We Tried Building a Remote Team and It Sucked - <AUTHOR> http://blog.statuspage.io/we-tried-building-a-remote-team-and-it-sucked

<comment><USER2> Having had teams that were half-remote before, and all remote now, doing lots of hangouts seems to fill the remote-feels-weird niche pretty well.

Just having long conversations in chat tends to not be productive, but you need chat. Something like Slack is a good choice if you can't get everyone on IRC.

Somewhat still wanting for better "whiteboard simulator" type options.

Ultimately not having an office not only saves the commute, but it saves a lot of thought-cancelling interruptions. People say this is "collaboration", but usually it's just someone being noisy in another department talking about a football game, or someone repeating the required meme / pop-culture reference to hearing a word.

The advantage of having a great home office and being able to play your own music (or not to HAVE to play your own music into headphones) is pretty much priceless.

It does require hiring the right kind of folks and being able to communicate very clearly what you want.

It's especially valuable as I really believe being able to work on what you work on shouldn't be constrained based on where you live, because that's unfair to a lot of smart folks with reasons to not want to live in the half- dozen or so major tech centers. (Or someone gets bored working for the only major software company in town).

<comment><USER3> If I can shamelessly plug my project: we're trying to solve the "whiteboard simulator" part of the picture by focusing on the essentials and getting out of your way.

If you'd like to give it a spin: [https://awwapp.com/](https://awwapp.com/)

All feedback welcome!

<comment><USER4> Thanks for this very useful tool! It became an essential part of online meetings with my team -- it's been working great for us. We love the simplicity. For me it's missing only a single feature: ability to draw basic shapes like lines, rectangles or squares.

Thanks again!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> This is a great post! Our entire team is fully remote all over the world, with 31 people in 22 different cities in each major continent. I'm quite glad the OP wrote this because it talks about the very first thing I try to say when people ask about what it's like for remote working: Remote working doesn't work for everyone. Some are energized by an office environment with face-to- face time, and others are more productive by self-managing and lots of focus time. I feel like it's key to recognize which camp you're in.

We've had to construct our hiring and on-boarding process to gauge in so many ways whether someone is a good culture fit and is also energized by remote working. We feel like there's no way to truly tell unless you work with them under a contract period, which is what we do for everyone that's hired. Generally we've found about 30% who enter this period aren't quite a fit for either remote or culture for us.

<comment><USER6> This. You can't just hire anyone remote. You have to hire people who want to be remote, embrace the isolation, and moreover, fit well into the culture you already have.

<comment><USER7> I don't think I necessarily agree with any of this.

First:

If you're hiring for a remote position, I think hiring people who "want" to be remote is obvious.

Second:

Hiring remote doesn't mean that you have to "embrace the isolation." There are plenty of people that do like the isolation, but I've worked with plenty of remote developers (I'm remote as well) that aren't isolated. We stay on hangouts/chats, work from coffee shops, meet up to work with colleagues/friends, or even work from someone else's office.

It's quite easy to meet other people in the same scenario (remote workers) that are more than happy to meet up to work, even if you're working with different companies. Just to have casual chat throughout the day or to bounce ideas off of.

Third:

I think "fitting will into the culture you already have" should be a requirement in general. Just because I worked on site wouldn't mean that I'd want to sacrifice culture anymore than I would if I worked remotely.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> An unexpected tool has helped tremendously for our teams in terms of remote work: Mumble ([http://wiki.mumble.info/wiki/Main_Page](http://wiki.mumble.info/wiki/Main_Page)).

Mumble is a cross platform, open source VoIP application. Often used for gaming in a group (like Teamspeak or Ventrilo). It has the idea of channels (rooms, offices, etc) is very high quality, low latency and low bandwidth installed on your companies servers in minutes, always encrypted... and clients are available for linux, windows, os-x, android, ios, etc.

So you can have channels like "Bob's Office", "Working on XYZ problem", etc. People can come into these channels to speak to you and can leave them. It feels a bit like an office environment, I can pop into Jay's office, talk to him about an issue, and go back to my office. I recommend people setup Push To Talk, which really helps create a silent non-annoying environment. Basically, me and another developer can be working on an issue, but maybe not actively talking, but in the same channel -- and there is blissful silence... I don't hear the fan, the cat, the fact that his wife came into talk to him for a minute, etc.

When I start my work-day -- I start it by logging into the mumble server (or more accurately, moving myself out the AFK channel) -- and when I end it, I move myself back into the AFK channel. This is a realtime communication system, async work still happens... well, everywhere else.

It is easy to be on all day as an "in-office" experience... when I am eating lunch, I create a "eating lunch" channel under AFK and put myself there.... We find it works so much better than video chat (or really anything else), is far more casual (like an office) and far more fluid... it is like having an open door policy. Sometimes I might be in a channel that says "Debugging Race Issue Go Away" \-- but it technically doesn't keep anyone out, it is a request.

Using mumble day to day basically changed the experience from mediocre to great for us. We still use everything else, but mumble is our real time core, and slack is our async core.

<comment><USER9> Interesting. I know Mumble is used a lot in the gaming community, but I never thought of the idea of using it for workspace/business.

I wrote a webapp targeted for gamers to easily setup temporary Mumble servers ([http://guildbit.com](http://guildbit.com)). So I'm sure someone can build a service similar to wrap the Mumble API for workspace users. Similar to Slack with IRC.

<comment><USER8> Yeah, I really think a polished / pre-configurable UI for business could be an amazing thing for Mumble (both for business, "use this binary" and for guilds / gamers ... same thing "use this binary" ... binary carries the config, etc). I consider Mumble like IRC, amazing but a bit raw. Someone is going to take shiny interface to it and make a killing in business.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> "I've spent the majority of my life surrounded by other people. I grew up with two brothers, played sports as kid, had a good amount of friends while going through school, have always had a pretty active social life, and lived with three friends in college."

Does the entire staff of statuspage.io feel this way? Sounds like this is more of a personal issue for the author of this post. There's nothing wrong with admitting working remote didn't work for you. Maybe the title should be "Reasons working remotely is difficult for me."

<comment><AUTHOR> You know, I considered putting this on my (currently non-existant) personal blog for this exact reason. I talked to several of them and they agree in varying degrees.

That is just one point out of several though so I thought it was fine to add here.

<comment><USER11> How much experience did they have working remotely?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I think it's less this:

 _REMOTE DOESN 'T WORK FOR GENERALISTS_

and more this:

 _Some people just aren 't wired for working remotely._

Nothing to beat yourself up over. And in my view not something that needs to apply to the full team - I've done a lot of work with a company where you get to choose whether you want to work remotely or not. Once every three months the whole company meets up for a couple of days and in between occasionally people will choose to meet up for a day to kick a project off or wind it up. Some people work full time in an office together. I think it works brilliantly letting people have the choice from a developer's perspective, although I can think of a few project managers that perhaps didn't get it.

</comment><comment><USER13> Although I disagree with the overall sentiment of the article (remote working doesn't work for generalists). I commend the author for at least trying remote work (especially as a YC company, an organization that openly discourages remote work).

Full disclosure, I work remotely and it's by far the best decision I've ever made in my entire life.

So to address a few points. Collaboration to me is when a group of people, at least two, are working on a project together. As a designer this is one of the core aspects of my job. I'm constantly working on things with engineers, founders and marketing people. Therefore I feel that I have a solid idea of what it takes to collaborate efficiently.

At my previous job, that was location dictated, collaboration typically took place over chat. We did have meetings to go over larger ideas and aspects of the project, but typically critiques, pair programming, decision making all took place over chat. Even though we were in the same room we made it a point to communicate over chat because one: you need to respect my space and not interrupt me just because we're in the same room and two: we have a transcript so we can reference it later.

When I decided to leave that job as a developer and pursue a career in design I decided that I would look for remote work only. I firmly believed that everything I did on a daily basis in a single location could be done remotely.

The biggest point I want to make in this post is that tools are essentially irrelevant. What matters most is the management of people on remote teams. When you hire remote employees they need to be both self managing and self motivating. You need to make them aware that collaboration on a remote team is what each individual member puts into it. If they aren't documenting their work each day, if they aren't participating in daily scrums, if they aren't contributing to chats, if they aren't volunteering to review PRs, etc. it's just not going to work out.

For me, and many of the folks I work with, remote work is about freedom. The freedom to build your own schedule. The freedom to work on something early in the morning or late at night, in the comfort of your own home. The freedom to walk to a coffee shop and work from there. The freedom to forgo that commute. The freedom to be more productive. The freedom to spend more time with your family and loved ones. The freedom to just build great products without the hassle of office politics.

<comment><USER14> How does pair programming work over chat? I feel like pair programming relies on you both looking at the same code + talking things through while one of you is actually coding. It seems like having to switch over to a chat client to communicate would decrease productivity a lot.

<comment><USER13> I can't comment too much on the pair programming aspect. I know Floobits[1] has been floated around often. It seems most of the pair programming we do is with interns or junior developers, who are located at HQ until joining full- time/gaining more experience.

As mentioned below Screenhero is really great for 1v1s (they plan on adding team collaboration early this year).

For reference I wrote a post a while ago with some tools and methods we use at Catalyze. The only tools we've added to the list that aren't in this[2] post are trello and teamspeak.

1\. [https://floobits.com/](https://floobits.com/)

2\. [http://m97.co/writing/working-remotely-as-a- designer.html](http://m97.co/writing/working-remotely-as-a-designer.html)

<comment><USER15> How has Teamspeak worked out for you? We're actually building a similar product that's specifically for teams. I'd be curious to hear your feedback on it as it may be helpful for you. Here's a quick walkthrough [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KV7HBXuhT7Q](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KV7HBXuhT7Q) Let me know if you have any thoughts / ideas.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> It seems wrong for this guy to generalize entirely about remote work arrangements based on his experience with 2 guys.

