 years. We have built both internal products and helped other entrepreneurs with their prototype and MVP development. Even though these projects varied across industries and geographies, the one common pain we noticed was with user interaction, engagement and support tools and the lack of integration. Hence we decided to build one ourselves.

[http://interakt.co/](http://interakt.co/)

Our goal is to build a product which allows web and mobile app builders to communicate with their users in a seamless way across different channels and for different purposes. We hope that through this vision we can help you understand your users, communicate with them more effectively and retain them for a longer time.</comment>


Ask PG: Bug or not? - <AUTHOR>

Ran into an interesting situation earlier today with points and comments:
http://1.media.tumblr.com/UC8UYzO4Ojesg36wKZujzL94o1_250.png
It seems that a certain post was rapidly upvoted then downvoted -- which then resulted in it being ranked higher than some positive comments (ignore that pun).
Looking around, I couldn't find the link for reporting bugs, and I assumed I shouldn't send this to the ycombinator info email address.
Thoughts anyone? <comment><USER2> Posts are ordered by a function of both time and points, so they won't always be in point-based order.

<comment><AUTHOR> Yea, that's how it is. But is that how it should be?

It seems plausible to me for net positive comments to be ranked vs each other in that manner and net negative comments be ranked separately, such that positive is always shown higher than negative.</comment></comment>


What Will Future Generations Condemn Us For? - <AUTHOR> http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/09/24/AR2010092404113.html

<comment><USER2> I'd guess the fact that education (giving back to society) has fallen prey to acquisition (taking from society) - in terms of priority, anyhow.

Don't get me wrong here. I'm all for making money with crazy business ideas, but it's important to make sure that we're giving back; we need to make sure that future generations have a foundation upon which they can build, not just survive.

A net positive for society - not just your bottom line - is pretty damned important.

</idealism off>

</comment><comment><USER3> For being greedy consumers. Using up the mineral, natural and other self sustaining resources at a tremendous pace and asking them to find a solution for the environmental problems we created and are unable to solve.</comment>


Excelize: Golang library for reading and writing XLSX files - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/Luxurioust/excelize <comment><USER2> The example code (both examples actually) should return after printing the error. Sorry, had to be that guy.

</comment><comment><USER3> Was this posted by the author?

<comment><AUTHOR> No. I've used this yesterday and it was very useful for what I was doing. Thought it would be of interest to others.</comment></comment>


Google mails 2D barcodes to local businesses - <AUTHOR> http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/12/06/google-local-maps-qr-code/

<comment><USER2> It remains unclear if businesses will be that enamoured with giving Google further control of their "message" at this point of engagement.

Would I rather a potential customer typed in my URL and got my "story" or would I let them scan a QRcode that takes them to Google and its links to reviews, competitors etc?

Might businesses also have legitmiate concerns that this is Google getting even more information about the customers (and that this might become yet another Google revenue stream down the track)?

<comment><USER3> I actually think Google gives businesses control of their "message".

Businesses can claim their identity at Google and modify information about them (hours, phone # etc.) I don't think you can control what reviews appear though.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> QRcodes (and the wide variety of barcode scanning products) never reached critical mass: \- it wasn't worth it for individuals to learn how to use it unless there were businesses that had them, \- it wasn't worth it for businesses to install them unless individuals knew how to use them.

Google might just have broken that barrier by mailing out 150,000 QRcodes.

</comment><comment><USER4> This is interesting, because Google has actually barcoded the business establishment. Just like RedLaser scans a product's barcode and gives you a breakdown of prices around you, you could potentially "scan" the business and get reviews, prices and alternatives.

</comment><comment><USER5> This reminds me of the "Q-Cat" bar code readers some magazines mailed out in the late 90's. Those never went anywhere, any reason why this will be different because it is on a mobile phone?

<comment><USER6> Them being on a mobile phone takes out at least the bad point of Q-Cats, which was the need for an extra device. While I don't fully understand the appeal of these codes (it's not particularly difficult to just google for the restaurant, instead of scanning its code), they are already popular in Japan.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> hmmm maybe some day google will pay for me to tattoo a bar code on my arm so if i'm at a bar a girl can scan me and find out all my dating statistics. Could link it to my facebook/twitter/linked in. :)</comment>


GitX: Git GUI for OS X - <AUTHOR> http://gitx.frim.nl/ <comment><USER2> GitX is just awesome, and getting better every day. You can currently stage and commit changes using the app, among other things (check out the 'committing' and 'advanced' screencasts on <http://gitx.frim.nl/seeit.html>).

