Ask HN: Review my friend's app (launched today) - <AUTHOR> http://meetordie.com/

<comment><USER2> it is actually quite interesting, and has a strong underhanded 'lets get something done so we don't end up on meet or die'.

But what is with 'Goolah'? That is a fairly ugly mascot, and I don't think he is adding anything to the site. Maybe he should be eating money and time rather than just staring at me blankly and asking me to enter some info.

</comment><comment><USER3> I was a little bit disapointed. I thought your friend had a revolutionary take at online dating :)

</comment><comment><USER4> Changing the url allows you to see what other results people got. now that was a waste

</comment><comment><USER5> I love it! :-)</comment>


registering a new domain - how to beat squatters? - <AUTHOR>

<comment><USER2> Absolutely. If you're going to build a company on your .com domain, you want to grab it with every available TLD, and get common mis-spellings as well. It will cost a few hundred bucks, but it's worth it for peace of mind, and it's the best way to defeat squatters.

</comment><comment><USER3> I try to get .com, .org and .net and not worry about the other TLDs.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> I am registering a .com and wondering if others here register .net and .org if its available?

</comment><comment><USER4> How much is the squatter asking? If it's a couple of thousand or less it might be worth getting it off them.

</comment><comment><USER5> i sometimes register .org and .net. But I think these are overrated. everyone and their mother thinks ".com". that's it, end of story</comment>


Show HN: IPvBar is a Chrome extension that display IP and country for each tab - <AUTHOR> https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/ipvbar/copjmgogifdfjkaenpallapiidcpkjbm <comment><USER2> A problem which I see is that geolocating IPs of servers gives no real value anymore. Thru CDNs the real host is obfuscated. Services may distribute data in the backend. So the geolocating might lead unaware users to wrong conclusion like e.g. that the data is stored in a country with strong privacy standards. But in reality, just the load balancer might be in such a country.

I think it might be an interesting direction for your project to query the WHOIS data of that IP. With these data you can show in which data center the first erver is hosted. This will show to the useres the large share of pages hosted just at a few hyperscalers.</comment>


Show HN: Findsimilar.info - my weekend project - <AUTHOR> http://www.findsimilar.info/

<comment><AUTHOR> I'm often interested in buying some book, film or piece of music based on someone I already know I like. The logic goes something like – 'if I like this I will like something similar'. Now it is already fairly easy to do this online by using one of many websites providing this information but it is a distraction to do so an requires navigating away from the work I am doing engage in some website for a couple of minutes. I wanted something quick and easy that would allow me to send off a request in less than 10 seconds then get back to my work. The information is now waiting for me when I'm ready to disengage from what I'm doing.

Its also command line-esque which I prefer than clunky interfaces.

I use Tweetie for Twitter which is always open and in less than 10 seconds I can have it open with a quick command line style query written and being processed while I get back to work.

To give it a go have a look at <http://www.findsimilar.info> to see how it works and what you can search for.

</comment><comment><USER2> Cool idea. But could you make it accessible to the poor sods who don't have a twitter and don't feel like making an account just for that (like me)?

<comment><AUTHOR> ok leave it with me. Sounds like an interesting challenge.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> It'd be nice to hear how to made it, what language, any problems etc etc.

<comment><AUTHOR> Sure. It was made very quickly with PHP and AWS SDK for PHP which can be found here <http://aws.amazon.com/sdkforphp/>.

I used a cron each minute to scrape twitter and search for the tweets to the @findsimilar account. These are then stored in a MySql table. Another script then runs over them and looks for the hashtag.

At this point we search a different part of Amazon depending on what is being searched for. The results are stored again in MySql tables (one for the page, one for the Artists / authors and one for the products).

I then used wildcard DNS entry for *.findsimilar.info and the same for apache so that we can use the format xxx.findsimilar.info which will be good for seo and also easy to guess.

In essence that is it. The biggest problem I can see is when someone is an author, artist and actor. We have a namespacing problem. Perhaps I need to add xxx.findsimilar.info/actor /author /artist

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> would be great to have a web interface.. for 1. convenience and 2. privacy as i wouldn't want people that check my twitter timeline to know that i'm trying to find something similar to _fill in the gap_</comment>


Weebly (YC 07) Launches Whitelabel Platform for Designers - <AUTHOR> http://blog.designers.weebly.com/1/post/2011/08/introducing-the-weebly-designer-platform.html

<comment><USER2> Weebly is _the_ most under hyped YC company.

</comment><comment><USER3> Wow, this is pretty huge. There's a big gap between designers and developers particularly in the smb market. Youll have designers that don't know how to develop make brochure-style sites that business owners don't know how to develop. Or you'll have developers make an editable site that looks like crap. If you want both you have to pay a lot of money.

For designers Weebly now takes the place of the developer and gives the designer the ability to make a great looking site that is easy to maintain and manage.

This is genius and is going to be very big.

<comment><USER4> Problem is some companies wants to go outside the 'template', and that's where direct manipulation gets really tricky when you got a different customer every month.

I work as a product designer for a norwegian CMS, and I would die to make it drag'n'drop direct manipulation-icious. But almost all of our BigCo customers demands solutions outside the regular blog/template, which then would give us two options.

a) Customize direct manipulation for each customer (expensive)

b) Semi-direct manipulation which launches TinyMCE and other micro controls when a users clicks a particular part of content.

<comment><USER5> You should checkout <http://www.webpop.com> (disclaimer, I'm the co-founder).

We've managed to make a dead simple on-site editing interface that works with any design, without any need to stick to any 'template'.

Our goal is to allow designers with a knowledge of HTML and CSS to make completely custom designed websites that a client can easily (and safely) keep up to date.

<comment><USER4> That's what I meant with b), which is how we do it too. But it's not the best solution, which is direct manipulation – no 'form window' to edit the content of a page.

Which, as stated, is hard when you got demanding customers with very different needs for a website.

<comment><USER5> I'm not actually convinced a) is the best solution though. For some things it is, but once you work with structured data that might show up in different places and might be displayed in different ways in those places, it's not always the best.

It works for simple pages where there's no real separation between content and design, but once you have text that's transformed to uppercase in one place because of a "text-transform: uppercase", or a long blog post that's only shown as a summary on the home page - editing directly in place becomes problematic.

<comment><USER4> Yes, but most of the time direct manipulation is king, so I hold that as the best solution.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> This looks fantastic, just what my company was looking for to quickly develop websites for the small business clients we deal with. They all want a CMS, but the value proposition just isn't there for us for a $2,000 project that requires all custom design work.

Nice work! Signed up immediately.

</comment><comment><USER7> This compelled me to play around with Weebly for the first time.

I created a quick landing page (<http://prototypecases.weebly.com/>). Easy to add built in contact forms, integration with Google's web fonts was nice, built in SEO tags to paste html. Tons of layouts to pick from and a super easy way to add images.

I was very impressed by how easy it was to put together and how fast customizing the site is. Classically, when it comes to this sort of thing, I think Wordpress but drag and drop is a very marketable feature for Weebly. I'm impressed.

I do have to note that the control panel timed out and the site displayed some sort of app disconnection error several times.

</comment><comment><USER8> "Weebly powers around 2% of sites on the web" – wow, really? I did some quick Googling, but couldn't find the survey. Someone got it handy?

<comment><AUTHOR> Here it is: [http://news.netcraft.com/archives/2011/07/08/july-2011-web-s...](http://news.netcraft.com/archives/2011/07/08/july-2011-web- server-survey.html)

<comment><USER8> Thanks David, but I actually still don't see it on there. No biggie; it's just such an impressive stat that I want to see it with my own eyes :)

<comment><AUTHOR> "In the July 2011 survey we received responses from 357,292,065 sites."

We're using the total published sites on the Weebly platform divided by that number to get our percentage of the total.

We could probably use active sites and put up a higher percentage, although that number is much harder to calculate...

<comment><USER8> Gotcha – very cool, and well done!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Seems like you've created a very polished control panel. I'm working on a wysiwyg web editor so I'm curious to know which javascript/css frameworks you've used.

<comment><AUTHOR> We started in 2006 and Prototype was the dominant framework back then, so we're still using that for the editor. Everything else is custom written.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Beautiful work guys. This going to be such a big deal.

<comment><USER11> Thanks Peter! We're stoked to have this out the door and excited by the potential.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> I'm not sure if I get the pricing right: using Weebly pro I'm paying 4,58 US$ a month max. and can use it on 10 Domains. If I use Weebly Designers I pay up to 24,95 US$ for a single domain. So the possibility for my own branding justifies a price increase of up to 50x or am I missing something?

<comment><USER13> I'm with you...with this price structure, I don't think the whitelabel upside is worth the extra cost. I'd rather create my client his/her own website in a Pro account and let them worry about the reoccurring annual fee. Plus, it appears that the designer is billed, when I'd much rather it be direct billing to the client.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> <http://www.quantcast.com/weebly.com> "Traffic data has been hidden by the owner."

Could the founders explain why it's hidden?

</comment><comment><USER15> Well done, Dave. This looks like an amazing solution for designers looking to jump right into client work, and at an incredible price point, too.

</comment><comment><USER16> the only feature i'd like to see is the ability to plug in functionality, like the ability to create your own front- or back-end plugins or an app store type of thing similar to shopify.

of course, i know that this isn't a simple request or even a likely one, as it causes all kinds of issues, but i'd start using this immediately if it were provided.

</comment><comment><USER17> Is there any plan for a designer API? I'd love to automate some of the functions on the designer platform for an idea I have.

<comment><AUTHOR> Absolutely, it's in the pipeworks!

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> This seems very similar to a product called LightCMS, which I have used before. Weebly seems to have better pricing though.

</comment><comment><USER19> Are you planning to have a market where designers can buy and sell themes/templates or even components?

</comment><comment><USER20> This is awesome! You're killing it!

</comment><comment><USER21> How does Weebly make money? I guess this Designers platform is the first step?

<comment><AUTHOR> Weebly has been profitable since 2008. We make money by selling Pro accounts and domain names.

<comment><USER21> Where are the pro accounts? I can't find a pricing page on your website (by design I assume).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> (Your 'About Us' link from the designer blog isn't working.)