I've been a part of 3 teams, that each were rather different, with significant remote reliance. It was great each time, productivity and collaboration, developer happiness were all at highs. Maybe he was just working with the wrong personalities and timezones, since two of the big problems he cited were "work-life balance," something that is very personality oriented, and another being East-West coast related.

Unfortunately it seems, people who are against remote work typically just want employees to invest more into their product, as too much independence for the employees is viewed as a bad thing. This is always a factor to keep in mind.

</comment><comment><USER17> I like that you mention the disadvantage that "employees struggle with work- life balance." This is often overlooked when considering the feasibility of remote working.

The ability to manage work-life balance when working remotely is a very rare ability, and one that takes practice to develop. The same ability is required of startup founders. Those who can define structure for themselves, even without external instruction, and then execute within that structure, will always succeed before those who cannot.

Because this ability is so rare, and necessarily present in startup founders, we can logically assume that a higher percentage of _startup founders_ have the ability than the percentage of others who do. Or, at least we can assume that startup founders are the most well-practiced in this ability to execute within their own structure.

This means _many of_ (not all!) the people who are best at managing work-life balance (a requirement for a productive remote employee), are already founding startups. So the best remote employees are selected out of the hiring pool if they decide to found startups instead. This leaves you with a plethora of less-competent potential remote employees, who are not as skilled at managing their own work-life balance as the best of them.

A risk when hiring a remote team is that you recruit too many employees who cannot properly manage their own work-life balance, and therefore suffer productivity losses. I would imagine the effect compounds as you hire more employees sharing this weakness.

<comment><USER18> Even when I was bad at work/life balance when I first started working from home... I still saved an hour-and-a-half each and every day by not having to commute or iron clothes or make my lunch.

<comment><USER19> I guess that depends on everyone's personal case. But I for one like my commute: 10min by bicycle or 15min by foot, with a nice parc with lots of birds on the way. So in my case, the pros of working from home are almost void compared to the pros of a workplace.

<comment><USER20> You sound like you have an awesome commute; consider me incredibly jealous.

On the other hand, I think besides the commute itself is the freedom you get from not having to constrain yourself to living in places where the commute is doable. I work in downtown Seattle and I would love to move to the suburbs but I'm not sure it's really feasible to spend 45 minutes on the bus to get to work.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> In my last job, we had three main hubs and each hub had offshoots. So it was possible that every person on a project was working in a different location or they could all be in the same office. We did a lot of military contracting, and as a result, some work could only be done on-base; otherwise, we were allowed to choose where we worked.

In otherwords, it was a wonderful mix of everyone in the same office, remote teams, and working from home. Based on this, I learned I really _prefer_ having semi-regular meetings in person (things like kick-offs and 6-month project retreat weeks), regular tele-cons (weekly all-project-hands), and the rest of the time I was able to work on my own from where ever felt the most productive that morning. On those days non-synchronous email communication worked splendidly. There were co-workers who really _preferred_ only ever working in the same location as the rest of their team, so we structured teams that met that preference. There were other co-workers that were perfectly happy with completely remote work (in fact, I never met, face-to-face, three of my regular co-workers).

By and large, it really did boil down to preferences, although I did note that my co-workers that preferred in-person projects were the ones most likely to interrupt me - and be completely oblivious to the fact that they were interrupting me! My remote coworkers were much less likely to interrupt me, check to see if it was a good time when they did, and apologize for the interruption.

</comment><comment><USER22> I can't imagine how you'd do pair-programming remotely, certainly. Some kind of shared-screen skype-call? Two sessions into a remote-desktop?

Collaboration over the wire is slower than collaboration in person and less enthusing, but it's also more considered, more precise.

We each have different styles I guess. Introverts likely prefer the considered precise way, extroverts the enthusiastic fast-paced way.

People who remote-work need to have a good social life outside work, certainly. I'm glad I've got that, coz remote work suits me so damned well.

<comment><USER23> Sococo (I work there) does a good job. Share apps (not desktops); talk and video, pointers and web apps all work together to make pair programming pretty seamless.

<comment><USER22> Heh, it looks like a game. Gauntlet or something. Strange model to deliberately capture the office layout even.

It looks so much like a game of "Cluedo" I'd be tempted to try a murder to see how it worked. "It was Thad, in Patrick's office, with the pistol"

<comment><USER23> Yeah some issues with the graphics causing credibility problems. But that's exactly what makes the presence work so well - "Patrick is in Thad's office, and they're both yelling!" Try that with any other tool

<comment><USER22> But part of the advantage of remote-work is that you can be in two or more conversations at once, that you can be in two or more 'places' at once.

No?

Seems odd to use a location metaphor, when online you can be in more than one place at a time.

<comment><USER23> Chatting works that way. But your video and audio don't.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> The title is very misleading. The content of the article doesn't support the title at all..

<comment><USER25> The article actually reads like this one individual got tired of working remotely (see "HAPPINESS SUFFERS (FOR SOME)") and then reverse-justified why it wasn't working so it didn't seem like that was the core of why he wanted to stop.

I'd be interested to see how many other of the team are unhappy, and more to the point how many are perfectly happy with the current situation.

<comment><AUTHOR> The happiness section about being around people is just one of the points and doesn't even really apply to the whole team. Though I can see it appears to be the main point because it is the longest in length.

The main reason is really that we feel like we'd be more productive if we were together more often.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> I like doing both. Previously I was working 100% remote and it was quite isolating. I don't really like being around people very much, so in that sense isolation suited me, but I still need to have some amount of interaction to feel "normal" and stave off sinking into depression.

Now I work in an office and work from home at least one day a week, sometimes more, and the freedom to work where I feel like working that day is quite nice. Sometimes you just don't feel like doing the commute, or you didn't get much sleep or whatever, and it's fine.

I agree the tools are not very good - using Skype-the-app sucks, but Skype is also the only video-chat solution I've tried where the audio isn't terrible or echo-y. (Sometimes the echo situation turns into straight-up feedback.) Actually, they all work fine for one-on-one video chatting, but when you start adding people to the call, things get ugly quick.

</comment><comment><USER27> I remember when we split from a 1 floor building to a 2 floor building and even _that_ really killed a lot of the communication. I'm sure part-time remote can work and might even be better in some situations. Full-time remote sounds extremely challenging.

</comment><comment><USER28> I'm working completely remote [1] for 2 years now.

Wouldn't want to miss it again.

I have two kids, 2 and 1 years old, and the office was the far noisier environment. Constant nagging, "Can you just for a moment" interruptions and people playing foosball (or whatever you call the tables on which you can waste a lot of time shouting and kicking hard plastic around) in the next room... Not for me.

Home does have its challenges, certainly. But for me it's the far better trade.

Now, communication and tools: I prefer less. We're a Windows/MS shop, so it's Office 365 (worst. thing. ever. [2]) and Lync (sad..) for us. I'd prefer mail, in a decent way, and a reasonable chat (IRC would work fine, but HipChat et al might work just as well). I have a corporate phone, that is with me all the time. People _can_ reach me - in theory - 24/7 with that.

That's enough. I have no need in this job for sketches on a virtual whiteboard. I couldn't care less about conferences (aka discussions with > 4-5 participants). Phone's fine, mail is for persistence and tracking, git is for source code and .. that works pretty well.

Sad to hear that it didn't work our for StatusPage.io, but I'm convinced that this model can work perfectly fine.

1: Remote as in 'Less than a single digit number of days in the office per year', although the distance to the Real Office™ is manageable at about 90-100km one way, same country.

2: WSDL files? Can't open those in OWA for example, because everything that looks like XML is obviously 'scary'. OWA 'protects' you and according to our IT Office 365 doesn't allow you to fix that. WSDL is just one example of gazillion, I should by now create a template for the "Sorry, dear customer. Our mail server is batshit crazy and acting up. Can you zip that stuff/share it in other ways?" mails I send regularly. Your company/coworker uses s/mime? Forget about using OWA, it will either throw around scary warnings or .. just refuse to open the message completely.

<comment><USER11> Just because you don't need to collaborate or whiteboard things out, doesn't mean others don't find it useful.

<comment><USER28> Arguably I am collaborating just fine.

I agree with the whiteboard part of your comment, but don't feel that I stated something to the opposite effect in my original comment?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> One of the things I've found about working remote that no one ever seems to talk about:

It doesn't work for teams where the Project Manager/owner/whoever is client- facing doesn't like to sit down and write out proper specs.

There are some teams that can't work remotely merely because the guy who knows what it is all supposed to look like doesn't like typing, and so there needs to be an environment where people can "drop in" on each other's work areas.

That's not a great thing anyway, but it definitely doesn't work when you aren't all in the same place, or even timezone

</comment><comment><USER30> The first two issues are software/technology issues and solving them is a business opportunity.

The third one is a social issue, and one which can only be solved through experience. The problem is not that human beings are destined to struggle with work/life balance in this situation, but that they have no experience to draw upon to learn how to do that.

The major problem here should be pretty obvious when looking at that list - the pros RADICALLY outweigh the cons. That 'no office overhead' thing? Just that alone benefits your organization more than all of the cons combined detract from it.

</comment><comment><USER31> I worked remote for about six months for the company I currently work for. I actually miss that arrangement.

I solved the problem of being alone by working from a coworking space where I shared an office with three other people, none of us actually working together. All the benefits of being around people, but none of the downsides of being stuff in a small box filled with office politics and whatever other BS is going around that week.

</comment><comment><USER32> I absolutely agree with you. It's been pretty well known for a while that creative work is best performed in a single location.

I would argue that a lot of engineering work can be done by remote teams; but defining your product, your market, your business model... all those need to be done by a team in the same location because remote working stifles creativity. All those interruptions that destroy productivity in an office are also great when you're working on a creative task - by looping a coworker into my creative process to help vet my ideas, the work product I produce as a whole is better. Inspiration strikes at all times, so it's nice to be able to just drop in on someone and discuss a topic.