Best of all: it's open source and makes great use of HTML & JavaScript. Even if you don't know ObjC, you can contribute.

</comment><comment><USER3> See also GitNub: <http://github.com/Caged/gitnub/wikis>

</comment><comment><USER4> I'd like to see Versions <http://www.versionsapp.com/> for Git.

<comment><USER5> I'd like to see Cornerstone <http://www.zennaware.com/> for Git. :)

<comment><USER6> Dammit, now I do too! I almost want to buy that app and I don't even use Subversion...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I am trying out Git for a new project and I think we are going to end up going back to SVN.

Problems:

There is no support user based auth, so you have to set up SSH keys. Pain for our non-techies in the group. You should be able to add users and get access via user/pw/repo url.

Bigger problem is the lack of Windows support. We have 2 people (the non- techies) on Windows and expecting them to learn the command line stuff isn't realistic.

<comment><USER8> If I could, I'd like to suggest using Mercurial instead. It is vastly better supported on Windows, has a simpler workflow, and allows HTTP-based authentication--no SSH keys required. Plus, if you really need git-like flexibility--rebasing and whatnot--it's there in the form of Mercurial patch queues.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> <http://gitabulous.com/> is supposed to be nice and sexy.

I've asked to be reminded but I've heard nothing so far.

<comment><USER10> there was a lack of interest in this and the open source gitx proved to be hard to compete against.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> I love GitX. While I'm developing I leave it up alongside Eclipse, and I actually like having a separate interface to my source control outside the IDE.

</comment><comment><USER12> Does it have problems with large repositories? It seemed to hang, and when I tried restarting it it just crashed.

</comment><comment><USER13> Is there a nice looking git client for windows?

<comment><USER7> nope. they are working on cheetah (like tortoise for SVN), but best I can tell it hasn't gone anywhere:

<http://repo.or.cz/w/git-cheetah.git/>

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> What do you need a GUI for?

<comment><USER15> I think that about Subversion, which is really just a versioned filesystem; the git command line is pretty complicated though.

<comment><USER16> I don't know if the _versioned filesystem_ metaphor fits Subversion that well -- clients do not store history after all. It is usually what Git evangelists praise about their software; you can use Git as a simple versioned file system if you wish (git add/commit/log and you're all set).

<comment><USER15> Subversion is literally a filesystem; that is all it is. Most of Subversion's problems come from the fact that the metaphor doesn't fit the task very well.

The fact that Git clients store full histories is one of the things that makes it _less_ like a filesystem; it is, instead, a system for managing overlapping patch streams.

Check out the core svn C APIs (nb: our product is built on them); it's basically an open/close/read/write/readdir system with one additional "history" option (which history snapshots an _entire filesystem_ , not just individual files (like CVS) or patches (like git).</comment></comment></comment></comment>


iTunes, app store and iTunes connect experiencing problems - <AUTHOR> http://thenextweb.com/apple/2015/03/11/the-apple-app-store-is-having-problems-and-itunes-connect-is-down/

<comment><USER2> What is the point of a status page if it doesn't display the status? Perhaps they are evaluating the status of their systems internally. Just wow.

[http://www.apple.com/support/systemstatus/](http://www.apple.com/support/systemstatus/)

</comment><comment><USER3> This matters a lot more to me due to Mac App Store now being down, with an important security update pending, than the iTunes Store itself.</comment>


Apollo 11: Four lesser-known facts - <AUTHOR> https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-48907836 <comment><USER2> About "Hidden Figures": It's worth reading the book: Quite a detailled history lesson!

</comment><comment><USER3> The podcast 13 Minutes to the Moon is full of details about the moon landing:

[https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/w13xttx2](https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/w13xttx2)

</comment><comment><USER4> The video of James Burke in the capsule was great. He could explain things to me any day.