<comment><AUTHOR> Whoops, thanks for the heads up. Fixed!

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> A little bit like emacs, it seems to do everything? : )

<comment><AUTHOR> I'm actually a vim user :)

So we're trying to tackle all of the hard problems with creating a website. Sometimes that means we develop very specific tools that just don't have a good solution yet, like our written-from-scratch ImagePerfect image editor.

In this case, we think designers still have it a bit rough. They end up doing a lot of things that aren't related to designing, like managing a hosting environment, or upgrading Wordpress when new vulnerabilities come out (or recovering from a hacked site). Then they have to continue doing inane little tweaks to the website on an unrealistic budget.

We're trying to make the designer's life easier with an integrated solution, and their clients happier by letting them log on and update their website themselves.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> This would have been soo helpful years ago when I started out doing web work for small businesses. Instead I used trash like webstarts.com</comment>


Localize It: PodPonics Grows High-Tech Organic Produce In Shipping Containers - <AUTHOR> http://www.fastcompany.com/1770816/how-a-former-software-engineer-is-scaling-up-the-urban-agriculture-movement <comment><USER2> The thing that gives me pause is the energy input, for air conditioning for example. You don't need AC on a patch of ground.

So the competition is between local pod growth, and no AC plus shipping for ground farming, and bad luck weather for ground farming, and not enough ground for the mouths to feed.

It looks like pod farms definitely have a place in the mix.</comment>


Tech Giants Want to Punish DMCA Takedown Abusers - <AUTHOR> https://torrentfreak.com/tech-giants-want-to-punish-dmca-takedown-abusers-150927/

<comment><USER2> These will really gonna hurt very bad those abusers. I appreciate this approach.</comment>


How I Create Websites: A Look Inside the Creative Process - <AUTHOR> http://devgrow.com/how-i-create-websites-a-look-inside-the-creative-process/

<comment><USER2>
         1. Draw some ideas out on paper, and work out the minimal viable feature set.
            I try and convince all clients to do this, that way we can get something out
            the door ASAP, and then take a breather before adding the remaining features.
            It also gives them more time to think their ideas through; the amount of
            features a client has decided against a few weeks later is pretty
            unbelievable. Before I started following the MVP way with clients, I very,
            very rarely got any requests for features to be *removed*. As a developer,
            it's just as much my job to keep the client's applications lean and
            bloat-free, as it is to actually write the code, I think.

         2. Use Balsamiq mockups to neatly replicate what I've drawn and make
            adjustments (this step could be skippable, but it only takes 10 minutes
            generally, so it's nice to have. I would get Draft for iPad or something,
            but I find it a little *too rough*, especially when working with clients.)

         3. Create the design in Photoshop, rarely pixel perfect, I just use it as a
            supped-up Balsamiq, to get a feel for the design.

         4. Create a Rails or Sinatra base, depending on the complexity of the project.
            For a Rails project, I git clone http://github.com/ashleyw/Slate

         5. Write some Cucumber features, referring to any notes or drawings I made in
            step #1

         6. Design the model structure, write some unit tests for them, and then
            implement each model until the tests pass

         7. Once I have a model basis, I move on to the controllers and views (HAML),
            going by the Cucumber features I wrote until they pass. Semantic markup is
            important here, but styling is not.

         8. Replicate the Photoshop design in CSS (or SASS)

         9. Launch

        10. Reiterate adding features which didn't fit into the initial version

</comment><comment><USER3> these are very, very broad strokes that basically anyone who has done a single freelance project would already know. is this really HN quality?

<comment><USER4> I don't know how you define "HN" quality, but at the time of writing, the submission has 35 points. The post provides a great overview of how the author consistently succeeds at freelancing jobs that I found insightful.</comment></comment>


Change Your Name, but Don't Sweat the .Com – A Response to PG's Naming Essay - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@patrickjwoods/change-your-name-but-don-t-sweat-the-com-1a9500687167

<comment><USER2> Eventually we're going to reach a stage where having the .com doesn't matter. Are we there yet? I'm not sure, but the amount of people primarily using .io domains is encouraging.

<comment><USER3> I think we are there.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Where do you look for work if you need experience? - <AUTHOR> I've done low-level network programming in C, game development with Lua, and for the past 7 months have become a Javascript/Coffeescript/Node.js web developer ~thing~ (preference for backend).
My question is this: Where do you look for work if you need experience?
I live in California about an hour by BART from San Francisco..  I have an AS in Computer Science and Computer Networking - and I am out of that community college, but haven't yet got the funds to do the university thing.  When I look at job ads I'm overwhelmed by the expectations and competition.  I feel like I don't have a chance, every firm wants the best of the best and I'm somewhere in the middle?  I apply anyway, but have only scored a handful of interviews (btw I love the people from TypeForm, very pleasant).  I guess I kinda hope that the people posting these ads realize they're expecting too much and do want you to learn some amount on the job.  I wish I could be an intern but most positions are unpaid and expect you to be a university student already.  I'm really trying to avoid working in the fast food industry..
I feel like I could be a government worker.  Somewhere you can't be fired and you have 3 decades of job security to learn one new skill and apply it (partially) before you retire on a nice pension.  Where are those jobs? :p <comment><USER2> I think you're looking at the wrong thing. You're getting interviews so you're doing something right and looking in the right place. Obviously you can find jobs to interview for and sounds like your CV is fine.

So keep at it?

You just haven't clicked with someone yet. Perhaps the questions you need to be asking is, 'how do I blow people away at interview?'.

But to answer your question, if you didn't know there's a monthly 'Ask HN: who's hiring' thread:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9812245](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9812245)

That's a list of a thousand companies that hire software developers. Plus loads more on the older threads, there's one every month.

If you're having trouble finding more jobs to apply for, you could email all the ones near you with a brief covering letter (as the body of the email) and your CV and ask whether they have any entry level positions. Bonus points for including something in the covering letter that shows you've read a bit of what they do. If you're having trouble figuring out who to email, you can phone the company and ask the secretary 'that you're looking for an entry level position and you were wondering who you would send your CV to'. They get questions like this all the time. Depending on who you are, that might be scary, but the quicker you get used to doing scary things, the more successful in life you will be.

The worst they can say is no.

In all seriousness, so many companies are constantly looking for developers but not constantly advertising. Like I went to a meetup last Thursday and a no-experience guy there got an interview from another one of the attendees, even though that's not what he came for.

Also, to follow up on that, network, go to technical meetups, talk to _everyone_ and introduce yourself. Drop in that you're looking for your first job without sounding too needy, making it the focus of the conversation or doing the whole 'I haven't got a degree' thing. Also some meetups have job announcements at the end, you can ask to be included in them, if you do ask keep it positive and short.

Finally, though it sounds like your CV is fine, get a couple of articulate people to look over your CV, especially anyone you or your parents know who works in marketing (for the presentation), recruitment (because they know what works) or IT (for the relevant experience).

<comment><AUTHOR> I really appreciate this reply, I hadn't thought about essentially cold- calling companies that need devs but aren't advertising.

My problem is I live in a small town that's really only residential and fast food - no real industry or large companies here. While I love public transit my transportation beyond that is limited (no car) -- which is why I wish I could get hired in SF, I can easily make it to that tech center. I have looked at the Who's Hiring post, but I wish I could find more companies interested in Coffeescript/JS or Lua that are willing to help with relocation - even remote work.

I have had friends look over my CV, and that was amusing - I had a section that essentially read like "He enjoys long walks on the beach and talking about American Idol". I was trying to sound more like a human than a machine. A friend rightly informed me that this sort of personality information would be best disclosed at an interview. After that I added a bit to my 'Experience' section - work that I had done for friends while acting as a system administrator. I get a little upset when I have friends who are more qualified in security fields and they get hired very easy - it seems like their resumes aren't formatted as nicely. Qualifications really do speak for themselves.

I think I'm just upset when listening to grandparents talk about how 'back in their day' they could easily go find an apprenticeship. I wish I could find the same for webdev, frontend work. I usually go to DEFCON each year if I can save for it, but I haven't had as much luck networking at that. I think most people show up to DEFCON to drink, really.. (not a bad thing)

Anyway, thank you for your kind advice, sir - I will adjust my search <3

<comment><USER2> By meetup I meant smaller ones like on meetup.com.

The meetup I was talking about only 7 of us were there. Sometimes it's 20, sometimes it's 5. Of which 2 mentioned their companies had open positions and the third gave another person at the meetup an interview (this is what I went to: [http://www.meetup.com/NottinghamProgrammers/](http://www.meetup.com/NottinghamProgrammers/)).

In Nottingham, a fairly small city, there's a different meetup every week aimed towards programmers/designers/web centric people, almost twice a week now. In SF there will be a different technical meetup twice or 3 times a day. They're social things as well as technical talks.

Also, I can practically 100% guarantee there will be a bunch of companies near you, right now, that need a junior programmer, within 30 miles of your town. They'll just be mainly Java or PHP jobs. If you want to be cutting edge, you know what you've got to do, move to SF.

<comment><AUTHOR> Oh cool! -- I had seen meetup.com before but I hadn't used it myself. Thanks for giving me another space to look through :-))

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> Something you might have thought about is applying for QA (Quality Assurance) jobs for software / startup companies. I got my foot in the door as a QA Engineer and was able to learn many different things besides testing software that allowed me to move on to different roles, including Sys Admin positions.

With your current experience I think you would be able to get a QA job pretty easily and move around after you get a years of experience and move towards being a Dev afterwards if that's your goal.

<comment><AUTHOR> I think part of the time I'm frustrated looking at QA positions that are largely dealing with customers vs QA testers who work more with developers. Still, a paycheck is a paycheck and I could probably use the experience either way.

Thanks for your input :-))

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> "I guess I kinda hope that the people posting these ads realize they're expecting too much and do want you to learn some amount on the job. "

It is sad that someone with no experience can see through these ads, and the writers cannot. Hiring is broken. "Come work for us and stall your career (by only practicing what you have already done)". Thank you, no. The underlying assumption is that either you are unable to learn anything, or that some other company should pay for you to learn something, and then this new company reaps the benefit while limiting your ability to advance your career. This is supposed to entice us to work for you how?