Many companies reach a point where creativity isn't as important as execution; and at that point I think remote teams are appropriate. OP discovered the hard way that when you're in the ideation stage, it's hard to have a meeting of the minds unless those minds are in the same room. Again, I don't think it's about remote teams being inherently good or bad as much as they aren't appropriate in every situation.

</comment><comment><USER33> Hi, a guy who has managed a remote team for 15 years here.

What it sounds like to me is that they don't have someone doing the communication. I get all the bummers that is no face time, no hallway stuff. But we are systems programmers (he said generalists and I think it is sort of the same thing, everyone does everything, there aren't any narrow roles) and we have made it work.

Some ramblings on what works for us.

IRC is big. We're all on it, if there is no chatter I know something is wrong.

Weekly staff meetings. I hate meetings but the team needs to sync. So do those. Maybe even twice a week.

Phones. So much phone, you have no idea.

This is perhaps the biggest thing. Here's how we do design. It's all on the phone and it is all someone talking about a picture. Then the other person talks about the picture. Then the other person. What I mean by picture is we're trying to solve $PROBLEM and we have a proposed $SOLUTION and we talk about the solution. Someone leads because they believe they have a real solution. So they articulate that and the next person either articulates it back or proposes a change. When you go around the circle and everyone says the same thing, you are done. Start coding. Don't code before that, you need to have all the people seeing and saying the same picture.

We've made it work. It has not been easy and someone needs to step up and be the communication dude (that was me). That person has to see everything that is going on and know who needs to know what and make sure they either get the info or talk to the person who can give them that info. It's a lot of work. Many, many hours on the phone. But it can work, we've been doing it for 15 years, we gave you distributed source management as a result, all that work was with a team that didn't live in the same city.

I would not give up on remote teams so quickly, they can work.

</comment><comment><USER34> What about:

Work remote.

Get all the company together to a trip to Hawaii each year.

I'm sure this can build camaraderie and morale, and I hope someone gives it a try.

<comment><USER35> "Companies, too, are drawn to the intimate communal areas, amenities and activities of co-working/co-living spaces. Nine remote-working employees of Automattic, a web development corporation gathered for a work meetup this month at the Surf Office in Gran Canaria, taking over the 10-room property for six days "to build relationships, have real-time interaction and also work on projects that are best done in person," the company said." from

[http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/20/business/co-working-on- vac...](http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/20/business/co-working-on-vacation-a- desk-in-paradise.html)

</comment></comment><comment><USER36> Hey, I fuly agree with what yor saying, having let dev teams for agile projects for more then ten years, all remove attemts we tried were not producing results as good as those of the onsite teams. I assume facing the same walls, being integrated with the full team dynamics, feeling all everyday emotions does integrate all team members much better and enables them to contribute much more efficiently...

</comment><comment><USER37> This is one of the reasons why I'm so excited about VR.

There's still an issue with timezones but I think the communication/camaraderie problems will be fixed in a VR workplace. This gives you all the benefits of remote and mitigates many of the downsides. If the downsides are sufficiently depressed then many more teams will be able to be remote and distributed and that may have a dramatic effect on society.

</comment><comment><USER38> Steve, have you considered the hybrid option, where you would have hubs, but still let some people to be remote?

May be this does not have to be an either or proposition. For some people remote works and others are energized by being together with people. It varies depending on their role as well (as you've stated).

</comment><comment><USER39> I see this more as a technology issue - no one has sufficiently solved the "remote creativity" problem of allowing people to communicate as seamlessly as they can in a room with a whiteboard. (Or someone has, and I don't know about it, and StatusPage doesn't either)

<comment><AUTHOR> I don't know that this is the case. I feel like there just isn't anything that can replace consistently being in the same room with someone.

<comment><USER40> Like muaddirac, I, too, think there's a lack of tools for solving the problem. I've been a remote worker for ten years or so. A couple of years ago, a colleague and I decided to just run a continuous all-day video conferencing session with dedicated screens and speakers. It was really great for hashing out random ideas as we thought of them, getting in some "water cooler" talk, joking about who's doorbell is ringing, and even having some beers together after a long day at work. It wasn't perfect (Google Hangouts kept wanting to kick us out every two hours, for instance), but gave me optimism that good tools could go a long way towards solving the problem. (One of these days, maybe I'll get around to putting together my own WebRTC telepresence solution.)

In any case, let me be the first to welcome you to Denver! There's no other place that I'd rather work non-remote. ;)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER41> Is this a scale issue or a frequency of co-location issue? e.g., What is the minimum number of people that must be collocated for an "office" to thrive? What is the minimum frequency that people must be together for them to collaboratively thrive?

</comment><comment><USER42> I'd love to hear others' tips on how they are using Slack effectively with remote team members (vs. typical email trails).

</comment><comment><USER43> Remote teams certainly doesn't work for big enterprise companies. My team is remote in a big software company. Most of remote employees are pure slackers. I don't do much of work either. Because if you want to do a code review it can take two days because of "time difference" and "personal issues".

I can see how remote teams can work for a couple of super passionate startup founder/employees but if it's in a highly political giant enterprise it never works.</comment>


16-bit Intel 8088 chip by Charles Bukowski - <AUTHOR> http://bukowski.net/forum/index.php?threads/16-bit-intel-8088-chip.2791/

<comment><USER2> I guess at some point I'll just publish my notebook of notes on architecture and todo lists as 'modern poetry'. I'm bound to get a Nobel prize for it.</comment>


Ask HN: What's Wrong with this Website? - <AUTHOR>

http://nciia.org
We're helping this non-profit redesign their website. The target audience is student and faculty entrepreneurs. Please give your feedback.
See if you can answer these after viewing the site: -What is NCIIA? -What opportunities does NCIIA offer students & faculty? -What is I2V and A2V? <comment><USER2> There's just too much text on the homepage. I'd go with shorter excerpts and no videos for the list of posts on the front page. Here's an example of what I did on a site where I had to list over 30 posts on the front page: <http://www.steves-digicams.com/>. I put the news in a list of 10 below the fold, and but the reviews and articles in a tabbed gallery at the top. Maybe you can do something similar to that?</comment>


Current Covid-19 Situation - <AUTHOR> http://www.covidgraph.com <comment><USER2> Thanks for sharing

</comment><comment><USER3> very old data</comment>


How I Almost Ditched ColdFusion, learned Ruby & Python & came back - <AUTHOR> http://grant.fusehill.com/2011/11/how-i-almost-ditched-coldfusion-after-12-years-why-i-wised-up-and-what-im-doing-about-it/

<comment><USER2> I have absolutely no idea how this sort of opinion piece is supposed to be of value to another person on this planet.

Sure - everybody has to learn their own lessons and sometimes it can be helpful to read about another persons journey. In this case, however, the author is still too much in the middle of it and would do good giving it some more time, then digest it, then look back and reflect and maybe THEN write about it. Reports from halfway through an experiment do make for good blog fodder (and a post about going BACK to Coldfusion sure gets attention), but most of them, as this one, leave me very unsatisfied.

So sure - go write stuff like that into your blog, but I think only the blog post at the end of the series is what should be submitted here.

<comment><USER3> I'm new here, but could we say many ASK Hn's are opinions disguised as facts?

<comment><USER2> I'm not exactly sure what you mean. I'm not an old-timer on HN, but what I do know is that opinion for opinions sake is treated with very harsh scrutiny and I enjoy the site for particularly that. Ask HN's may be slightly softer on that rule and since this years 'eternal september' there have been a lot of new people who don't understand the rule in general - yet, but the crux is this: This is not reddit.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Text only google cache version, since the website seems to be slagged.

[http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:UGF6HCq...](http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:UGF6HCqDPk4J:grant.fusehill.com/&hl=en&gl=us&strip=1)

<comment><USER5> Because it was probably written in ColdFusion.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> People still use ColdFusion? wow :O

</comment><comment><USER7> As someone else mentioned - learn more than one language. That's fine, and good. The main takeaway is often a broader understanding of how to solve problems from new perspectives, but at some point you need to implement things in a particular tool.

If investigating other platforms gives you a new appreciation for modern techniques which you can apply to your previous platform - that's great. If you decide to take the plunge and hone your skills on a new platform - that's great too. Seems like in either case, the net result should be getting better at development overall.

To the extent the OP didn't initially - found himself making the same mistakes in new platforms as he'd made in old platforms - it was great that he had the insight to realize the meta of the situation and reexamine what the real problem was. I (less often now) run in to people who jump to new platforms every few years, and never really get _good_ at development, just good (enough) at shiny-new-tech-X.

</comment><comment><USER8> I ditched ColdFusion for Ruby as my go to language years ago. Rather than reiterate the overwhelming negative aspects of ColdFusion, I suggest you spend a bit more time with Ruby, Python, and other languages; don't be constrained by one.

</comment><comment><USER5> This is the most worthless post I've read in a while. Why did you ditch the real programming languages again?</comment>


Apple logo converted to second monitor - <AUTHOR> http://www.macmod.com/featured-mods/1933-apple-logo-converted-to-second-monitor <comment><USER2> Seems like the site is down.

Video: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=is5GZNHPfo0>

</comment><comment><USER3> That's awesome. It would be great if you can display the webcam from the front to achieve some faux logo transparency.

<comment><USER4> or better yet, apply some of the iChat blue-screen magic to show an altered version of what the webcam displays.

All in all it seems like a lot of effort for little gain, but it's entertaining all the same.

<comment><USER5> I predict he'll make a damn good profit when he sells it, knowing his target demographic.

<comment><USER6> It's a custom hack that's rather pricey. I don't know if this is sellable. It's neat, though.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I expect that this article is one of the few on which a 'Yo Dawg' meme would be socially permissible on HN.</comment>


Any Hackers in Charlotte, NC? - <AUTHOR>

I have an excellent location if you guys would like to meet up for beers, gaming, and coding. <comment><USER3> you can see others in your area at <http://www.hackrtrackr.com>

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> What's everybody's background?