I'm Canadian. When I was a kid we got reruns of Connections on TLC before it was a reality TV network. That was possibly the most informative TV show I've ever watched. When my kids start hitting the middle school science age I think we're going to marathon it.</comment>


Fire and Motion - Leadership Strategies - Joel on Software - <AUTHOR> http://www.inc.com/magazine/20080401/how-hard-could-it-be-fire-and-motion.html?partner=fogcreek <comment><USER2> I think he is slowly working out Boyd's OODA loop (Orient, Observe, Decide, Act) which says that a faster decision cycle in a competitive situation will allow you to outperform your competitor. Fire and Maneuver are two types of action, but I think he misses one of the key challenges most startups face: they are in a battle of maneuver. They have to substitute agility for mass in taking on more established competitors. See <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OODA_Loop>

<comment><USER3> Fortunately for startups,

      E = 1/2 mv^2

So, your energy rises with the square of your velocity, while the incumbent competition only rises linearly with their mass.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Google Docs = Fire and Motion.

I don't think Google cares much whether or not Google Docs ever replaces most MS Office installations. But it forces Microsoft to respond and protect their core business, and not focus on competing with Google in the markets Google actually cares about.

Meanwhile, Microsoft disparately tries to get Yahoo, just to stay far behind Google in advertising, but maybe less far behind than they are now (see McDonald's trying to make Starbucks style coffee in the article).

</comment><comment><USER5> Old but still very true</comment>


Bloomberg mistakenly publishes obit for Apple CEO Steve Jobs - Atlanta Business Chronicle: - <AUTHOR> http://www.bizjournals.com/atlanta/stories/2008/08/25/daily73.html <comment><USER2> You could make good money owning a news company by manipulating stock prices like this

<comment><USER3> Until you went to jail.

<comment><USER2> Is it illegal? As far as I understand it's the business model for Mark Cuban's sharesleuth.com (although he fully discloses that's what he does)

<comment><USER3> They're investing based on true information they find out about fraud, not spreading misinformation to manipulate the market.

"We're looking for companies that were built for fraud, for executives who are enriching themselves at shareholder expense, and for businesses whose behavior runs counter to their stated objectives or to the public interest."

"In certain instances, the majority partner of Sharesleuth.com is going to make personal investments based on information we uncover. Those investments will be fully disclosed, so that readers can evaluate any potential conflicts of interest.The reporters and editors , however, will maintain policies of not holding individual securities, and we will report Sharesleuth.com stories no differently than we have others throughout our careers. "

<comment><USER2> Even if you restrict yourself to true information, there is still a ton of space to manipulate stock prices. A good writer can make a company look brilliant or like a loser using the same set of true facts.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Apple's Self-Destructive Qualcomm, China Strategies - <AUTHOR> https://www.technewsworld.com/story/85740.html <comment><USER2> > It's because Apple uses a lock-in strategy, where once on an Apple platform > it is painful to get off. Most of the smart Apple iPhone users I know > actually use Google apps and Google's infrastructure and other third-party > tools on their iPhones, so if they want to move to an Android phone they can > move almost seamlessly.

...what? Sentence 1, "once on Apple it's painful to get off." The _very next sentence_ , the author says that most iPhone people he knows could move to Android almost seamlessly. That doesn't sound like it's that painful to get off.

Look, if you're going to contradict yourself, _fine_ , just... put a few sentences in between first.

<comment><AUTHOR> I'm glad others found this post so weird, happened to follow some links and found it, felt like I really fell into the rabbithole. I thought it was translated from some other language but I'm not a native English speaker myself so.

<comment><USER2> > I thought it was translated from some other language but I'm not a native > English speaker myself so.

Nah, turns out it was written by Rob Enderle. He's been writing really bad tech articles for... a while.

Because you're right, it really was bizarre.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> There are a lot of words here with not much sense. This isn't just Apple v Qualcomm. Four of the major tech manufacturers (Hon Hai Precision Industry, Pegatron, Wistron, and Compal) are also suing [0] Qualcomm for $9 billion, which may be tripled to $27 billion.

"The group's complaint is that Qualcomm charges for chips used in manufacturing, but then requires a patent royalty on top, which the firms believe is an anticompetitive business practice. While the firms collectively demand $9 billion from Qualcomm in damages if the payments are deemed illegal, there is also a possibility of the figure tripling if antitrust claims in the suit also succeed."