But that is not an answer to your question. Unfortunately at this stage maybe you do need to market yourself some. You mentioned learning the Paxos algorithm. Why not write it up nicely and stick it on medium or something? To the right company you'll be displaying initiative, curiosity, intellectual capacity, an ability to communicate, and so on. Those are (should be) highly desirable skills and qualities. Not everyone will value them, because you don't have React or whatever. Those aren't the good jobs anyway, so don't fret too much (I know, easier to say than do, we all need income, and poor jobs look pretty enticing when you don't have one).

I think the meetup ideas posted by others is excellent, even though it apparently imposes a commute burden on you.

Maybe your interviewing isn't going well? If you have a friend, even if they aren't hiring, can you have them run you through a 50 minute interview session? Buy them dinner, 2 tickets to an event, or something. Like it or not a lot of not very emperical things factor into interviews, and if you do something to dispose somebody to not like you in the first 3 minutes that will color the rest of the interview. Something as simple as picking at your face, making a weird face, or whatever can undo you. It shouldn't, but it does.

I would suggest not taking job descriptions _too_ seriously. Some companies just dump a bunch of key words, but then triage the resumes that come in and pick somebody good regardless of whether you tick all those boxes. Of course others use them as gates and your resume will get tossed. But no one will remember your name, you could reapply in six months with more skills, so it doesn't hurt to throw your name in the ring. But chances are good that they got zero resumes that matched everything in that list.

<comment><AUTHOR> Hmm. I hadn't thought about 'no learning on the job' as 'this will stall my career development'.

You make a really good point. There is a certain area between 'you don't have the skills needed to become useful' and 'you can pick these up in short time' \- but I think I have been looking at this wrong another way. I do apply to positions I feel I'm unqualified for (within reason), but it's also ridiculous for me to think companies expect all-knowing engineers. Any other trade would have a worker learning new skills on the job.

My resume does change fairly often - I had an interview a couple weeks ago where I was a little embarrassed because I went in with my current version and they pulled out the resume I had from 5 months ago. I was like, 'er... may I see that?'

On a side-note I think wining and dining potential employers is a fabulous idea, even friends for interview practice.

Thank you for your feedback <3

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Internships in Silicon Valley are most certainly not unpaid. The company I work at pays our interns really well.

It sounds like you need to increase the breadth of your knowledge. No one hires for Lua, and although Node is pretty popular right now, you not being able to get a job indicates that you are probably missing some fundamental knowledge, like algorithms, etc. You probably need to increase the quality of your coding, and increase your preparation for interviews.

You are 1 hr away from SF, which suggests to me you live in Livermore or Tracy. You probably need to study up on things that companies are expecting. Go to sites like leetcode.com and glassdoor and work on your skills, maybe that's where you're lacking.

<comment><AUTHOR> I don't think BART goes to Silicon Valley - is there something to connect the two?

Yes, Lua is very much a niche. I tried applying at Cloudflare because they use the Lua module for nginx - that is definitely in my field as I use them both already. I'm haven't heard back but they've had that position (Lua Engineer) posted for months now. I think my resume might be sitting in a stack.

I had hoped my community college AS in Computer Science would account for something, but when you compare it to those who went to uni I'm sure it's greatly devalued. I like to learn on my own as needed, but I can't show that on paper (can I?). I do feel that I know algorithms fairly well - I spent last week learning the Paxos algorithm so I could apply it to database (mirroring?). I have fun doing things like that, it's just not something I can say I'm accredited for by a university.

I hadn't been getting interviews for a few months but I managed to get 4 all last week (when it rains, it hails?). I was nervous for the first interview but because it was for a friends' company I think I still gave a good impression with him vetting me. I had an easier time admitting my limited frontend experience in the subsequent interviews with other companies. I actually think the way I said this made me appear stronger, like I expected to have no trouble picking it up quickly.

Anyway, I've been trying to decide if I should throw myself into a project to show my ability through Github. I'm torn thinking I should be devoting all my time to the job hunt, but many of my friends have done this to get noticed..

I appreciate your feedback, thank you sir <3

<comment><USER5> You said SF, not Silicon Valley.

Degree is not relevant, no one in SV cares. There are plenty of people that don't have college degrees that have very good jobs. All that matters is your skill and competence.

You are in an awkward position. You know Javascript, but you don't know front end. There aren't very many purely backend positions that require only Javascript/Node. They probably expect a complete fullstack knowledge, so not knowing front end will hurt you, and not knowing a more back-end language like Python, Java, etc will also hurt you.

Keep interviewing, but learn a new language, like Python or Java, and try to get some experience in it, through open source projects, freelancing, etc.

<comment><AUTHOR> I did say SF - the fellow before me said internships were paid in Silicon Valley so I was curious if there was a leg that added to BART to get there.

I just don't know what companies expect for frontend work - I have been doing the tutorials for React, Meteor, Ember, and Angular but this sounds more like backend work to me. Should I be looking in the direction of markup languages? I have used HAML to work with data in YAML, I need to conquer SASS, LESS, and Stylus I think.

I feel pretty confident about my language list - IRC kinda 'raised me' on programming.

C, C++ (templates are still hard), Java (don't know popular libraries), Ruby, Python, Lua, Coffeescript, JS, Lisp, Haskell (can read, not write..), Erlang, Elixir (beginning), PHP, ...

I just mean to say I do know Python quite well - I worked through the Violent Python book a month ago and loved the hell out of it :-)

Thank you for your feedback - I just wish I had a better idea of what is frontend. Imo things like React blur that line building components against the backend so closely?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Your main strength compared to other candidates is that you are cheap. When most CS college grads expect a starting salary above $100K, hopefully you are willing to work for half.

So focus on companies that are price-sensitive. A good starting point: small, underfunded startups.

After 1 year working at a low-paid job in a tech startup, starting with QA or similar low-coding expectations, if you are any good, you'll pick up more and more work. Within a year or two, you'll be a full-time, full-stack dev. Your next job will be easy to find.

<comment><AUTHOR> I still can't get used to $100k being a realistic salary for an experienced dev. It seems so astronomically high - I live at home with a mom who has supported our family of 4 on $45k/year before taxes for over a decade. I do hope to use a minimum starting salary to my advantage, it just feels like I can't gain independence and save for my future with rent being what it is in the bay area. It definitely makes sense to find a roommate though..

Thank you for your childhood. -- oh, I mean input :-) Just having a flashback to The Giver..

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Applying for jobs is a volume thing. Don't worry if you don't have specific skills or years of experience, let them assess that, just apply for any positions that seem interesting. Apply for a lot of jobs, have a github with side projects, even if they are half finished,that's fine if they have readmes. Get on Dice.com. Go to events when you have time and meet people. Don't give up.

<comment><AUTHOR> I actually felt really bad about my Github after I started applying because most of the repos I had were forks of things I wanted to work on but hadn't gotten around to. I felt like I was taking credibility from others so I spent an afternoon deleting a lot of untouched inspiration. I do think applying for jobs is like throwing spaghetti on the wall and seeing what sticks - but it's such a waste of good pasta :(

(I swear that's a metaphor with deep meaning)

Anyway, I'll go look at dice.com right now, though :-) - my pool has been craigslist, indeed, linkedin, glassdoor, assembly, caljobs, and.. I know there are a few others :s

This might be an unpopular opinions but I sort of wish there were just a government-run site for posting your resume and connecting you with companies. If I ever do get hired I'm sure identity theft is soon to follow from all my applications :(

</comment></comment><comment> introv-preneur Maybe try this: [https://www.jrdevjobs.com/](https://www.jrdevjobs.com/)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you for another resource, I found this that I think I will apply for: [https://www.jrdevjobs.com/jobs/1438869644aa61299d](https://www.jrdevjobs.com/jobs/1438869644aa61299d)</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Is it necessary to say open-source software comes with no warranty? - <AUTHOR> I just looked at the list of open-source licenses. It's a long list that takes time to read and understand.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_free_and_open-source_software_licenses
Is there or can there be a license that means all the good things and none of the bad, and is under 5 words? <comment><USER2> I'd suggest reading this line-by-line explanation of the MIT license: [https://writing.kemitchell.com/2016/09/21/MIT-License- Line-b...](https://writing.kemitchell.com/2016/09/21/MIT-License-Line-by- Line.html)

Once you understand why everything that's in a license is there, it's hard to imagine making it much shorter.

The Apache license does a good job of separating out the full text and a smaller boilerplate to put on each file, so that may be a good option.

</comment><comment><USER3> Discussing serious concerns with a lawyer might be a useful strategy. The cost of doing so reasonably filters concerns on seriousness. Among serious concerns, proprietary commercial licensing, and dual licensing seem like a good candidates.

Another useful strategy in many other cases might be choosing a standard license because it allows energy to be devoted to the product which is often where value lies.

Good luck.</comment>


Enabling Decentralized Private Computation - <AUTHOR> https://eprint.iacr.org/2018/962 <comment><USER2> Also check out OpenMined.org if this kind of thing interests you.

</comment><comment><USER3> Is this a competitor to something like Enigma?

<comment><USER4> There's Enigma "v1" (SGX only) and "v2" (SGX + MPC). My understanding is that in both schemes, all code will be public, although inputs and outputs can be private. So e.g. if a company wrote a multisig contract, the multisig parameters could hint at the identity of the company. Zexe seems better in that sense, since the code is private.

On the other hand, Enigma v2 could enable certain use cases that ZKPs don't. E.g. MPC protocols can solve the classic Millionaires' Problem, while ZKPs don't help there.

Most of the authors are affiliated with Zcash, so they're probably thinking about adding this as a feature of Zcash rather than a new system.</comment></comment>


Show HN: Finding niche markets in other countries - <AUTHOR> http://austrailium.meteor.com

<comment><USER2> You gotta be kidding</comment>


Early printed book contains rare evidence of medieval spectacles (2012) - never-the-bride http://sites.utexas.edu/ransomcentermagazine/2012/04/17/medieval-spectacles/ <comment><AUTHOR> "During the early period of the production of eyeglasses, they were referred to as vitreos ab oculis ad legendum (eyeglasses for eyes for reading)..."