I'm currently coding in Ruby on Rails. Studied CS and Math at Appalachian State (graduated in 2004). Working at Enventys in Charlotte (<http://www.enventys.com>).

We could definitely meet up at the Enventys facilities ... cool place to hang out.

</comment><comment><USER4> We're in Clemson. We make it up to Charlotte every now and then - <USER2> interested in some sort of meetup.

<comment><USER5> Clemson? Me too. Didn't think anybody else lived here. What's your background, you a student?

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> I'm in Charlotte: <http://icculus.org/~icculus/>

</comment><comment><USER7> I'm in the area and definitely down for coding/pizza/beer.

</comment><comment><USER8> my brother is a dev in Charlotte... I'll send him this post.</comment>


Why your brain loves procrastination (and how to help it stop) - <AUTHOR> http://www.vox.com/2014/12/8/7352833/procrastination-psychology-help-stop <comment><USER2> It can also be described as two different story-tellers in your brain: one is concerned about present, but the other one sees the long-term story. Invoking a long-term storyteller shifts motivational focus away from "I am not in the right mood" excuses.

</comment><comment><USER3> Another post which gives people a biased excuse to procrastinate. It's quote- fuel for sloths</comment>


Oracle start charging for Sun's Office ODF plug-in - <AUTHOR> http://www.h-online.com/open/news/item/Oracle-start-charging-for-Sun-s-Office-ODF-plug-in-981132.html

<comment><USER2> Oracle is one of these companies that seems to have a corporate culture which finds it morally wrong to offer any product for free for which they can legally charge you.

If Java were not already open source, you can bet they would find some way to start charging for the JRE.

For them, it's just business.

Yes, you can argue that it makes no business sense to do this, nor to charge for the ODF adapter, but for them, business is making people buy a product, even if it costs them in the long run. It's almost like a mental block.

</comment><comment><USER3> It seems that Larry Ellison ought to love OpenOffice. It's a really inexpensive way to constrain Microsoft's air supply.

When OpenOffice reached feature parity with Office 2003, Microsoft was stuck between a rock and a hard place. If it didn't do something semi-profound with the suite, it risked being compared side-to-side with a free competitor. However, if it innovated, it risked alienating those users who found comfort in the familiar. Could the 2007 "ribbon" have been a competitive response? Or, was it just a way to differentiate its next version so users might want to upgrade?

Also, because of OpenOffice, it's harder for Microsoft to extract high prices from Corporate America for Office. If it gets too greedy, CIOs will start to consider what the retraining costs would be to adopt OpenOffice.

What's the total development cost for OpenOffice per year? $50M? Its existence probably costs Microsoft $1B in lost revenue opportunity compared to a world in which no feature parity competitors exist.

The real threat to both OO and Office is obviously the web, but killing .doc and .xls as exchange formats will be as tough as killing off the fax machine. It's not like Oracle cares if OO dies -- as long as MSOffice dies along with it.

</comment><comment><USER4> If Oracle has any desire to popularize ODF, this is about the dumbest thing they could possibly do. It doesn't even seem likely to result in much short- term profit.

<comment><USER5> Random guess #1: If some Oracle insiders are saying "we don't care about ODF, and this makes us no money - kill it," other insiders who want to save the plugin may respond with "people want this, sell it!" as a delaying tactic. Expect the plugin to die in six months after nobody buys it.

Random guess #2: Sun already had some contracts that require it to support this plugin for some time, but Oracle doesn't truly want to encourage further adoption.

<comment><USER6> My guess: some VP decide this could be a way to reach his targets.

Any company must be acutely aware of execs sacrificing long-term survival for a quick buck.

Not that I think the ODF plugin is important for Oracle's survival, but, if left unchecked, this kind of attitude is very, very dangerous.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Well, that kills that.</comment>


ABC, CBS, And NBC Shut Out Google TV: Fox And MTV Still Available - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2010/10/21/abc-cbs-and-nbc-shut-out-google-tv-fox-and-mtv-still-available/ <comment><USER2> I would think that Fox would be quite smart to embrace GTV. Considering how much influence they have over politics in the US, this could give them a serious leg up over their competitors plus access to potentially younger audience.

<comment><USER3> Fox != Fox News. They are both owned by Newscorp, though.</comment></comment>


Whatever happened to Japanese laptops? - <AUTHOR> http://jamielittle.org/2016/11/06/japan-laptops.html <comment><USER2> The japanese companies were pretty amazing in the commercial space.

My employer had a few Fujitsu ultra portables in the circa 2007 timeframe. One of our internal customers mentioned to a salesguy that they needed a particular port in a particular location on the laptop, not expecting anything. Two weeks later, they Fedexed a loaner/prototype with the port.

Really an amazing experience. We were buying 5-6 figure quantities of Dells and HP, and they could barely handle trivial requests re packaging, etc.

<comment><USER3> I wonder what their manufacturing processes are like, such that they could accommodate this kind of flexibility.

<comment><USER4> In most manufacturing, you have a prototype hall or floor where you have somewhat more general purpose/flexible machines with a lot of manual intervention to make small quantities of prototypes, and factories with automated machines set up to make the exact parts you need for your full production.

This was always my experience in electronics - you, as the development engineer, set up small-scale production (going from prototypes to EV or engineering validation articles, which are basically the final product produced by these manual/slow methods), and then manufacturing engineers work with you to transfer your processes to an automated assembly line making who knows how many units a minute.

It's not unusual to produce a special prototype in the small/experimental floor; I mean, Apple probably goes through hundreds (or whatever) of prototypes and test articles before releasing their next phone, and they are certainly not stopping their million-per-day manufacturing plants to make them. However, it does show impressive commitment to the customer on the part of Fujitsu.

Also, electronics is more cyclical than cars (3-year-old model may be completely different and useless compared to the current one), so it is common to produce everything in batches rather than "the Toyota way" with just-in- time. In other words, if a laptop model is sold for 2 years, the whole run may have been made in 6 months, and then you have that manufacturing equipment sitting idle while the next prototype is worked on, so you may have equipment and engineers to spare. Only a few of the highest-volume factories (e.g. Apple again, I assume) run at full capacity all the time.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> In the early 2000's Japan was way ahead in the Sub-notebook market. As subnotebooks and tablets have come into popularity and wide availability worldwide, this arbitrage opportunity has narrowed significantly.

In 2007, I picked up a Panasonic R6 (10" LetsNote/toughbook). It was a great little machine, and I ran both Windows and Debian on it. The keyboard was a bit cramped, and the circular trackpad was pretty lame, but overall I loved the machine. Everywhere I went people would notice it and ask about it. After about 14 months, the logic board failed, and I discovered that as grey-market import, there was no warranty. This was a hard lesson, as I had paid almost $2k USD for the machine. Fortunately, I was back in the states when it happened, so I wasn't stranded abroad without a working laptop.

Earlier this year, I was in Japan and picked up a Japanese chromebook 10" for under $200. The keyboard is both english and Japanese which makes it a bit of a conversation starter. I installed Debian on it via Crouton (alongside ChromeOS). When I travel, I usually bring both my MacBook Air, and the Chromebook, and particularly in the developing world, I leave my MBA back in my hotel or apartment and bring my Chromebook with me when I'm out and about in the city.

<comment><USER6> > The keyboard is both english and Japanese

So, Japanese, then? Or does it have English labels on the modifier keys?

<comment><USER7> This usually implies a QWERTY keyboard with Japanese kana printed on the keys and a way to switch modes:

[https://encrypted- tbn1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSH1YLn...](https://encrypted- tbn1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSH1YLn0FIXihr_tZjuhtsGHP2sQl9GeaavUOTT- WaFVGjn3oaFZpisVRvxtQ)

<comment><USER6> Oh I see, it's US QWERTY with labelled kana, as opposed to the Japanese layout, which adds some extra keys specific to Japanese (mostly for IME use).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Japan is really behind in PC/Laptop. I was just there last week and the big PC and electronic stores only stock up to Geforce. Asus also has a big presence there now, but the prices are a lot more than US pricing for the same stuff. Not much innovation in the computer space. Home eletronics and appliances are amazing though. Their high end electrolux style vacuum stick cleaners easily clear $800 USD and are really awesome. The rice cookers can hit $600-$800 and can make the perfect rice you normally only get in Japan. The mcirowaves have built in toast oven in one unit, and it works amazingly well. Coming home, its kinda sad some of the convinces we dont have like the toilets, bathroom, kitchen, and even video doorbells (out current "smart" stuff are still rubbish).

<comment><USER9> > The mcirowaves have built in toast oven in one unit, and it works amazingly > well

I had one in my apartment outside Nagoya in 1996. Still can't believe I have never seen one in the states. I wonder if they just can't justify the potential marketing friction.

<comment><USER10> It's the same reason we still have 2 piece washer/dryers: so they can sell two appliances instead of one. Until our market demands a combo mike/toast, we won't have one.

<comment><USER11> Maybe they're much better now, but 15 years ago, I used a machine that washed and dried in the same drum, and it was pretty bad at both. A full cycle for one load on minimum settings took an hour and a half or two hours, and the load was tiny in comparison to any other washer or dryer I've ever used. Even if it had taken slightly less time than separate units, and even if the load size had been realistic, I would have had to use two of them to get the usual throughput I'm used to, where I can do a week of laundry in about 5 hours (two people's clothes, bath and kitchen, bedding). If I had to use that machine currently, it would be running for a few hours every day.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I had a Panasonic CF-Y5. As one review had it: "The exterior design of the machine's casing is reminiscent of a Sherman tank cross-bred with a 1970s sports saloon, while the lid opens with the grace of a bank vault door."