[0] [https://appleinsider.com/articles/18/12/17/apple- manufacture...](https://appleinsider.com/articles/18/12/17/apple-manufacturer- foxconn-not-negotiating-with-qualcomm-over-9b-royalties-dispute)

</comment><comment><USER4> Former industry analyst here. The article felt like a poorly written businesses school assignment. Then I checked the author and it made sense. Enderle is a click-baiting joke. Moving on.

</comment><comment><USER5> What a weird post

<comment><USER6> This. Since this article [https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/21/technology/definers- publi...](https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/21/technology/definers-public- affairs-tim-miller.html) I'm really cautious about what I read on this kerfuffle. I remember few months ago before knowing there was an ongoing PR campaign suddenly observing some articles moaning about the lack of speed of baseband chips used in iphones and the superiority of Qualcomm's ones.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> The incidental quips about President Trump were so bizarre and forced I thought the article was generated by a bot.</comment>


The Insurance Market Mystifies an Airbnb Host - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/20/your-money/the-insurance-market-mystifies-an-airbnb-host.html?_r=0 <comment><USER2> _Ms. Pfeffer eventually found a solution, but it wasn't easy. And this is mostly the fault of the insurance industry, which doesn't always want to answer questions about this sort of activity, whose agents aren't always as knowledgeable as they should be and whose own policy language can be incredibly confusing._

This isn't the "fault" of the insurance industry. Homeowners insurance policies mitigate the standard risks of residences. They don't cover hotels, which have _wildly_ different risks due in part to the radically different incentives and risk tolerances of hotel room occupants.

This whole article is premised on the idea that it shouldn't be hard to figure out which homeowner's policies can be abused to cover ad-hoc hotel businesses. I'm alarmed that there are policies that _do_ work that way; if I were a Liberty Mutual customer, I'd be painfully aware that my premiums took into account the idea that I might rent out my own house that way.

I sort of adore Airbnb and have never had a bad experience with it, but everyone in the Airbnb ecosystem appears to be relying on denial in one way or another.

<comment><USER3> 1) Insurance companies mitigate a lot of risks that are a lot rarer. It's pretty common to do a short-term rental, rent out a room to a roommate. Doing the occasional Airbnb rental is essentially the same thing.

2) Insurance companies should have a straightforward answer to a reasonable question. Not covered, covered if rental income < $15,000 , needs a rider, etc. Of course, at some point you're operating a B&B and you need to get commercial insurance, and they should be able to tell you at what point it would be considered a business.

3) If Airbnb's secondary coverage is predicated on a primary coverage that is not standard or impossible to get, then yeah, it's denial. If it's predicated on a normal homeowner's liability policy with a standard rider, seems pretty reasonable. Maybe I'm missing something.

4) If the liability is hard to predict now that Airbnb is as big as it is, there probably haven't been that many claims.

<comment><USER4> The commonality of a short-term rental isn't the issue. What matters is that the liability changes massively as soon as you charge someone money to come into your home, rather than inviting them as your guest.

<comment><USER3> My takeaway from the article is

\- State Farm is a mass-market company - no Airbnb

\- Chubb is an upmarket company - $15k revenue limit

\- Liberty Mutual is a mass-market company - 'occasional' rental, cannot be 'engaged in business' \- rather vague

Problem is the vagueness, and the Chubb and Liberty Mutual agents contradict the firm's spokespeople, which is kind of their fault. They should get it together when it comes to Airbnb. Pretty common, easily insurable use case with a known claim history.

Of course, if you want to run a hotel business, you need a commercial policy, and many if not the vast majority of Airbnb-ers skirt the rules.

So yeah, when you do that, there is a massive change in liability, and yeah, if you don't get the right insurance there's denial.

If somebody trips and falls and sues you, or burns down your place, and the insurance company says you were running a hotel business and denies your homeowner's claim, you're screwed. I don't know what Airbnb's umbrella does for you then.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> This is not too surprising for people who are in the short-term / vacation rental market. If you regularly rent out your property short-term (when I lived in Santa Cruz, CA, a lot of people did), whether it's as a B&B, whole- property rental, boarding house, or anything similar, you typically need a completely different kind of insurance from regular homeowner's insurance. They exist, but are more expensive (unsurprisingly, since the risk of payout on the insurer's part is also higher).