Guess they wanted to make sure nothing was left to chance.

<comment><USER2> It has been a long time since high school Latin, but a better translation might be "glasses for eyes for reading."

<comment><USER3> Or even "thing made of glass for eyes for reading."

<comment><USER4> Why "ab oculis" instead of "ad oculos", though?

<comment><USER5> Literally, "without eyes". Without working eyes, anyway.

<comment><USER4> Shouldn't that be "absque oculis" instead in that interpretation?

<comment><USER5> > From an earlier orbus ab oculīs ("deprived of eyes").

> (Late Latin) blind

[https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/ab_oculis](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/ab_oculis)

<comment><USER6> I don't think that link to "ab oculis" is relevant. I suspect that "ab" just means something like "on, in front of" in this case: "glasses in front of the eyes for reading".

If you have time, check this article for the various possible meanings of "ab": [http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:19...](http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.04.0059:entry=ab) (It's a bit more detailed than wiktionary!)

<comment><USER7> I love how there are so many Latinists here :)

<comment><USER5> Hey, Latin was my third language :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Amazing that glasses was invented almost thousand years ago, and today it is still that overly expensive item.

I only need glasses since the last year or so and I have been amazed by how monopolistic and bad this whole industry is.

The prescriptions are fairly standard, but still, making a pair of glasses cost more or less 200$ and require a 1:1 appointment. The price of the lens mounts is just ridiculous for a piece of metal.

Even looking at an alternative like Warby Parker, the price is still about the same for something, that let's be honest must not cost more than 20$ to make!

I since then bought 4 pair of glasses directly on Amazon from a Chinese vendor for 10$ (I have a small standard prescription) and they do a perfect job. I can barely tell the difference from my Warby Parker ones.

It's crazy to me that cheap glasses are still that difficult to get.

<comment><USER9> > The prescriptions are fairly standard, but still, making a pair of glasses > cost more or less 200$ and require a 1:1 appointment.

Depends on the country. I went to Japan for vacation a few months ago ; my girlfriend wanted a new pair of glasses. She just went to a mall in an optical center, they took her eye measurements on the spot, we went back two hours after and the glasses were ready.

<comment><USER10> I did the same when I had to travel to Moscow the day after I had lost my glasses in the ocean from a boat.

Going into a shop in Stockholm I was told it'd take 2 weeks, which obviously wasn't acceptable.

When I arrived in Moscow, just like you I went into a shop, took the measurement, went for lunch and it was ready when I came back. What was fascinating was that they had the actual machines to grind the lens at the back of the shop. It was pretty cool.

Those glasses lasted me for years, and they worked really well.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Want to help people in 3rd world countries get affordable glasses? Support the One dollar glasses non-profit (i did). [https://www.onedollarglasses.org](https://www.onedollarglasses.org)

</comment><comment><USER12> Did they know about the law of diffraction, or did they just grind the glass until it had the desired effect?

</comment><comment><USER13> Eyes of glass in twin hoops!</comment>


Help naming my event sourcing / CQRS platform - <AUTHOR> I have a working prototype of an event sourcing / CQRS platform for Java with some interesting capabilities. It's already being used in commercial projects and is licensed under Apache license.
I want to find the most appropriate name for it:
https://twitter.com/yrashk/status/707399517025374208 (or reply with your suggestion) <comment><USER2> If you could describe a little more details, it would be great. With the current description, I'd choose EventTune, EventResponder, and EventPing. I'd be glad to know if one of them is chosen.

</comment><comment><USER3> What are some of the interesting capabilities? I like eventrecord and eventchain, but don't overly love either of them.</comment>


Tutorial: OS X automation with MacRuby and the Scripting Bridge - <AUTHOR> http://arstechnica.com/apple/guides/2011/09/tutorial-os-x-automation-with-macruby-and-the-scripting-bridge.ars <comment><USER2> _As you can see from the example, we use Ruby's standard find, find_all, sort, and map array methods. Chaining together Ruby blocks in this manner can be a really convenient and syntactically expressive way to dig into the contents of Scripting Bridge data structures_

I think that doing it that way sends many more apple events (and is thus much slower) than needed. Here's two examples in Python. The first is similar to the example ruby code in the article:

      from ScriptingBridge import SBApplication, NSPredicate

      iTunes = SBApplication.applicationWithBundleIdentifier_("com.apple.iTunes")

      library = [s for s in iTunes.sources() if s.name() == "Library"][0]
      playlist = [p for p in library.playlists() if p.name() == "Top 25 Most Played"][0]
      tracks = [t for t in playlist.tracks() if t.rating() > 3]

      favsongs = ["<li>%s - %s (%s)<li>" % (t.artist(), t.name(), t.playedCount())
                  for t in sorted(tracks, key=lambda t:t.playedCount())]

      print '\n'.join(favsongs)

The problem with this code is that we first ask iTunes for all its sources, then filter those in Python. Next we ask the library source for all its playlists, and again filter in Python. Etc.

Instead, we can rely on so-called lazy evaluation and send a single apple event like so:

      library = iTunes.sources().objectWithName_("Library")
      playlist = library.playlists().objectWithName_("Top 25 Most Played")
      tracks = playlist.tracks().filteredArrayUsingPredicate_(
        NSPredicate.predicateWithFormat_("rating > 3"))

See the Apple Scripting Bridge documentation for more info.

</comment><comment><USER3> For those who are interested, the tutorial is doable in Python too. One thing to watch out for is that things that appear as properties are at times functions; so safari.windows [rb] turns to safari.windows() [py] and "window.currentTab.name" [rb] turns to "window.currentTab().name() [py].

</comment><comment><USER2> See also <http://appscript.sourceforge.net/>

"Appscript is a high-level, user-friendly Apple event bridge that allows you to control scriptable Mac OS X applications from Python, Ruby and Objective-C."

<comment><USER3> Interesting. What are the advantages of appscript over ScriptingBridge?

<comment><USER2> The appscript documentation is excellent and I find its syntax (at least in the Python case) a bit more "natural" than ScriptingBridge.

However, it does have to be installed separately. ScriptingBridge OTOH comes installed with OS X.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> While OS X is great, it is slightly less hackable than I would like. MacRuby is a great way to fix this. I have slowly been piecing together various MacRuby scripts that do this sort of thing, and hopefully will someday be releasing it. The goal is to create an emacs-like system (tiling window manager, I mean) out of the entire OS. I entirely expect it to be somewhat ugly, but workable.

<comment><USER5> OSX is quite hackable. Check out these projects:

* <https://github.com/albertz/simbl>

* <https://github.com/albertz/FScriptAnywhereSIMBL>

* <https://github.com/albertz/Pyjector>

* <https://github.com/albertz/ChromeWebApps>

I have them running and they just inject to all running application and it is pretty easy to make it all stable and just working fine because of Cocoa and ObjC.</comment></comment>


Hawaiian Volcano Observatory issues "Red" aviation warning relating to Kīlauea - <AUTHOR> https://volcanoes.usgs.gov/volcanoes/kilauea/status.html <comment><USER2> I'm an air traffic controller at HCF Center (the airspace that has this aviation red warning). I wish I was working there right now to see this firsthand, but I'm currently in Oklahoma City at the FAA center. If anyone has any questions, I'll do my best to answer them.

The summary says the ash cloud is drifting southwest which would put it on the south end of the Big Island. Almost no one flies that way so it shouldn't have a big impact on aviation traffic.

<comment><USER3> Ash output is apparently already declining, so even though the trade winds are expected to slow it appears the NWS just canceled the ash warning: "Cancelled the Ashfall Advisory for Kau District as volcanic ash emissions at Halemaumau have decreased since Tuesday evening. However, vog will be particularly thick today on the Big Island as sea breezes and upslope flow will collect the plume over the island."

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> What happens when you don't avoid clouds of volcanic ash:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Airways_Flight_9](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Airways_Flight_9)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KLM_Flight_867](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KLM_Flight_867)

<comment><USER5> > "Despite the lack of time, Moody made an announcement to the passengers that > has been described as "a masterpiece of understatement":[3]"

> "Ladies and gentlemen, this is your captain speaking. We have a small > problem. All four engines have stopped. We are doing our damnedest to get > them going again. I trust you are not in too much distress"

<comment><USER6> Seems like that wasn't an understatement, they didn't end up being in any distress at all. The plane landed safely and nobody was injured.

<comment><USER4> A 747 gliding all engines out and not immediately above an airport is kind of a major crisis. The number of times that has happened is an extremely rare occurrence.

<comment><USER7> On average and handled correctly, a 747 at 40000 feet has about 100 miles of range, discounting winds.

<comment><USER4> Which is not a lot, if the only airports within 100 miles have runways too short for a 747.

<comment><USER8> What about a body of water? It's not ideal but it seems like the best option if there's no suitable runway.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Very impressive pictures: [https://volcanoes.usgs.gov/volcanoes/kilauea/kilauea_multime...](https://volcanoes.usgs.gov/volcanoes/kilauea/kilauea_multimedia_15.html)

<comment><USER10> And life goes on, love this angle of ash behind golfers:

[https://twitter.com/GettyImagesNews/status/99653888156569191...](https://twitter.com/GettyImagesNews/status/996538881565691910)

<comment><USER11> I find it hard to take a disaster seriously when people are playing golf. At what point do they start telling the tourists to leave, or at least stop arriving? I'd imagine a mass evacuation of Hawaii, or any part of it, would be a logistical nightmare.

<comment><USER10> The island isn't going anywhere, they're not in any danger.

<comment><USER11> Maybe not today, but the Hawaiian islands are all temporary. There is a reason they get smaller the further they are away from the hotspot. The big island is doomed.

[https://hilo.hawaii.edu/~kenhon/GEOL205/Landslides2/default....](https://hilo.hawaii.edu/~kenhon/GEOL205/Landslides2/default.htm)

<comment><USER10> Well on a long enough timeline we're all doomed, but that doesn't mean golf is out of the question. This eruption has been going on for decades (1983!), it's OK to live a normal life on the Big Island.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Ah volcanoes, the 3d printer of nature.