It was incredibly lightweight (1.53kg at 14" with an optical drive!) and built like, well, a Sherman tank. It wasn't only the casing reminiscing it. In a weird little apartment overcrowded by all startup coders attending a conference someone accidentally kicked it off the table and yet it was completely OK.

I could only afford it because the CF-Y7 just got out and for a while I couldn't afford them and then the B10 was no longer so incredibly tough (although the current models do mention a drop test and a pressurized test). Anyways, I am back to ThinkPads ever since. The keyboard is much better but the weight is worse. I am currently using a T420s upgraded with an 1080p screen and waiting for the Retro to happen. Our last hope.

</comment><comment><USER13> One thing likely contributed to their downfall was US manufactures moved operations overseas and many Japanese manufacturers kept production in Japan making them expensive to the Us market --that and Apple and others catching up in terms of "sleekness" and aesthetics. People would buy Vaios despite poor hardware because they were thin and looked cool.

<comment><USER14> > _that and Apple and others catching up in terms of "sleekness" and > aesthetics._

Wasn't Apple always ahead of the Japanese laptops in terms of sleekness and aesthetics?

<comment><USER15> No, not always. The Sony Vaio was attractive enough back in its day that Steve Jobs offered Sony to run Mac OS on them (which they declined).

<comment><USER16> Had to look this up because I had no clue.

> Most of Sony's executives spends their winter vacation in Hawaii and play > golf after celebrating new year. In one of those new year golf competitions > back in 2001, " Steve Jobs and another Apple executive were waiting for us > at the end of golf course holding VAIO running Mac OS" recalls > Ando.[President of Sony at the time]

> Ando liked Apple. He always felt Mac and VAIO were so close in philosophy. > He especially admired the original iMac introduced in 1998. But the timing > was bad for Sony, it is just about the time, Sony's VAIO gained popularity > and it is just about the time that VAIO team had finished optimizing both > VAIO's hardware and software specifically for Windows platform. Because of > this, most of the VAIO team opposed asking 'if it is worth it.' And that was > the end of story for this Mac-compatible VAIO.

[http://nobi.com/en/Steve%20Jobs%20and%20Japan/entry-1212.htm...](http://nobi.com/en/Steve%20Jobs%20and%20Japan/entry-1212.html)

<comment><USER17> A couple of things about these anecdotes to give some context:

Steve Jobs used a Thinkpad (a 560E I believe) running OPENSTEP for quite a long time after taking over Apple, because of his objections to using what he considered to be the primitive MacOS 8/9 OS. So Jobs had no problems with using non-Apple hardware.

The Titanium Powerbook and the iBook G3 Snow were already in the production pipeline when Steve Jobs met with the President of Sony, so aesthetics probably weren't the reason for trying to partner with Sony, perhaps Jobs may have already concerned about the PowerPC Alliance's ability to produce mobile processors and wanted an x86 partner to help pivot Apple away.

When Sony's president was shown a Vaio running "MacOS" what it was running was the preliminary build of Cheetah, MacOS X 10.0[1] without either the Blue Box (the classic Mac emulator) [2] or Rosetta [3] the "dynamic binary translator" (which didn't come out until 2006).

Cheetah was pretty exciting to us NeXT junkies but if it was running on x86, then it was quite limited in the amount of "Mac" software available for it, most everything that didn't start on OPENSTEP would have needed a lot of work to be recompiled and a lot of what would eventually be ported to Carbon would never have made the transition.

So it's understandable that the VAIO team wondered if it was worth it, since there was still a lot of uncertainty about Apple's ability to pull off the transition to Mac OS X.

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mac_OS_X_10.0](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mac_OS_X_10.0)

[2] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_macOS_components#Class...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_macOS_components#Classic)

[3] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosetta_(software)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosetta_\(software\))

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> I had a Vaio Z once (This was ~2010, probably the first Vaio Z series). Performance was good in the 11" package. But... the hinge was terrible, and I snapped it with a light drop. Agonizing 1.5 month repair sendout. $300 bill. Same day it came back, broke the hinge in the same place.

Never bought another Vaio.

And this is why I just buy Macs now. Repair is easy - a couple hours at the Apple store. And the things are built well. They can take a bit of a beating, which you need in a computer you're moving around, have in a backpack that'll inevitably be tossed around a bit, etc etc.

<comment><USER19> Using a 13" 2013 Vaio Z right now. It's a really great machine: 2x SSDs in RAID0, HDMI + VGA, 2x USB 3, SD reader, ethernet port with an interesting hatch mechanism to support its very thin form factor, 1080p, good thermal design.

The product design is quite nice as well, which was an important factor for me. When researching the model before purchasing, I found a YT video with one of Sony's industrial designers disassembling the entire laptop, describing all the components and a few of the design decisions, to a tech reporter. There was definitely a level of design consideration and technology craft that reminded me a lot of Apple, albeit not as sophisticated with material science. But it was the nicest 13" PC laptop at the time.

That said, there are issues with it: small key travel, flexible plastic body, bendy screen, out-of-box Sony bloatware (which I formatted away), lack of dedicated graphics, and it has absolutely terrible speakers.

<comment><USER20> I have the same model (SVZ13), I'm sure. Is yours carbon fibre? It's super fast and hasn't slowed down with a little maintenance. I'm sure it will go for a few more years with care. The docking station external graphics are useless though (only marginally better than the onboard intel HD) That said...

Limitations I'm coming up against right now:

1) Cannot upgrade from 8GB RAM which is soldered to the board. I want to run more VM's!

2)I want two bigger SSD's to replace the current 2x128GB scenario. Once again, these are soldered to the board.

3)My sim tray broke and if I remove it it will definitely not be usable any more.

4) would love to install linux on it but not sure what the RAID0 story is there with this machine.

There might be a way to do it, I just need a guide to parts etc (for ssd and hdd).

<comment><USER19> No, I didn't get the carbon fiber version (nor the dock, which I'm glad I didn't based on peoples negative reviews of the video card).

I've been surprised at how much it has held up its speed, even with upgrading to Windows 10. I can see myself using it for at least 1.5–2 more years.

The on-board RAM and SSDs are unfortunate. I experience memory limit issues occasionally, especially with heavy Adobe usage.

I believe linux will support the RAID configuration (seeing it as one drive). Good way of checking is to boot Ubuntu on a thumb drive.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> I spent a lot of time on [http://www.dynamism.com/](http://www.dynamism.com/) looking at the ultralight computers they had in Japan. Almost pulled the trigger a few times, they had awesome stuff.

The OQO was from that era too.

Good times.

<comment><USER22> I spent thousands with them on teeny teeny computers, including the OQO. Worth it!

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> I think Japan is going to be one of the first markets to see laptop sales dry up almost completely. Most people are fine with their iPhones. Where I work, all developers use macbooks and everyone else uses a thinkpad. A lot of other laptop models, like a lot of tech in Japan, is targeted at the Japanese market only. Dynabooks are the budget windows machine of choice at the moment, it seems. Although most young people choose Apple whenever possible anyway.

<comment><USER24> Really not trying to start an OS war but for the sake of accuracy Android is the dominant mobile OS in Japan, not iPhone.

<comment><USER25> This is from last year, so could have changed, but Q4 2015 web traffic was 66% iOS vs 34% Android in Japan:

[https://deviceatlas.com/blog/android-vs-ios-market- share-201...](https://deviceatlas.com/blog/android-vs-ios-market-share-2015)

<comment><USER26> If you are selling phones, Traffic /= market share. There is good reason to believe that iPhone users use more traffic. They are the premium phone and their users spend more. Similarly, app installs are also not market share for the same reason.

There is even an argument that handset sales isn't market share, that the only real measure is to survey some people to see exactly what phones they own and use. That's the only way to include old phones that aren't used for much other than making calls.

<comment><USER27> Would traffic not be a good indicator of the parent's argument about that the iPhone is a replacement for a laptop? Based on the assumption most computer usage is internet-dependent now (a stretch, but not completely illogical), then a user with an Android device not connecting to the internet would probably need another device to do so?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> What's the laptop market like in Japan anyway? I don't really know a lot about it, but it's always interesting to see these random Panasonic or Fujitsu laptops not sold here, or those rare Japan-exclusive experimental ThinkPads.

<comment><USER29> As others have said, Apple has a very strong presence in Japan. If I go to an electronics store, usually half the models on display are Apple. Panasonic and Fujitsu pretty much rule the desktop with bizarre television/computer fusions. Imagine a TV about the thickness of one of the old plasma TVs. It usually has a stand, but I think you can also wall mount it. You can watch and record TV on them, so they are basically consumer devices.

For laptops, the biggest brand (other than apple) is probably Asus (based on retail floor space ;-) ). Sony, Panasonic, Fujitsu and Toshiba pretty much share the rest. Toshiba is apparently exiting the market soon, though. From my perspective, it seems that the market is split between very high end, large format, desktop-replacement machines and tiny machines. There is not very much in the middle. I live in the countryside, though. It is very possible I don't see the interesting models where I live.

When I worked at a high school, all of the machines were actually Dell. It surprised me greatly.

One thing that most people don't realise is that Japanese electronics are expensive compared to the rest of the world. If you have high end purchases (like a computer), you can fly to Korea and the money you save will pay for the flight, easily. Especially with the insanely high yen, American machines are also a pretty good deal.

I like to support the local economy, but when Toshiba exits, I might be stuck finding the kind of machine I like to use.

<comment><USER30> I'd like to add NEC to your list (surprised no one is mentioning them). They completely dominated the Japanese PC market during the 80's and 90's, and even though the've been declining heavily since, it's still a strong brand in Japan holding about a fifth of the market share.

<comment><USER29> That's really interesting. You are right. As far as I remember, though, I've never seen one in a shop. I'm going to go to the electronics store today, so I'll have a peek for them. I know that they sell routers and and things (and in fact I will probably buy one of their routers today). Hmmm... Definitely something to consider.