The tricky thing with AirBnB, I think, is that a lot of people are in that market, but don't view themselves as "really" being in it. Even some people who are for all practical purposes running a full-time B&B don't see themselves as doing so, so they don't know about some of the standard stuff you have to do to safely operate in such a market.

<comment><USER6> i wonder if AirBnB could suddenly find themselves in the lucrative insurance business? Or maybe this aspect would be a big turn off point for renters.

<comment><USER7> Not very likely. Insurance is a highly regulated business (at the state level, in the U.S.), and insurers need to satisfy regulators that they have the capital reserves to cover their customers' claims. It's not something that a small company can easily do.

<comment><USER5> I could see AirBnB reselling someone else's insurance perhaps. I agree it's less likely they'd run the actual insurance business themselves. Besides the capital and compliance parts, property insurance is also fairly labor- intensive, requiring a large organization to do it on a national basis (let alone international). Claims investigation is pretty fact-specific, requiring you to have staff on the ground more or less everywhere you sell insurance, who are able to interface with police departments, inspect properties, investigate fraud, litigate claims, etc. (And if you skimp on the claims investigation bit, you'll get eaten alive by scammers with false insurance claims.)

<comment><USER8> > I could see AirBnB reselling someone else's insurance perhaps.

If AirBnB and Uber want to "go legit," this would be a good way to do it: bargain with insurers for a discounted group rate, then require their "contractors" (i.e. employees) to be properly insured. They could even do the research on homeowner's insurance themselves, and make it nearly painless for employees to make sure they're obeying the law.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I bet the reason is that _most_ airbnb hosts haven't been checking or asking for riders, since they're violating local ordinances anyway, and riding in a rather grey area. The risk is small, so most have just been eating it. So who _has_ been checking?

People who have had repeated problems that have some specific ongoing source or reason due to something about their property or the way they conduct themselves. If so, these people are certainly about to file a claim. This means this is a terribly toxic pool of people, i.e. not the whole airbnb community. _if_ this is true, airbnb has a really easy solution: just offer its entire customer base to an insurer, which solves the problem that most of its customers haven't been signing up for special coverage.

This is actually close to what it's doing, though with the difference is that it sounds like it's being white-labelled. Maybe there is no national insurance company that can accept every airbnb in every market, which is why airbnb doesn't use the name of one for its own program.

</comment><comment><USER10> It seems like an enterprising insurance agent who understood this issue could do _brisk_ business in writing new insurance policies by papering the town with postcards saying some variant of "Don't want your homeowner's insurance policy cancelled for using Airbnb? Give us a call -- we'll introduce you to a more appropriate policy."

If you wanted to pitch a company on something you could build for them, the above activity suggests a fairly straightforward one-day consulting engagement which you could credibly promise as being worth thousands of dollars.

<comment><USER11> I have less confidence that renter understand their needs. Getting "AirBnb" marketed insurance would be an uphill battle of mind share. Too much of the AirBnb competitive advantage is based on avoiding legitimate business expenses, like hotel taxes and liabilities.

It would require a high profile case of an uninsured renter losing big on a civil lawsuit to change renter's approach. Too many think they are not businesses. They do not understand they've left the warm and safe world of coddled house owners and entered the cold and uncertain land of liability and responsibility. This is no longer the land of mortgage subsidies, mortgage issuance.

These renters are often pathological customers for their suppliers. People who've rented an apartment and are sub-leasing to strangers. Utility customers not paying commercial rates for garbage collection. They are re-selling residential internet against TOS. Just about ever form of price discrimination businesses have setup to favour home owners is getting abused in Airbnb hotels.

Airbnb renters are going to need convincing before they increase their cost basis.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> So insurance companies don't like it when someone carries out commercial activities (with increased risk) on a residential policy...

Makes sense. To be fair, (in theory at least), the increased risk is spread among the remaining residential insurance payers who are not engaging in commercial activity. So once again, (as with taxation), borderline legal, er, I mean "innovative sharing" activity is imposing a financial cost on the rest of society.