Some interesting fact I found the other day: Hawaii was created by one (edit) volcanic hotspot, while the tectonic plate moved above it. And there's a line of underwater islands all the way to Siberia.

<comment><USER12> > Hawaii was created by one volcano, while the tectonic plate moved above it. > And there's a line of underwater islands all the way to Siberia.

Just a quick clarification: the Hawaiian islands comprise multiple volcanoes. There's at least five that make up the Big Island (Hawai'i): Mauna Kea, Mauna Loa, Kilauea, Kohala, and Hualālai. I think what you mean is that the island chain seems to have been created by a single mantle plume / volcanic hotspot: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hawaii_hotspot](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hawaii_hotspot)

<comment><USER13> Well, there are two distinct loci of volcanoes at the hotspot: the loci that creates Mauna Loa, Loihi, Hualalai, Lanai, etc., and the loci that creates Mauna Kea, Haleakala, Kohala, Kilauea, etc. It's still referred to as one hotspot, but there may be separate mantle plumes in close proximity.

<comment><USER12> > It's still referred to as one hotspot, but there may be separate mantle > plumes in close proximity.

Does it need to be separate plumes or can it be bifurcation of a single plume as it passes through the crust?

<comment><USER13> I don't know the answer to this question myself, and I suspect our knowledge of hotspots is poor enough that no one can answer this question definitively.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> How do the telescopes on Mt Kea protect themselves from the ash? I know that they are on another island some distance from this volcano (I visited a decade or so ago) but does the ash cloud risk transporting damaging particulates to the special glass?

<comment><USER15> Classic HN, how is the scientific equipment holding up? Dust in nooks and crannies? Why I can't even imagine!

Hmm there are humans on the island as well?

<comment><USER16> We know what happens to humans in volcanic eruptions, nobody needs to ask about it.

Evacuate the area, wait until it stops, rebuild afterward in the same place because people like Hawaii well enough to accept the risk of living on a volcano.

<comment><USER17> _nobody needs to ask about it_

Also any human toll is widely reported in the news media, while effects on scientific equipment is not.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> First time I've ever seen the term "vog" (volcanic air pollution) [https://vog.ivhhn.org/](https://vog.ivhhn.org/)

<comment><USER2> It's a common report from pilots when we solicit the weather from them. (Every hour when certain conditions are met, air traffic controllers have to solicit PIREPS - Pilot Reports). It reduces visibility similar to haze.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> What does "Red" mean exactly here? All flights are grounded/need to avoid this airspace?

<comment><USER13> Kilauea has been at Orange for the past several years--the ash clouds that were generated were small, highly localized, and not really a threat to aviation. On April 30, the erupting fissure (Pu'u 'O'o) suddenly had its floor collapse, cutting off the main escape path of lava. At the same time, there was a massive surge in magma underneath the summit, which shortly thereafter shifted down the flank.

The lava lake at the summit is now a crater over 300 meters deep. This means that, in addition to rocks falling into the crater and subsequently being ejected into the air in the form of fine ash, water is also intruding into the column, which raises the distinct possibility of a high pressure steam explosion. The alert level was changed because there is now a persistent, high-level ash cloud that is traveling some distance. It's not on the same scale as Eyjafjallajökull (the volcano that shut down European airspace), but it is big enough to start wrapping around the Hawaiian islands.</comment></comment>


The Fantastic World of Professor Tolkien (1956) - <AUTHOR> https://newrepublic.com/article/136543/fantastic-world-professor-tolkien <comment><USER2> > "I do not feel any pity for Gollum. He deserves death."

> "Deserves death! I daresay he does. Many that live deserve death. And some > die that deserve life. Can you give that to them? Then be not too eager to > deal out death in the name of Justice ... even the wise cannot see all > ends."

Remains a very good, concise argument against capital punishment.

<comment><USER3> An alternative to capital punishment: exile.

Fence off a large part of the American southwest. Surround it with guard towers and automatic motion-activated machine guns to destroy anything that comes within 100 ft of the fence. Then drop the exiles off with a backpack of basic equipment and wish them well.

<comment><USER4> That's not "exile." That's just prison, only even more sadistic and poorly run.

<comment><USER3> It's not sadistic; it's neutral. Nature is the only guard. It's not poorly run; it's not run at all. This is nearly the very definition of exile, so I'm not sure where your confusion comes from. Perhaps you feel throwing them into a desert is inhumane? Fine, then fence off part of a jungle or plains with a river or something else more comfortable. Build some basic infrastructure if necessary.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> LOTR is really cool. For example, Aragorn is a supersoldier and long lost true heir who's engaged to an immortal princess, but the world ends up being saved by Sam who doesn't have any of those gifts. Sadly, most later genre fiction succumbed to nostalgia for aristocracy, with heroes like Luke Skywalker or Paul Atreides relying on inherited special powers.

<comment><USER6> >Sadly, most later genre fiction succumbed to nostalgia for aristocracy, with heroes like Luke Skywalker or Paul Atreides relying on inherited special powers.

Which by the way I prefer. The cliche of the powerless humble guy who in the end saves the world has become boring and predictable.

<comment> guard-of-terra It's only boring when done wrong. But so is any plot.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Since it's the best source on Tolkien's view of his stories, let me recommend his "On Fairy Stories" for those who have not read it: [http://idiom.ucsd.edu/~bakovic/tolkien/fairy_stories.pdf](http://idiom.ucsd.edu/~bakovic/tolkien/fairy_stories.pdf)

</comment><comment><USER8> The Lord of the Rings is the book that turned me into an avid reader when I was 13 or so. I remember sitting in the school library studying the maps and translating the runes with a reference book I found. I was so excited when I discovered that the runes on the maps in the Hobbit turned out to be the riddle for opening the way to the lonely mountain. I still read it every few years, and was just listening to the audiobook while browsing HN and saw this article! I do get tired of all the singing though. :)

<comment><USER9> Tangentially related, in the sense of inspiring imagination - this summer I was in Switzerland and looked up Wiki articles on where I was visiting, and came across this Tolkien-related tidbit:

>J. R. R. Tolkien hiked from Interlaken to the Lauterbrunnen Valley while on a trip to the Continent in 1911. The landscape of the valley later provided the concept and pictorial model for his sketches and watercolours of the fictitious valley of Rivendell, the dwelling place of Elrond Half-elven and his people.

Source: [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lauterbrunnen](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lauterbrunnen)

Having accidentally recreated this trek, I can attest to its natural beauty, and I can see how it inspired his imagination. I highly recommend doing the same if you're lucky enough to be able to.

A photo of Lauterbrunnen: [http://gotravelaz.com/wp- content/uploads/images/Lauterbrunne...](http://gotravelaz.com/wp- content/uploads/images/Lauterbrunnen_16610.jpg)

<comment><USER10> I did that exact hike in 2014 and didn't know that. That's incredible! It is the most beautiful place I have ever seen with my eyes for sure. I highly agree with your recommendation.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> "For evil is matched and overcome not by superior power, but by the determination and the goodness of ordinary beings, ennobles by the assumption of burdens beyond their capacity to bear."

Lovely bit of prose for a book review.

<comment><USER12> I do love the style of that review - you don't find reviews like that nowadays. Pity about all the spelling mistakes in the digital edition though.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> If you're into Tolkien, I highly recommend listening to the Silmarillion Seminar: [http://tolkienprofessor.com/lectures/courses/silmarillion- se...](http://tolkienprofessor.com/lectures/courses/silmarillion-seminar/) and also to the Tolkien Professor's other series. They've greatly increased my understanding and enjoyment of Tolkien.

<comment><USER14> Shippey's "J.R.R. Tolkien: Author of the Century" is a very good read.

[https://www.amazon.com/J-R-R-Tolkien-Century-Tom- Shippey/dp/...](https://www.amazon.com/J-R-R-Tolkien-Century-Tom- Shippey/dp/061812764X)

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> "The Lord of The Rings" is the most incredible book and the most well done I ever read.

I read it recently, I knew it first time because the movie. I read it in English, and it improved my language skills a lot (even the listening, to my surprise).

</comment><comment><USER16> The author, Michael Straight, later said he was a KGB operative at the time he wrote this.

<comment> guard-of-terra ...and Tolkien wasn't really translated or available to Russian up until late 80s, but when the Professor finally arived he sparked spectacular amount of activity in Russian-speaking fandom.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> One more random thought: I can barely remember anything of the animated LotR film, but the "Where there's a whip, there's a way" marching song has stuck with me for _decades_.

"We don't want to go to war today, but the Dark Lord says, nay nay nay".

<comment><USER14> Found it: [https://youtu.be/YdXQJS3Yv0Y](https://youtu.be/YdXQJS3Yv0Y)

Was a bit off ("lord of the lash", not "Dark Lord"), but not bad for something I haven't heard for ~35 years.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> I wish that copyright law was different than it is largely because Tolkien's works would then have entered the public domain. And the opportunity to create, play, and profit in Middle-earth sounds amazing.

</comment><comment><USER18> This review is scarily wrong in its understanding of Tolkien's works. First, LotR does not refer to the One Ring, but to the master of the ring. Second, Balrogs are not "dreadful spirit of the underworld" but are Maia, basically corrupted angels. Third, Orcs are not "a new kind of goblin", but are tortured and enslaved elves. And they're not new; they've been around since the First Age. Fourth "Aragorn returns from the battle and by healing earns his place as King". No. That is not why he is the King, it just fulfills the prophecy. He is King because he was descended from Isildur, not because he has magic healing powers.

If you're going to review something, at least get the facts right.

<comment><USER19> Satan isn't a dreadful spirit of the underworld, he's basically a corrupted angel!

I get where you're coming from, but this kind of pedantic hair-splitting with a condescending tone doesn't advance the conversation. There's nothing "scarily wrong" about a reviewer from 1956 not being intimately familiar with the breadth and depth of Tolkien's canon.