Edit: I take it back. Should have did some poking around before I posted. NEC sells the Lavie model in Japan, which I have definitely seen. Looks like they are filling in that middle tier that I like as well. I wonder how well it supports Linux...

<comment><USER30> Funny you mention it - I actually have a LaVie (PC-LL750TSB [http://kakaku.com/item/K0000704707/](http://kakaku.com/item/K0000704707/)) that I purchased late 2015. I appreciate the robust feeling and the touch screen. Initially I thought the touch screen was just gimmicky, but actually started using it a lot (perhaps due to the touch pad not being sensitive enough for my taste). Also the four USB ports is something I miss on my MacBook Pro. The Intel HD Graphics 4600 handles multiple displays and 1080p video fine, but is not great for games.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> I bought a Toshiba Libretto L1 back in 2001 via the Internet (using translation services) and had it shipped to Germany. It was a fantastic form factor: A super wide 10" 1280x600 display (143dpi) which was so wide that it left enough room for a decent keyboard. The CPU was a Transmeta Crusoe 600Mhz which was, unfortunately, the bottleneck of the system.

One other highlight I remember about this machine: Despite not having any international warranty that I was aware of, when the machine developed a problem, I called Toshiba Europe and they picked it up and send it back repaired a week later for free.

I was in Japan this summer and also had a look at the notebooks on sale there but nothing really caught my attention. With the arrival of Netbooks and later the Macbook Air 11", small notebooks are no longer hard to get in Europe.

<comment> amiga-workbench I've got a few Libretto's kicking around, they are fantastic machines, full pentium class UMPC's

I've also got a GPRS modem for my 100CT and it makes a nice portable IRC machine.

[http://i.imgur.com/IUp4U7p.jpg](http://i.imgur.com/IUp4U7p.jpg)

[http://i.imgur.com/SuMjceM.jpg](http://i.imgur.com/SuMjceM.jpg)

<comment><USER32> I still have my Libretto 30, which was right on the bottom edge of usable performance with its 486-class processor and 8MB RAM. I remember being able to play MP3s - but only with the Fraunhofer codec, not WinAMP, and I eventually lost the PCMCIA sound card. It also ran Opera quite nicely. Eventually I installed Redhat.

Still the best "touchpoint" interface I've ever used, since you worked it with your thumb rather than an extended index finger. And the keyboard is just _adorable_. The whole thing fit in a pocket if you had very large pockets.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> I bought a Sony VAIO MultiFlip 13A for my wife because she loves Sony's design and she wanted a touchscreen, so we bought the basic model with an SSD.

a) of a 128GB SSD, only 90GB was left after Sony took wat they thought was necessary

b) the fan was incredibly noisy, it would crash randomly and would eventually die and take the notebook with it

c) when put in a less performant mode, it's really less performant and still gets really hot

d) the touch screen freaks out and other issues once it gets hot

e) it still ran Windows

That's what happened to Japanese laptops in my personal experience. Now I could eventually fix a) and b), e) was still required for Adobe software and it's still a freaking hot slow laptop that freaks out once in a while.

<comment><USER34> > a) of a 128GB SSD, only 90GB was left after Sony took wat they thought was > necessary

> e) it still ran Windows

Your "e" item indicates that it was not Sony who took 90G of the 128G SSD, but rather it was Microsoft who took 70% of the drive space.

Lay the blame where it belongs, on Microsoft, they created an OS that consumes 90G of disk space. Sony did not create mswin, Sony just installed it because it is what most of their target market believes they want pre-installed.

<comment><USER35> 90 GB is what was left, not what was used. But even 38 GB seems a bit too much for a fresh OS, I assume that includes a recovery partition or the good old GiB/GB mix-up.

<comment><USER36> > GiB/GB

That's only 7%

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> I've always loved their[Japanese] ultraportables for as long as I can remember. Probably their prime placement in the film and television I watched growing up. I've ended up with quite a collection of them at this point, ranging from the amazing little Vaio UX through the little Vaio P up to my 12" let's note. It weighs nothing, has an i5 and tons of RAM, I'm amazed they haven't taken over the US. Not to mention its tough as bricks. They certainly have a quirky, unique charm to them.

</comment><comment><USER38> I thought this would be about the tiny models like the Toshiba Libretto

<comment><USER39> My drinking buddy in the early 2000's carried his libretto around in big baggy jeans pockets so he could pull it out and code on his game any time he was out and about and had a free moment. I always thought that was so 1337.

<comment><USER40> I used to code on the Voyage 200, which also fit in my coat pockets: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TI-92_series#Voyage_200](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TI-92_series#Voyage_200)

My fingers were small enough to touch type on those keys.

After I grew out of TI-BASIC, I always wanted something like that for computer programming, too, but I never managed to find one.

A laptop in regular-laptop shape that was 6" or so would be ideal for me. I've also been considering a phone/phablet with a keyboard case or keyboard cover, but none seem to be touch-typable. :/

<comment><USER41> How about the Pyra? Seems to be close to your ideal. [https://pyra- handheld.com/boards/pages/pyra/](https://pyra-handheld.com/boards/pages/pyra/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> My current laptop is a toshiba, and I bought it in the US. I've had good luck with the brand over the years.

<comment><USER29> I have a Japanese Toshiba KIRA V63 (only sold in Japan, for some stupid reason). It's a great machine and quite cheap for it's specs. I bought it for battery life (I can do a whole day of programming on a single charge in Linux), but it has good performance as well. I've been very pleasantly surprised at how well the Intel 5200U has performed. Also at only 1.2 kg, I can easily stick it in my bag and carry it with me anywhere I go.

I've seen on the news that Toshiba plans to shut down its laptop division in the near future. Some people have told me that it isn't 100% for sure, so I'm hanging on to some hope. I've been looking at offerings of other Japanese makers (I live in Japan) and there is nothing else comparable. I'm not sure what I'll do when I need to replace this one. Toshiba has been my go to maker for the last 10 years or so because virtually everything they make "just works" on Linux.

<comment><USER43> >Toshiba has been my go to maker for the last 10 years or so because virtually everything they make "just works" on Linux.

This is honestly a pretty shocking statement for me, because Toshiba has long been my go-to example for the worst-case scenario of installing Linux on laptops. I have never once had a Toshiba laptop that "just worked" out of the box with Linux. Whether it was power management, display drivers, or wifi, there was always something that was broken out of the box and needed to be fixed. Heck, I have a Toshiba A305 for which Linux still doesn't have proper power management drivers, even though the laptop is about a decade old.

When people ask me about Linux on laptops, I say that they should go with either Lenovos or (more lately) the new Dell XPS models. Never Sony, never Toshiba. I've never heard of anyone having a good experience installing Linux on laptops made by those two manufacturers.

<comment><USER44> Toshiba was my first laptop back in 1999.

One of the reasons I went with them was that besides being famous for making good laptops, was that they had a dedicated Linux web site and forum for supporting Linux on their laptops.

While most other OEMs couldn't care less.

<comment><USER44> Extra info as I cannot edit my comment any longer.

They still have it, here is the German version

[http://www.toshiba.de/generic/np-linux- support/](http://www.toshiba.de/generic/np-linux-support/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER45> I bought a 11" Vaio in 1990 and loved it, but it only lasted about 18 months. I just bought one of the small 12" MacBooks last Friday and it reminds me of the Vaio experience, but I am concerned that it is not physically robust.

</comment><comment><USER46> Japan is more active around smartphones rather than laptops and desktops, since you can use them on trains, the preferred way of transport. People spend some considerable amount of time on trains.

Small spaces make desktops not a very good choice.

</comment><comment><USER47> Your anchor tags are using curly quotes, so external links aren't working.

</comment><comment><USER48> I love Panasonic's feature-packed laptops. Too bad they aren't sold in Europe, and with some strong components, too.

</comment><comment><USER49> The iPad happened. Most of the uses for the Japanese laptops can be covered by the iPad.

</comment><comment><USER50> If thats your site. Please check the mobile view.

</comment><comment><USER51> > I have a strange attachment to Panasonic

I have a lifetime prohibition on any Panasonic products after experiencing the most craptastic DVD recorder ever to grace this Earth. It crashes at random, takes forever to boot, won't boot reliably with a disc in the drive, can't play Audio CDs without locking up, responds to remote button presses with multi-second lag, and gets the tuner channels out of sync with the OSD. Basically a complete fuckup. Their "fix" in the successor model was to add a reset button. Never again Panasonic.</comment>


China Admits Problems With Three Gorges Dam - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/20/world/asia/20gorges.html?hp

<comment><USER2> Three Gorges Dam was built only to show off the engineering might of China.

Its disadvantages far outweighs its advantages.</comment>


Firefox Nightly now supports WebSocket debugging - <AUTHOR> https://blog.nightly.mozilla.org/2019/08/30/these-weeks-in-firefox-issue-63/ <comment><AUTHOR> Relevant heading: Network.

> WebSocket Inspection (GSoC project) – This feature is enabled on Nightly by > default (devtools.netmonitor.features.webSockets)

Another interesting addition is inline variable previews in the debugger. Still behind a flag: devtools.debugger.features.inline-preview</comment>


24th Birthday: What it's like to be 24 for a Software Engineer in India - <AUTHOR> http://techapj.com/24-birthday/ <comment><USER2> "IMHO work quality is severely underrated in India, everything just needs to be done, the end quality does not matter, it should just work, that's enough" \- this fact about Indian software development is well-known throughout the world.

<comment><USER3> Honestly I think that there's nothing national in this. It's just because the majority of the development work in India is being done in outsourcing. When you outsource you rarely pay for 'quality code', you pay for the code that works, delivered on time and preferably below the budget. Okay, you get what you're paying for.