</comment><comment><USER13> This pattern seems to be quite common today:

Entrenched interests refuse to budge on issues related to evolving markets. Smaller, more nimble, more open-minded companies see opportunity and take market share. Eventually entrenched interests either lose market share (no longer as entrenched as they once were) or they catch up.

</comment><comment><USER14> My insurer (Amica) was very easy to work with on this matter.

<comment><USER15> Easy? How?

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Home and car sharing are with us now so the insurance companies will need to adapt or get steamrolled.

<comment><USER4> Get steamrolled by who? Insurers are in the business of mitigating risk by paying out on unforeseeable losses. There are more than enough people who purchase private non-commercial insurance for them to make a profit, why should they or the insurance companies' shareholders subsidize the people who want to engage in commercial activity but don't want to pay the costs of doing things to commercial standards? You don't get isnurance because of the low risk of bad things happening, you get it because of the potential liabilites on the rare occasions when they do.

Say someone is at an AirBnB, falls down the stairs, breaks his/her neck, and is paralyzed. AirBnB's million dollars of coverage may not be enough to meet the medical costs of such an injury, to say nothing of other damages. So the injured party's lawyer and/or medical insurers will go after the host's homeowner's insurance or else after the host's property or income stream.

Hotels aren't expensive because all hotel owners are greedy people intent on bleeding their customers dry (although such owners exist); to a large extent they reflect the significant costs of doing business.

<comment><USER16> By insurers who accommodate these customers, who are already a large and growing set.

<comment><USER17> There are insurers who accommodate these customers - lots of them: who do you think is insuring hotels and regular Bed and Breakfasts? The problem, as ever, is people wanting the benefit of commercial use insurance without the pain of paying commercial use insurance rates.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


OkCupid's CEO Donated to an Anti-Gay Campaign Once, Too - <AUTHOR> http://m.motherjones.com/mojo/2014/04/okcupid-ceo-donate-anti-gay-firefox

<comment><USER2> This title is disingenuous. He donated to a candidate, and responded with the following statement in less then 24 hours.

"decade ago, I made a contribution to Representative Chris Cannon because he was the ranking Republican on the House subcommittee that oversaw the Internet and Intellectual Property, matters important to my business and our industry. I accept responsibility for not knowing where he stood on gay rights in particular; I unequivocally support marriage equality and I would not make that contribution again today. However, a contribution made to a candidate with views on hundreds of issues has no equivalence to a contribution supporting Prop. 8, a single issue that has no purpose other than to affirmatively prohibit gay marriage, which I believe is a basic civil right."

<comment><USER3> > During his time as congressman from 1997 to 2009, Cannon voted for a > constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage, against a ban on sexual- > orientation based job discrimination, and for prohibition of gay adoptions.

The Congressman Cannon took a strong anti-gay stance & supported legislation allowing job discrimination against homosexuals. The title seems accurate.

> However, a contribution made to a candidate with views on hundreds of issues

Obviously the rights of homosexuals was not that important to Yagan.

<comment><USER4> Donating to a congressman who took a strong anti-gay stance is hardly the same as "donating to an anti-gay campaign".

<comment><USER3> It's pretty similar. Actually, it's worse since the congressman is a lawmaker that can influence other lawmakers with his agenda & draft bills. Yagan is also rewarding the Cannon for his stance on the issues.

<comment><USER2> "Rewarding" instead of "Rewarded" implies that he's continuing to do so. He stated pretty clearly that he wouldn't make the donation again.

And donating to support a specific law is definitely worse then supporting a law maker more generally.

<comment><USER3> Whatever. These witchhunts are distasteful & hypocritical. Bleh!

Then again, I've always been a fan of Jesus' saying "let him who is without sin cast the first stone". Oops, I can't say Jesus, or "him", because it's against the new "progressive" order. I fear I will soon have angry atheists & feminists demanding that I step down from my job for uttering a religious phrase. Infringing on the atheists' human right to be free of religion & feminists' human right to be free of the patriarchy & "rape culture". Does this make me look like a bigot? Please, I want to hold on to my "privilege, not right", to have a job.

It's like modern "civil rights movements", "progressive movements", blah blah blah, are corrupted to be the new oppressors and promoting new speak. It's really sad :-( MLK & Ghandi would be sad.