<comment> Ar-Curunir In fact, most of this background material only became available ~20 yrs after this article was published.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> LOTR is a fine but flawed book. Reading it as a dark skinned Asian boy the characterization of all dark races as evil definitely stung and still hurts. The evil side is one dimensional and has no redeeming qualities at all.

The female characters also tend to be quite weak and uninteresting.

Still the vision and the universe was inspiring. I still prefer it to most other fantasy.

<comment><USER21> That Sauron was evil with no redeeming qualities was the whole point. Otherwise the quest would not have been so heroic. Some of the dark races were described as deceived more than evil. As far as female characters go, I would say Galadriel, Eowyn, and Arwen were all quite powerful and interesting.

<comment><USER22> >Some of the dark races were described as deceived more than evil. I would argue the larger point still stands if the light skinned races aren't depicted as falling for similar deception, because a tendency to fall for deception is equally unedifying. I haven't read the books, so I wouldn't know how other races are portrayed.

<comment><USER21> In Tolkien's legendarium many light-skinned races, including elves, fell for Sauron's deception.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Much of the article is retelling of the storylines.

</comment><comment><USER24> "trilogy" Eh,, Maybe I'm being a pedant but LOTR is 6 books is it not?

<comment><USER24> I looked it up.. whomp "Tolkien regarded it as a single work and divided it into a prologue, six books, and five appendices. Because of post-World War II paper shortages, it was originally published in three volumes." :p Tolkien is quite clear about that in his letters

[http://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/47419/is-lord-of- th...](http://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/47419/is-lord-of-the-rings-a- trilogy-of-books-in-tolkiens-opinion)

<comment><USER25> Reminds me of the, uh, "mistrilogiation" that happened with the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy:

> The novels are described as "a trilogy in five parts" […] The US edition of > the fifth book was originally released with the legend "The fifth book in > the increasingly inaccurately named Hitchhiker's Trilogy" on the cover. […] > the blurb on the fifth book describes it as "the book that gives a whole new > meaning to the word 'trilogy'".

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker%27s_Guide_to_th...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker%27s_Guide_to_the_Galaxy)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Wish they'd put a bit more time into editing this OCR scan. So many typos, it gets quite distracting.

</comment><comment><USER26> '(1956)' should be appended to the title [1] thank you for fixing

</comment><comment><USER27> Most overrated author of all time whose shortcomings and excesses (simplistic morals, obvious dichotomy between good and evil, wafer thin characterizations) continue to haunt the genre

<comment><USER28> I'd say he _invented_ the genre and so had to include some simple and readily grasped tropes in order to give it mass appeal... Or perhaps it gained that mass appeal precielsely by incorporating what you criticize.

Don't sweat it, when you write your world changing, genre defining masterwork, you can make it as deep and morally ambiguous as you please.

<comment><USER29> There was plenty of fantasy fiction pre-Tolkien.

<comment><USER30> No clue why you are being downvoted. You are 100 percent correct. If anything, we are now saddled with Tolkien's dry tropes as the defining element of "fantasy".

<comment><USER29> It's just how things are on HN.

Here are some pre-Tolkien authors people may be interested in: * Dunsany * Mirrlees * Hodgson * Eddison * Howard * Lovecraft * and there are more, just google them, these are just the ones that come to mind

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> Just like with Star Wars, revisiting one's preferred childhood media can lead to disappointment.

I recently re-read Tolkien's material and have to admit that whilst it is indeed genre-defining and carefully planned on the conceptual level LotR is indeed a heavily flawed book. I do not understand the reviewer's POV as we had excellent "high" literature all through the 20th century.

I totally accept that the more nerdy HN community mostly see literature as having three genres (Sci-Fi, Fantasy, and Horror) but there is a weird egghead world of people reading "art" books. Those who attended school might had the questionable experience of studying Hemingway or Joyce or Fitzgerald. These authors are different to Tolkien.

You can indeed compare Beethoven to Elvis. Or Michelin gourmet places to street food. I am just not sure it makes sense.

And no, one is not "better" than the other. Outside of the minds of console warmongers and GOP nominees there are more shades of grey than any shady SM e-book fanboi would ever fathom.

<comment><USER32> Who's comparing? It is a great book. It both influences and is influenced by other great books. I agree that it's pointless to ask whether "Lord of the Rings" or "For Whom the Bell Tolls" is the best, but I don't think anyone here is doing that.</comment></comment>


Ke Jie (9p) to Challenge AlphaGo - <AUTHOR> http://weibo.com/p/1008083ec48cfc1aa3aa0a3d2ab4aa04e9eed3 <comment><AUTHOR> Loosely translated:

Just today, Jinli Guan Fang announced Ke Jie's endorsement contract and will support Ke Jie's challenge of AlphaGo.

Also of interest is a Bayesian estimate that AlphaGo has a 58% chance of being stronger than Ke Jie.

[https://www.reddit.com/r/baduk/comments/4ai6g0/is_alphago_ev...](https://www.reddit.com/r/baduk/comments/4ai6g0/is_alphago_even_stronger_than_ke_jie_a/d10ioo5)</comment>


Adventures of Porting MUSL to PS4 - <AUTHOR> https://dayzerosec.com/posts/adventures-of-porting-musl-to-ps4 <comment><USER2> Nice work! One step forwards towards a less botched libc for game developers! Should probably be noted that musl isn't necessarily very performant compared to something like glibc. Kudos for getting musl which is very geared towards linux to work on a BSD!</comment>


John B. Goodenough, Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2019: Official Interview [video] - happy-go-lucky https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jBTfdUkVxLg <comment><AUTHOR> Didn't Chuck Berry write a song about this fellow?</comment>


OpenBSD 5.7 Released - <AUTHOR> https://marc.info/?l=openbsd-misc&m=143043178115828

<comment><USER2> There was some conversation on this release announcement a few days ago: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9467990](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9467990)</comment>


"The Cause and Consequences of the Retail Apocalypse" - <AUTHOR> https://newrepublic.com/article/145813/cause-consequences-retail-apocalypse <comment><USER2> Something in this article has to be wrong. A bankruptcy shouldn't result in closing profitable stores, just in a change of ownership from the holders of shares to the holders of debt.

If a bunch of stores are closing AND a bunch of retail chains are bankrupt, the causal structure seems more likely to be unprofitable->closing and unprofitable->bankrupt, rather than bankrupt->closing which makes no sense.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Thought this was an interesting addendum to this discussion from last week based on Bloomberg's report:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15653871](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15653871)</comment>


Sound and Hearing Protection: (Best Practices for Musicians) - <AUTHOR> https://artlapinsch.com/2019/08/18/sound-and-hearing-protection/ <comment><USER2> I don't see much in the way of recommendations or best practices in this article, so here is what I can offer:

1\. As mentioned already, get custom-molded in-ear monitors. They're wonderful. I dropped like $1500 on mine but someone below mentions much cheaper models. Mine are great, hopefully his are too. But this only works if everybody is playing direct or miked and you can get a reliable mix. Oh, and be careful working with inexperienced engineers because if you take a blast of shrieking feedback from one of these it's probably even worse than not wearing ears at all.

2\. For bigger stuff, playing in an orchestra or whatever, where no mix is available, just go with earplugs. I find Etymotics uncomfortable for more than an hour or so, but some people like them. With about ten seconds of googling you can find some huge sample packs of disposable foam earplugs online, so you can try out lots of different varieties and find what works for you. And if you're new to playing with an orchestra, do not underestimate how loud they are. A brass section can absolutely compete with the loudest of guitar amps or drummers.

3\. If at all possible, just don't play crazy loud gigs. If you end up with guitars, drums, bass, brass, whatever, all competing with each other for volume the overall mix will be a mess. I find few things less enjoyable than concerts where no one can control their stage volume and you just hear a poorly-mixed muddle of sound. If you've spent time honing your craft and learning the parts, why play in such a sub-par environment?

And in general, just take care of your ears. I'll wear earplugs on a motorcycle, in one especially loud datacenter I used to spend time in, at concerts, when using powertools (or even hammers), on aircraft, etc. I keep a huge pack of disposable earplugs I bought at Home Depot for like six bucks in my car and I use them regularly and hand them out to people as well.

<comment><USER3> I actually wrote the blog post and it's still work-in-progress. Thanks for sharing your insights.

Can I share a screenshot of your comment directly in the blog post? I think it would help the few users that stumble upon this post :)

I got custom-molded ear plugs with 25db filters, which I primarily use for DJing gigs and when going to a concert. Dropped $190 on the pair, works well and prevents my tinitus to be aggravated.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Get custom molded IEMs. Alclair Audio will sell you a pair for $250. They sound so incredible you'll wish your phone had a headphone jack. Mine block 30db of sound. You can quite literally forget they're in your ears.

</comment><comment><USER5> I now always wear Ety plugs to concerts, shows or loud convention spaces. I had a bit of hearing damage from a bike accident. I now also double up on protection when I go to my local indoor shooting range. I have rubber ear- plugs and wear a pair of MSA Sordin Pro X electric headphones (allow you to hear surrounding sounds with the headphones on) along with the ear-plugs. I'd be surprised if tech like the Etymotic shooting ear protection doesn't become common place in the future, for general use.

</comment><comment><USER6> I explain my kids that using stuffs in an unexpected way will generate unexpected damages.

Clapping doors, dropping phones, pulling wires not on the plastic plug, continuously switching on/off the lights...

This applies to everything, and ears in particular: I'm a drummer with tinnitus and hyperacusis.

Can't recommend enough to protect your ears!

</comment><comment><USER7> I have had a good experience with Westone, going to concerts and power tools work: [https://www.westone.com/store/music/hearing- protection/tru-u...](https://www.westone.com/store/music/hearing- protection/tru-universal-wm25-black)</comment>


Ask YC:your opml files, please. - <AUTHOR>

Developing a personalized news service. Id really like to beta test it with news.yc users in the near future, but need to train the algorithm a bit before its worth spending your time with it.<p>Could you guys post your opml files as comments here, or a link pointing to them? I would be eternally thankful. <comment><USER2> <http://bhaskervk.com/opml/></comment>


Ask HN: How do you really feel about web-based programming? - <AUTHOR> 1) What do you love about it?
2) What do you hate about it?
3) What do you wish got better? <comment><USER2> 1) What do you love about it? \- making things \- logical element of programming.