Having said that I realize that this is a vicious cycle - young developers can write good code, but the market requires them to quickly crank up a lot of code which is just good enough to satisfy customer's quality requirements. In few years this developer is not able to write good code because he basically forgot how to do that.

Want to improve the quality of code from India (any other country for that matter)? Stop outsourcing there :-)

<comment><USER4> This. I've outsourced to India, Uruguay, Poland and I think Ukraine. Every single line of code from outsourcing has been thrown away. That was from finding a dev shop and them leasing one of their "devs" for x per hour (x was never under $20).

When I learnt my lesson, I thought about it and removed the indirection. Since 2011 I've only hired directly, but still remotely. I explain exactly what quality level is expected and that it's not a rush to finish.

The countries I've hired from still aren't high wages countries and the initial wages paid were the same as in my unsuccessful attempts. The quality output is far higher, and it's been worthwhile re-writing problem code rather than giving up and trashing it.

I don't think it's the country or the wages that are the problem, I think it's the indirection of another manager, plus the use of another company who often stacks (cheap) junior devs up and their only measure of success is whether their clock hours are full at the end of the month. You just can't expect that company's business goals to align with yours, especially when other companies using their services are often very inconsiderate about dropping the contracts with virtually no warning, that makes their planning really hard.

<comment><USER5> I recently did a code review for some work from a team in Ukraine. I was not expecting much - instead, I was blown away. The code was phenomenally well put together, good tests in place, comments were clear enough - this was tens of thousands of lines of code I'd never seen before and I was able to find my way around - and understand it - within just a few minutes. Not once did I cringe or find anything desperately in need of a rewrite. There were some not great architectural decisions regarding the database which I'd have done differently, but I understood how they got there, even if it was not a good point to be at.

This was easily some of the best code I've seen in years, both of my own and other colleagues. There were some key takeaways I got similar to davidjgraph's points. The company here in the US using this team worked directly with this team - there were not multiple agencies in the middle taking their cut. Additionally, it was the same core team (7? 8 people?) working for more than 2 years - they had a long term sense of commitment to the problem and the project, and it showed. Many outsourcing disasters I've seen are rush jobs by people trying to hit billable hours and move to the next project (well, same for onshore workers, really).

<comment><USER6> My experiences were similar - at the last job we had a team in Ukraine (they were in Zaporizhia and Odessa). It took a long time to find them (we wanted excellent English as well as coding skills) but once we did we signed them to a 2 year contract. They really were an extension of our company.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> s-topper >>>> _98% of Indian Population have not even heard the word "Github" in their entire life, yet everyone acts like they know this stuff_

What kind of logic is it? Are 98% of Indian population software engineers? Why do they need to know about GitHub?

<comment><AUTHOR> You haven't mentioned the complete sentence => "98% of Indian Population have not even heard the word "Github" in their entire life, yet everyone acts like they know this stuff".

The problem is "They try to act" like they know about software industry, meanwhile when you try to explain them that you are working on some open source project, they refuse to respect your opinion.

<comment><USER7> But 98% of US population, or 90% maybe - have never heard of github either.

<comment><USER8> Read the previous paragraph in the article. The point was that "everyone" assumed they understood how well he was doing, while being unable to evaluate that. (E.g. never heard of github.)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Wow man! I think you have a really bad attitude.

I am a programmer. I am not a software Engg. I am actually a Production Engg. However, I am a programmer. I'm a little bit older than you....27.

Let me tell you what I spend my days doing. I sit in a CCD (Cafe Coffe Day) with my best friend from 10:30 - 1 pm and code and work on making a beautiful product. Our product caters to the Indian market. We make a decent amount of money. Enough to allow me to buy my first house and go for vacations every few months.

My problem with your post is your attitude. India is an amazing country to me cause the market is so insanely large that if you capture a niche of a niche of a niche.... you can live a great life. In fact, I will argue, you can have a more beautiful life than you would in countries like the US etc. You will be able to delegate all boring aspects of your life (to maid and cooks and helpers and assistants who are all very cheap because labor is cheap) and just focus on what you want to do. That is the beauty of India. I could go on and on. But, let me assure you, that you are missing out if you think its a bad thing to be a skilled programmer in India.

</comment><comment><USER7> I think the outsourcing industry has killed tech entrepreneurship in India. I have checked with many 24-30 year olds, and all of them are doing the same grind for some outsourced project.

<comment><USER10> Outsourcing industry is the only reason, why the tech entrepreneurship even exists in India.

Its easy to troll on these companies for not offering us the great life in a gift box. But the fact is bulk of the infrastructure, reputation and even the very trend to help build the entire ecosystem was done by these companies.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Hah! This is very interesting.

I am a programmer from India. I somehow prefer programmer over software engineer. I turned 23 on 11th. And for me 22 was complicated enough. Interestingly, I am not from any IIT, NIT or whatever that you mention and neither do I have a job in the big brand firm.

But still I think the situation is somewhat better than what you have mentioned in your post. Maybe its a difference between where we are located but I don't get that much heat anymore as far as job and stuff are related. Also I do not think everyone should care about your open source contributions or code quality, unless by nobody you meant people who code next to you.

Also its great that you finally are doing what you like. It is pretty guaranteed that there would be people out complaining about something in your life even if you were working at some big company. It is difficult enough to be bothered with what we are doing, that we should care about what others thing. ;-) Oh btw, Happy Birthday!

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks.. :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> India is an English speaking country, and made its name writing software. (in modern times).

Yet you use the term "softwares" \- learn some grammar first - especially when it comes to your identity as a software engineer. Or are you a 'softwares engineer'?

If you are curious, I studied in Chattisgarh, India.

<comment><AUTHOR> That was a mistake. Thanks for pointing out. Corrected.

<comment><USER7> Sorry If I came across as being harsh - but you are that 0.1% minority in India, that wants/dares to be an entrepreneur.

Your courage, and determination to _try_ to break away from the suffocating conventions around you - I applaud you.

<comment><AUTHOR> No worries, Thanks for the appreciation. Glad you read the post, and pointed out the mistake. Regards.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Happy Birthday!

There will always be things that you feel like you _should_ or _must_ be doing when you are 24 or 25 or 65!

Its great that you have found something you enjoy. As you get more experience and explore new avenues, you may find things that interest you more. Be open to change. The peanut gallery will always be there, but the only person you are accountable to is yourself.

The social pressures are a part of the culture, but they are background noise as such and should be treated as much. Focus on what you want to do, and where you are going. The other things will fall into place one way or the other.

</comment><comment><USER6> So, when they ask why you aren't working for InfoSys etc., turn the question around:

"So, where did InfoSys come from? A startup like mine, right?"

Instantly, you have _potential_

</comment><comment><USER13> Heh. As a recently graduated 23yo, I feel you brah. Based on a few of my friends' experiences, I'm determined to stay away from the "outsourcing industry", where engineering quality is secondary to things like seniority, management etc. I was lucky to get an Internship with an up and coming startup and learned the ropes. :)

<comment><AUTHOR> Glad you liked the post!

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> You have to say software engineer, not programmer, engineer has to be included. It is like spying. If you work in a famous company, people could guess your salary. If you work for yourself, many things are unknown about you which irritates people. On the other hand people do business and does not reveal income to avoid paying taxes.

</comment><comment><USER15> India is not the problem neither the people around you, its your attitude. And its better we Indian's stop injecting this sort of stereotypes about the country. I will be 24, new year eve. And nobody is going to ask me to get married, nobody is going to until I am 27 or 28, and I don't have to go for arranged marriage. After college I threw away offers from these big companies Infosys, Wipro, Accenture or whatever and choose to work in startups. And boy, the job is awesome and you get paid fine, better than my friends in these so called big companies. I didn't study in any of those NIT's or IIT's and I don't think that really matters to you in any regard. My parent's weren't supportive and I have been asked several times to quit the job in india and go abroad and work. But I don't think there is anything negative in it. They have grown up in a situation where married life and job in a good company/government service were important. Make yourself clear to them and none is going to ask that to you again, they are educated enough to understand that and they will be happy as long as you are (and its a good thing about Indian parents). And why should you care about what others think or care as long as you are living a life that satisfies you? Indian's maybe a little nosy about things you do. But its never going to affect you as long as you don't want it to.

        The term "Entrepreneur" here in India is a synonym for "Jobless"

hell no!! they are respected and appreciated. We have startup incubators in India, the governments are supportive as well. [http://startupvillage.in](http://startupvillage.in)

        IMHO work quality is severely underrated in India, everything just needs to be done, the end quality does not matter, it should just work, that's enough

No! there are companies that value good programming, and they are ready to higher you at a good cost and you are appreciated for writing good code. There are Indian's working in Indian companies who do contribute to some major open source projects. And I have friends in these big companies who are really good programmers and writing good code there, neither they are under appreciated. And in business "Everything needs to be done", and for the end quality to matter. Its the programmer's discretion. Its not specific to India. And at 24, probably your life just started and there is lot to live and achieve (it doesn't matter you are in India or in US). And life on entrepreneurs is just as hard as it is for the ones in other countries, its not any different.

</comment><comment><USER16> That sounds pretty tough, Arpit. Best of luck following your intuition, and be patient with your family. :)

</comment><comment><USER17> Well, too much is being told about the Indian outsourced code quality.

I did some bit of work on VWorker (now Freelancer) based out of India and I always got good ratings for my work, never once, I was told that the code I delivered was a shit job.

</comment><comment><USER18> I have to ask - what's up with the " _Steve Bhagavat Gita_ "?

<comment><AUTHOR> To answer this question, I wrote an entire blog post, explaining how Steve affected my life - [http://techapj.com/thank-you- steve/](http://techapj.com/thank-you-steve/)

In short, I think of "Steve Jobs Stanford Commencement Speech" as a modern approach to "Bhagavat Gita".