Feminism has been preaching sexism for a long time. Their tactic of demonizing anybody who dares to disagree with them are well known and advanced. It sucks to be a heterosexual male in America. I can't step outside without getting accused of "promoting rape culture". I hear that will soon become "hate speech" with jail time. I don't want to get married. I don't want to live with a woman in america. I already got screwed with that nonsense. My only choices are to grow a mangina or be gay :-P

Anyways, I guess the "Gay rights" movement has a template to follow. So all of you can feel better for judging others who are less "progressive" than you. I wonder if there will be a progressive 1%, because the progressive middle class is getting hollowed out.

That's ok I guess. All good things get tired and must end. Franchises & knock offs happen. The quality gets diluted. There will be a new revolution to move us forward.

\---

Btw, did you know that Jesus was really a feminist who died to save us from the patriarchy? j/k

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Without commenting on the overall debate, I think this nails the issue with the article:

> However, a contribution made to a candidate with views on hundreds of issues > has no equivalence to a contribution supporting Prop. 8, a single issue that > has no purpose other than to affirmatively prohibit gay marriage, which I > believe is a basic civil right.

</comment><comment><USER6> I find this to be another instance of "That's not quite what happened" when comparing a Mother Jones headline and the article.

</comment><comment> mkr-hn I'm upvoting this for the quote they added at the bottom. Brendan Eich was completely silent about his donation, so people made up their own minds about his current views. This is fundamentally different since Sam Yagan expanded on why he donated and what his current views are.

</comment><comment><USER4> article was sensationalistic (not shocking out of motherjones) and erroneous. please don't turn HN into reddit.

<comment><USER3> The whole Eich scandal was also sensationalistic. That's the problem with being judgmental. Often times the judgmental people are being hypocritical.

<comment><USER7> In addition, it came off as a politically-manufactured "moral panic" more than anything. [0,1] The gay friends I polled were like "meh."

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

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

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> So what was the point of OKCupid's boycott of Mozilla again?

<comment><USER7> Headline$.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Yay! More witch hunting.

/s

<comment><USER7> I think we need a witch hunting API, that way mob violence can be faster and more efficient so as to preclude any sort of defense.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> lets create a big internet shitstorm and make him resign. sad case about what happened to the Mozilla ex-CEO.

</comment><comment><USER11> Off with his head!!</comment>


The most amazing natural arrow in neg space – photo is Not edited - <AUTHOR> https://scontent-lax3-1.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-xfp1/t31.0-8/12418910_10103716194877567_4797997363792666329_o.jpg <comment><AUTHOR> you see the arrow right side center? It's like the fedex logo. it's amazing and occurred in real life, no image editing.</comment>


Ask HN: What problems need to be solved for mobile? - <AUTHOR>

Greetings,<p>Lets face it, mobile is the way forward and I feel as a developer that is the way to go. Instead of App development, I am considering offering some kind of service to mobile developers and users. People say build solutions not ideas, can you guys think of current problems with mobile? :) <comment><USER2> Privacy. The combination of a distracted user and a small screen make communicating privacy choices really difficult on mobile platforms (phones and tablets). In addition with the ability for apps to do things like potentially log communications (voice and text) and geographic location developers need to careful about the collection and protection of the personal information they are collecting.

Privacy laws are pretty lax in the US but in Europe, Canada and much of Asia the story is different.

A service that can handle "privacy" would be very valuable and would probable get support from regulatory agencies around the world.

<comment><USER3> I second this and want to expand upon the issue of "privacy" to include the ability to send and receive payments with complete anonymity.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Take every service that is on the web and give it a try on mobile. Close to all of them don't work for mobile.

Most products are build for the web and then ported to mobile. I believe to be successful on mobile you have to think mobile first. Example: Web forms and surveys. There are services like Wufoo that build a great web product, but on mobile it sucks. We have a mobile app and close to all our users use this as their only computer. There is no service for great forms that we just can use.

This is the case for many other products.

These are my thought beside the typical mobile apps. Think of existing services, but think mobile first!

</comment><comment><USER5> Problems for developers as I see it

Distribution

Data Sharing

Privacy

Offloading to the GPU

Encryption

UI/UX when delivering across differing platforms natively

Localisation, especially when you involve bi directional languages</comment>