2) What do you hate about it? \- css, javascript bugs \- tech-bro culture \- gloat of companies

3) What do you wish got better? \- more companies making products helping the world / making a difference \- less competition for jobs

</comment><comment><USER3> 1) instant feedback. Not just some backend code no one sees.

2) Javascript and npm and all that is rubbish. Rather write web 1.0 than import leftpad in grunt

3) Scala.JS is good. We need more good stuff to compile down to web assembly so we can write browser code in a sane language.

</comment><comment><USER4> 1\. Visible results, easily shared, just send a link.

2\. Over-tooling and complex architectures, look at NPM and Flux(react)

3\. Inbuilt dependency management by browser, Grunt/Gulp/Bower/Webpack/ the compression and minification done by these should be handled by browsers so that we no longer have need for them. Just one standard configuration to be used by everyone.

</comment><comment><USER5> I love that it's somewhat the most portable platform.

</comment><comment><USER6> Are we talking about web-based technologies, or programming via the web with on-line tools?</comment>


What could you do with $41 Million? - <AUTHOR> http://photoshoplayerstyles.com/blog/41-million-dollars-color

<comment><USER2> I would almost rather turn down $41M in the first round. I just don't need that much money so early on, and quite frankly, I think it would corrupt me. I'd be much more prone to making expensive, wild, ultimately bad choices. I'd be more liklely to overhire and overspend. I'd be more likely to get reckless. I'd probably, even if not consciously, scale up my _company_ more quickly than I'd scale up my _business_. And I'd probably have an army of financial overlords demanding that I do so.

That's just me, obviously, and I can't generalize to everyone out there. But I have a pretty good feeling that plenty of others would fall into the same traps.

$41M is way too much for an early-stage startup for most people -- unless we're talking about a category with extremely high capital barriers to entry, like biotech or energy.

$41M to scale up an existing and growing business? Definitely. $41M to start up a business? No, thanks.

</comment><comment><USER3> I'd start a Y Combinator East Coast, looking for great startups between D.C. and Boston.

</comment><comment><USER4> [2] More than enough money to give seed funding to every Y Combinator startup since 2005.

That says it all. Instead of pumping it all into one company, diversify.

If you invest in 40 different companies, more than one is bound to come out on top. 40 x $150k = $6 million

[http://techcrunch.com/2011/01/28/yuri-milner-sv-angel- offer-...](http://techcrunch.com/2011/01/28/yuri-milner-sv-angel-offer-every- new-y-combinator-startup-150k/) <http://www.crunchbase.com/financial- organization/start-fund>

<comment><USER5> There is a bit more to YC than just investing in a lot of companies. If that were all the secret sauce you needed, the VC industry would probably rack up impressive average return numbers like _cough_ 0%. (It has not been a kind ten years to the industry, to put it mildly.)

<comment><USER4> "There is a bit more to YC than just investing in a lot of companies."

You're exactly right, investing isn't going to make those companies succeed as you said, doesn't increase your chance of getting a return at all. There's a ton of dynamics at work.

What we do know is that the YC team has a process that works. I'm not going to say they have a "formula," since that would imply that they take the same approach with every class and company. I imagine it's something they work to improve each time and adapt uniquely with each situation.

The recent bulk investment in YC companies rides on the YC team's decision making process, based on a good track record. Granted, you're likely to see a better return with investment in 40 YC companies over 40 that have been randomly picked.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Build a paywall for the NY times :o)

<comment><USER7> ... With $1M left over to embezzle! :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Love this quote:

"I think, at the end of the year, if you picked your team right, you'd have a pretty good shot at a profitable business. And if it fails? Well, good news, you can do it all over again. 40 times. And still have $5 million left"

As someone who has bootstrapped a company to profitability, you're definitely right about people the most important ingredient.

I think Color definitely took a lot of money, but the goal is to get the app installed on every phone possible - and that will take a lot of advertising money.

</comment><comment><USER9> Making 40 stable revenue growth driven companies does not trump 1 Google or Facebook.

These companies are not comparable, and cut from entirely different DNA and if you try to compare them, you just sound bizarre.

<comment><AUTHOR> I wasn't really comparing them as much as just thinking about other ways to use that money. Would any of those 40 companies turn into the next Google? Probably not. On the other hand, what are Color's odds?

And like I said, you'd still have 5 million left, enough to give seed funding to every Y Combinator launch since 2005. If you're looking for Google-sized returns, that's where I'd start.

<comment><USER9> Their odds are much better than the 40 other companies.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I'm at the beginning of a (non software) project that $40 MM would likely return 25X (will need about 3x that before it's done).

</comment><comment><USER11> Retire

<comment><USER12> I agree! I would make games for the iPhone, and let my imagination run wild!

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> fund SENS.</comment>


React's Diff Algorithm - <AUTHOR> http://calendar.perfplanet.com/2013/diff

<comment><USER2> I wonder if React's algorithm could be used to implement support for 'operational transformations' on DOM trees?

OT is the technique used for collaborative editing, etherpad-style. Current implementations don't work with conventional DOM's: Etherpad has its own model of plain text with an additional 'attribute pool'. Libraries like [http://sharejs.org/](http://sharejs.org/) only know to deal with plain text and JSON.

I would love if I could implement a collaborative editor that hooks into an existing HTML element on the page, in the way contentEditable allows for in single-user apps.

cf [https://github.com/share/ShareJS/issues/1](https://github.com/share/ShareJS/issues/1)

<comment><USER3> For OT to work you would need the ability to track all the changes and mirror them to the other users. React appears to have the ability to track changes, but I am unsure how easy it would be to mirror them over the network.

There's a great article here that describes how OT and other synchronization algorithms work (OT is event passing): [https://neil.fraser.name/writing/sync/](https://neil.fraser.name/writing/sync/)

<comment><AUTHOR> React internals support being used in a web worker. It should be easy to send it via XHR.

Now, synchronizing two clients is going to be more tricky. The diff algorithm works on the virtual DOM which is the result of an arbitrary javascript execution.

So while it's certainly possible to synchronize and merge the virtual DOM. You'll need to also feed this result back to the javascript program that generates this virtual DOM. The next time you call render, it should return the new merged virtual DOM.

This would be a pretty exciting thing to be able to do, i'd love to see a demo :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> It would seem that browsers could implement the exact same algo using native code and achieve far better performance.

This raises the question: why aren't browsers already using this or something superior?

<comment><USER5> Probably a big difference in the API applied; the DOM model may be much more flexible than what React allows.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> I implemented something similar for Brackets so that it could do "live development" of HTML. In an editor, it's not uncommon to need to reparent a node, so our algorithm supports that.

I had a chance to speak with some of the React team at JSconf.eu and there are similarities in our approaches, but it turns out that what you're trying to ultimately do (an editor vs. an rendering application views) makes a big difference.

For those curious, here's the talk about what goes on in Brackets:

[http://2013.jsconf.eu/speakers/peter-flynn-kevin-dangoor- omn...](http://2013.jsconf.eu/speakers/peter-flynn-kevin-dangoor-omniscient- debuggers.html)

</comment><comment><USER7> React's rendering looks really awesome, but I'm missing the bit that binds application data to views.

e.g. in KnockoutJS I can just use observable arrays and properties and never have to call `setState()` on anything. What's the equivalent for React?

<comment><USER8> You can very easily do this by combining Object.observe() (or a polyfill) and calling forceUpdate().

However we've found that this sort of data binding is suboptimal since it encourages mutation which forces you out of some great perf optimizations (like the Om stuff, and Object.observe() has its own performance penalties). And thinking about your data flow a little more explicitly makes it easy to follow where updates are being triggered from (so a mutation in one part of your app doesn't accidentally trigger updates all over the place).

Most of the time doing this explicitly is a little more typing up front but is worth it for larger apps from a performance and maintenance perspective. If you start building with React you'll find that your data model flattens out as you go down the view hierarchy so this becomes less of an issue.

<comment><USER9> You can read more about how React combined with immutable data structures provides great performance in this blog post by David Nolen [http://swannodette.github.io/2013/12/17/the-future-of- javasc...](http://swannodette.github.io/2013/12/17/the-future-of-javascript- mvcs/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I think the stuff React is doing is impressively simple and non-magical. Although I haven't used React yet, I wouldn't be surprised if these ideas make for code that's relatively easy to reuse and reason about.

The format of the post is also quite nice; a few short points with illustrations and a clear takeaway.

<comment><USER11> I use React and like it a lot. The biggest issue it has right now is there is no good way for a component on one branch of the tree to get information to a component in another branch. You have to talk to your parent components by having them attach a function as a property, and this simply doesn't scale to large or even medium sized applications.

<comment><USER8> This model usually works pretty well for smaller components (see [http://facebook.github.io/react/blog/2013/11/05/thinking- in-...](http://facebook.github.io/react/blog/2013/11/05/thinking-in- react.html))

For larger ones, we provide lifecycle hooks so you can set up these subscriptions manually. In componentDidMount() and componentWillUnmount() you can subscribe/unsubscribe to some sort of messaging system, and when you receive the message call setState(). Usually you only need to do this in a few places and the regular React dataflow will carry you the rest of the way.

Does that make sense? We should probably write up this technique.</comment></comment></comment>


Obama Discusses Airbnb's Success in Cuba [video] - <AUTHOR> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hP6TH3pBPi8 <comment><USER2> "It used to be, if an American or a German or anybody wanted to come to Cuba they could come to a hotel and that was it"

This isn't remotely close to the truth. When traveling to Cuba it has always been advisable to stay in a casa, which is basically a room that one of the locals is renting out to tourists. Some of these casas have their own website, some are just found by word of mouth or by networks of hosts built up across cities (you want to go to Havana next, there is a decent chance your host can "recommend" someone there to put you up and organise it for you. It's a mutual agreement between hosts to bring each other business). The idea that AirBnB has somehow created this market is not true, it was always there. Now it is just sanctioned by an American "social network" instead of the pre-existing Cuban actual social network.