<comment><USER19> As someone from a Hindu family - this was very interesting. Thanks for sharing.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> I am from south of India - In Kerala, my state, marriage is a 30ish affair. 20s is the time to explore,experience,learn and experiment. Nobody but you can stop yourself from achieving your dreams.

</comment><comment><USER21> If someone asked me what my salary was, I'd kick them in the teeth. Not sure if that's a 'British' thing, but asking someone what their salary is, is really rude!

<comment><USER22> Welcome to India. Around 22, all your relatives (especially aunts) turn into marriage bureaus and need this information. Hell, even matrimonial ads feature "x figure income" here!

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> Happy birthday, you think 24 is bad? I'm gonna be 29 in May, and I'm an American, and I feel pressured to get married and have kids too.. Haha.

<comment><USER22> You and Jalan are really freaking me out. I am in early twenties and about to finish studies. I'm more of an introvert and people asking me all those questions is going to be, well, quite unpleasant!

<comment><USER23> My mom is most of it, the other bit is a good friend of mine... I was in a relationship for 6 years, 2 of those years engaged... It didn't work out. My shortest ever relationship was 3 months. I've dated many woman since my first girlfriend at 15... But I decided I wanted to focus on my career over relationships for the last 4 years, now my family and friends feel as if I am never gonna get married or have kids... I had always set a goal of not having kids until I'm 30.

Needless to say, I'm starting to search now... :/

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Happy birthday, Arpit! 24 is a great year.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks!

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> so when will you get married ;)

</comment><comment><USER26> What about female software engineers in India? I know this is off topic, but I wonder what pressures they feel at 24. What are their relatives asking them?

Back on topic, happy birthday Mr Jalan!

<comment><USER15> They certainly do feel a lot of pressure. But their opinions about their life and career are respected, at least for my female friends.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Hey, firstly Happy Birthday!

>>I mean, literally, give me some personal space. I am just (about to be) 24. I have to achieve some things in my life first, I have set some goals.

You know what, go check what has become of people who marry late and have all sort of financial commitments like their daughters marriage or their retirement year or their kids educational fees coming pounding on them just 2 years from their retirement.

There is a reason why people prescribe early marriage, you can be off your responsibilities early. And that ensures you have a peaceful time after your 50's.

>>In India, it's hard for people to believe that a person can be successful by bootstrapping his own business.

So wrong, Stories of successful Marwari's, Gujrati's and People from Kerala are a common place in India. Please don't generalize so much. So people know the truth too, but its not about the truth, Its about safety and fear.

To understand why parents in India prevent their kids from starting their own business, especially those from lower middle class and poor back grounds is the fact that parents slog like dogs their whole life to get their kids into a position where they can secure a decent job. Imagine giving all that away(Decades worth hardwork) and risk it all on a venture which statistically is almost assured to fail.

For the higher middle class and rich kids this is nothing. Because they fall back on father's property and some thick dowry sort of gifts coming in a never ending stream from their father in law to keep them and sustain them in the game.

For some one poor it means game over, and they have start all over again work a few decades and hope their kids don't make the same mistake again.

>>The term "Entrepreneur" here in India is a synonym for "Jobless".

That's because starting up petty grocery stores was the trend if you didn't net a job else where.

>>If you are not employed, then be ready to hear some harsh comments from your relatives

May be for a good reason. If you are 24 and still expecting your dad to support you to buy a tooth brush in the morning. I don't think that's acceptable.

>>98% of Indian Population have not even heard the word "Github" in their entire life, yet everyone acts like they know this stuff

98% of the population in any country haven't heard about Github. Have you heard of the top civil engineering related discussion site? How many times do you visit that site per day?

>>(IMHO work quality is severely underrated in India, everything just needs to be done, the end quality does not matter, it should just work, that's enough

Who told you that? I've worked on some top notch projects here. You get what you want. If your aim is simply to buy a few expensive flats in Bangalore, buy a car, watch movies in a multiplex all weekend and eat out. You might as well play some dirty polities secure a undeserved promotion and travel abroad to fund it.

But there are awesome projects all over the place. You will get them if you look for them.

>>From where you have done your Engineering

Because statistically speaking, someone with an engineering degree generally does better than the one that doesn't.

>>The brand name of the company you work for (Infosys...

I've worked in one such a company, Most of the people who worked with are all doing well. Many have started companies, and many are working public projects of importance.

Do you even know what kind of ecosystem, training, infrastructure and facilities such companies offer. Its next to impossible to match that outside such companies, I was fortunate to have benefited immensely in early parts of my career. If you walk in a gold mine, and worry all about mud, I'm not surprised if you don't find gold ever.

>>Luckily for me, my parents were supportive...

Finally! There are folks in this country whose parents don't have the money to buy them even a pair of slippers throughout their entire 4 years of engineering. I hope you understand why such people make choices they make.</comment>


File Format Posters - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/corkami/pics/tree/master/binary <comment><USER2> Reminds me of the MPEG-2 transport stream poster: [http://in.tek.com/poster/mpeg-poster-dvb](http://in.tek.com/poster/mpeg- poster-dvb)

If he runs out of file formats, he could move on to protocols...

</comment><comment><USER3> _edit_ : I just noticed the author has a link to order prints from him/her, that's definitely the more polite option: [http://www.redbubble.com/people/ange4771](http://www.redbubble.com/people/ange4771)

It also seems to be less expensive than options like Office Depot, too.

Does anybody have any suggestions on how to get these printed as full-sized posters?

<comment><USER4> From the readme in the parent directory: [http://prints.corkami.com/](http://prints.corkami.com/)

<comment><USER3> Funny enough, I edited my comment at just about the same time you posted this comment :-)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> > > [https://github.com/corkami/pics/blob/master/binary/CryptoMod...](https://github.com/corkami/pics/blob/master/binary/CryptoModes.png)

This one is great. Nothing as using crypto wrong so that it becomes useless.

</comment><comment><USER6> I'm a big fan of these posters! I even made something similar to show the format of the Tor consensus [0]

[0] [http://jordan- wright.com/blog/images/blog/how_tor_works/cons...](http://jordan- wright.com/blog/images/blog/how_tor_works/consensus.png)

<comment><USER7> Nice! What tool, and technique, did you use to create this?

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> back before 2000, it really was important to know file formats. we didn't use libraries. we looked up the formats in books and implemented fresh code every time. I prided myself on having memorized most of the .wav header, enough that i didn't need a reference. Then, I learned .fig. Then, I worked on understanding .jpg.

Nowadays, with widespread APIs, the file formats' significance is almost irrelevant! In theory, _only a single person in the world_ needs to know any file format. Everyone else can use a library they've written.

my how the world changes :)

<comment><USER9> If only that were true. Yet as far as I can determine there is no available Java library which allows for full reading _and writing_ of the JPEG/EXIF file format. There are a number of Java libraries which allow for reading and encoding JPEG image data but none of them offer complete support for the metadata.

The JPEG/EXIF format itself is a mess, just a completely horrible design. It's one of those old-school file formats like MS Word .doc which isn't so much of a "format" as modern programmers commonly understand the term but more like a straight dump of memory chunks into a file. That's not so bad if you're programming in C but surprisingly difficult in higher-level safe languages like Java.

<comment><USER10> For metadata, did you check Tika?

<comment><USER9> I tried that but it's pretty buggy. Writing some metadata just fails silently with no indication of what went wrong.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> What! I always thought .SWF was for "ShockWave Flash", not Small Web Format. Ha, a bit late to learn though.

<comment><USER12> In all reality, it was originally named after Shockwave Flash, but the extension meaning was retcon'd to Small Web Format to avoid confusion with Shockwave.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> This is excellent, thanks a lot for sharing!

</comment><comment><USER14> Thank you so much. I need to write a program that creates png files from arbitrary data so this will certainly come in handy!

</comment><comment><USER15> It would be awesome to have a file poster of itself. For when one day we run out of electricity and hand-translate bits.

</comment><comment><USER16> We have two of these prints up in our office. I highly recommend them, even if just as decoration.

</comment><comment><USER17> Great stuff but the font is comical.

<comment><USER18> Does anyone know what font is used in the main code in the following image?

[https://raw.githubusercontent.com/corkami/pics/master/binary...](https://raw.githubusercontent.com/corkami/pics/master/binary/CLASS.png)

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Awesome! Where can I buy the book?

</comment><comment><USER20> > gif.png

This made me chuckle.

</comment><comment><USER21> Very cool

</comment><comment><USER22> Wow! These are pretty cool.</comment>


Ask HN: Best technical / scientific resources for cannbis-related subjects? - <AUTHOR>

Coming from development, it's frustrating to see the dearth of good, technical material in the weed world on subjects like growing, harvesting, manufacturing oils and resins, producing potent edibles, and other cannabis-related topics. Most of what I've found seems to be "do X until Z looks like Y" and ultimately comes down to guesswork.
Does anyone know of any good blogs, books, or materials that go into the science behind the production and consumption of marijuana?
Thanks! <comment><USER2> I'd recommend Ed Rosenthal's "Marijuana Grower's Handbook" here: [http://www.amazon.com/Marijuana-Growers-Handbook-Complete- Cu...](http://www.amazon.com/Marijuana-Growers-Handbook-Complete- Cultivation/dp/0932551467)

You can find more gems by looking at Oaksterdam's recommended reading lists for their classes: [http://oaksterdamuniversity.com/students/textbooks/](http://oaksterdamuniversity.com/students/textbooks/) (scroll down the page a bit to see the books)

And of course, the Oaksterdam classes are a great resource if you're nearby.

</comment><comment><USER3> This may be a good place to start-

[http://www.coloradonorml.org/information/resources](http://www.coloradonorml.org/information/resources)

</comment><comment><USER4> 'site:.edu OR site:.gov' into any decent search engine. Also, look for country's who love cannibis, add their related tld; eg. site:.gov.au. Good luck in your search!</comment>