</comment><comment><USER3> I don't understand this president. Just a few days ago, he saus there isn't a difference between communism and capitalism and you just have to choose what you want. Then he decodes to praise capitalism in an off narrative about Airbnb. He makes no sense. I guess he's a politician, as it just matters who he's talking to.

<comment><USER4> That's not quite what he said, though. Here's the full quotation:

"I guess to make a broader point, so often in the past there's been a sharp division between left and right, between capitalist and communist or socialist. And especially in the Americas, that's been a big debate, right? Oh, you know, you're a capitalist Yankee dog, and oh, you know, you're some crazy communist that's going to take away everybody's property. And I mean, those are interesting intellectual arguments, but I think for your generation, you should be practical and just choose from what works. You don't have to worry about whether it neatly fits into socialist theory or capitalist theory -- you should just decide what works."

His point seems very straightforward and noncontroversial - why should we marry ourselves to ideology when what we truly care about are solutions to problems?

What would you call a CEO or an executive at a company who rejects a solution simply because it doesn't match their rigid ideology regarding the matter at hand? Bad - very bad.

There is much to be said for the flexibility and wealth of options that a free market can provide, but is there truly nothing that other systems can offer?

Cuba is in many ways far behind us, and I am glad that we aren't in their situation. Havana looks just as it did in the 1950s.

But at the same time, the Cuban health care system has far better coverage than ours. You can decry waiting lines and shoddy doctors and so on, but there is objective truth to my statement. Cuba has a lower child mortality rate than we do - 4.83 per 1000 compared to 6 per 1000. Just last year, Cuba became the first country to eliminate mother to child transmission of HIV. The first!

When we talk about the world (I guess economic systems in particular) as simply a matter of capitalism vs. communism vs. socialism and so on, we limit our ability to solve problems and make progress. That's all Obama was trying to say, I think.

<comment><USER3> You say these medical advances would be true, but do you really consider them to be correct? Coming from a communist country, they do in fact control the media. They do in fact control what is disseminated and what's not.

On that note, comparing a government to a company is generally wrong. Why you ask, because companies have the ability to run as a dictatorship, but if a country did that, it would be denying of someone's rights, to compare a company to a government, is simply and fully incomparable and quiet frankly scary.

<comment><USER4> Well the facts about health are true because they come from the World Health Organization of the United Nations, which compiles health-related data on all countries. It's a reliable source.

You're right about not running countries like companies - I was just making a point about management style. It's important to consider ideas from all sources and toxic to tie yourself to ideology. Free market, socialist, etc. - fundamentally, these are all methods of solving problems for people, and there is nothing wrong or controversial about borrowing the best ideas and practices from each. I think most people would agree that a government should marry itself to finding solutions, not ideology.

[1] [http://www.who.int/countries/cub/en/](http://www.who.int/countries/cub/en/)

<comment><USER5> Ideology is the lenses through which we decide what the problems are and how we can evaluate the solutions. It's meaningless to say that a solution is better than another; it just has different tradeoffs. Ideology is what gives weights to those tradeoffs and makes the choice meaningful.

People who say we should just ignore ideology and "choose what works" are just passing off - consciously or not - their own ideology as the 'natural' state, which doesn't really exist.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: I built tick-by-tick crypto market data replay API - <AUTHOR> https://tardis.dev <comment><AUTHOR> Hi, founder of [https://tardis.dev](https://tardis.dev) here. Happy to answer any questions you have.

<comment><USER2> Have you built an API based business before?

<comment><AUTHOR> No, it's my first one, perhaps it's obvious by looking at some aspects of the API and site, but did my best I could given my 'limitations'. Would love to hear some feedback on it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> "Per data day". Is this pricing per single date?

<comment><AUTHOR> Yes, pricing is per single date, initial version was 'per month' but that was too restrictive IMHO. With per day pricing one can order exact historical data that is necessary for the task and nothing more also mental calculation from day to month/year is rather quick.</comment></comment>


FDA urges consumers not use certain hand sanitizer products - <AUTHOR> https://www.fda.gov/drugs/drug-safety-and-availability/fda-updates-hand-sanitizers-consumers-should-not-use#products <comment><USER2> My biggest concern when I read this—perhaps unnecessarily—is how do I know if the sanitizer dispenser at $random_grocery_store is safe? A lot of stores _require_ that you use those upon entry (for perfectly well-intentioned reasons).

<comment><USER3> Every one I've seen has the ingredients listed. Just avoid methanol. Ethanol is the same alcohol you drink, so I would guess that's relatively safe.

I also imagine a store employee wouldn't balk at you using your own sanitizer instead. Or even notice if you pretended to use it.

Edit: I missed the idea that these products have unintentional, and undocumented, methanol in them. Note that some hand sanitizers intentionally have methanol in them, and it's listed. Those, at least, are easy to avoid.

<comment><USER4> Early warnings from the FDA said "in most cases methanol did not appear on the product label"[1] or I remember reading something about methanol being mislabeled as ethyl alcohol

[1] [https://www.fda.gov/news-events/press- announcements/coronavi...](https://www.fda.gov/news-events/press- announcements/coronavirus-covid-19-update-fda-reiterates-warning-about- dangerous-alcohol-based-hand-sanitizers)

<comment><USER3> Hmm. I suppose you could make your own with aloe vera and some everclear from the liquor store.

<comment><USER5> Is ever clear still available? I know people have had a hard time getting rubbing alcohol. I've got a stockpile of rubbing alcohol, and been using it to top off my hand sanitizer bottles.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> This seems curious. Methanol is toxic bit it's not novichok [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methanol_toxicity](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methanol_toxicity)

"Methanol has a high toxicity in humans. As little as 10 mL of pure methanol when drunk is metabolized into formic acid, which can cause permanent blindness by destruction of the optic nerve. 15 mL is potentially fatal,[1] although the median lethal dose is typically 100 mL (3.4 fl oz) (i.e. 1–2 mL/kg body weight of pure methanol[8]). Reference dose for methanol is 0.5 mg/kg/day.[9]"

I've been using methylated spirits (~10% methanol IIRC, rest ethanol) as a hand sanitiser (on my hands, not as a flipping mouthwash) for months with no problems and I'm going to dig around and check its skin permeability tomorrow, but I wonder if the FDA is doing a bit of major just-in-case butt-covering here.

Edit: some links

[https://chemistry.stackexchange.com/questions/24036/methanol...](https://chemistry.stackexchange.com/questions/24036/methanol- skin-exposure-serious-or-not)

Quite long.

[https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF00378331](https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF00378331)

"Methanol absorption rate through the human skin has been examined by the use of a modified direct method, and a value of 0.192 mg/cm2/min was determined."

</comment><comment><USER7> Most of them seem to be from Mexico, is this a comprehensive list? Or are most of the sanitizers that are imported into the US produced in Mexico?

<comment><USER8> It's possible that there's common manufacturing involved, either of an ingredient or the whole product. That's fairly common for this sort of rather generic product, and can lead to extremely broad recalls. A while back, almost all hummus in the UK and Ireland was recalled; turns out practically all manufacturers shared one company in the supply chain.

<comment><USER9> A lot of them were recalled for containing methanol, which could be a characteristic of the original bulk alcohol. I'd imagine most plants are not set up to do the necessary separation

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> There is a business opportunity here for someone to sell test strips that indicate the presence of methanol plus maybe some rough color indication (70+% ?) for ethanol.

Edit: This already exists for home distillers etc.

</comment><comment><USER11> Didn't the FDA waive some regulations regarding production in March?

<comment><USER12> That was more with the production of ethyl alcohol, not methanol.

<comment><USER13> Methanol is a byproduct in the production ethyl alcohol and has to be removed. The stories of people going blind drinking moonshine is do the methanol.

</comment></comment></comment><comment> bjelkeman-again Are These bring sold in the US? Are there repercussions for people importing or manufacturing them?

<comment><USER14> They mention that they are adding them to import alert in order to stop them from being legally imported into the US

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> I remember drinking fridge cleaner with friends in college.

Had the producers lied about their product we'd have been badly hurt.

Had they changed the contents and we didn't carefully re-check every thing we'd be badly hurt.

This is what we are fighting here.

It's not about getting it on your hands.

<comment><USER16> > drinking fridge cleaner

> in college

I don't know if I should be inspired or horrified.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> Is there any easy diy way to test at home?

<comment><USER18> This site claims you may be able to test by scent and flame color. It's about testing alcoholic beverages, not hand sanitizer though, so assess your risk accordingly.

[https://sciencing.com/test-ethanol- content-4598588.html](https://sciencing.com/test-ethanol-content-4598588.html)

<comment><USER19> I'm reallllly skeptical of their recommendations here, because of their two solutions for testing for the presence of methanol, one won't work for contaminated ethanol (which is what this is likely to be), and the other uses a toxic heavy metal with inhalation risks.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> all but 1 are manufactured in Mexico, yet this is not directly stated in the headline, nor the abstract.

curious.

<comment><USER21> Why should it be?

If 90% of all sanitizers produced in Mexico were dangerous then it makes sense to include it in the headline: that's useful information for the reader. But if it's a tiny minority then knowing the country of origin doesn't actually help the reader make a choice in the store.

In any case, this isn't a new article, it's an FDA dataset. It isn't supposed to be editorialised.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> Edit: apparently methanol is also absorbed through the skin through extensive exposure, so it's safer to stay away from it.

<comment><USER23> Methanol exposure through the skin can also cause a lot of issues: [https://www.cdc.gov/niosh/ershdb/emergencyresponsecard_29750...](https://www.cdc.gov/niosh/ershdb/emergencyresponsecard_29750029.html)

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> Keep in mind this list contains subpotent products which are not dangerous to use and should not be discarded or recalled, just mentioned that you didn't get the protection you were looking for.

<comment><USER25> This is a list of products that you should NOT use. They all have been recalled by the FDA.

<comment><USER24> Read the categories of products on the list!

<comment><USER26> Only two on the list of 101 products were listed as sub-potent.

You can search for methanol or sub-potent and see the categories.</comment></comment></comment></comment>