Saying goodbye to App Review Times - <AUTHOR> https://daveverwer.com/blog/saying-goodbye-to-app-review-times/ <comment><USER2> Thanks, Dave. Your site helped us understand when we had to submit our app to be live on specific deadlines. Most of the time it was pretty accurate.

But I am glad we no longer need an site like this because Apple improved one of the worst parts of the AppStore (from dev POV).

</comment><comment><USER3> How about a site that shows how often an App has been purchased?

</comment><comment><USER4> It was shutdown because it isn't needed anymore. The review times are usually short and the quality of crowdsourced data is lower because of this.

[https://daveverwer.com/blog/saying-goodbye-to-app-review- tim...](https://daveverwer.com/blog/saying-goodbye-to-app-review-times/)

<comment><USER5> That's a great summary! :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> This truly was an awesome service.

Back in the day when I started out dev'ing on iOS, I remember times when it would take up to 4 weeks to get an app out. It was painful, as you'd wait weeks to get a rejection on some simple sub-clause that took 5 mins to fix.

Thanks @daveverwer for this service over all these years! :)

<comment><USER5> Thanks for the kind words!

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Thank you for providing App Review Times for so long. I used (and gave my own results to) this service. I wish you good luck in your next adventure.

<comment><USER5> Thanks for the kind words!

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> The actual shutdown blog post is linked from the page:

[https://daveverwer.com/blog/saying-goodbye-to-app-review- tim...](https://daveverwer.com/blog/saying-goodbye-to-app-review-times/)

It would be nice to see a final graph of review times across the entire span the data was tracked. Luckily there's Archive.org to fulfill that curiosity in some way. Here's 2018:

[https://web.archive.org/web/20181202101424/http://appreviewt...](https://web.archive.org/web/20181202101424/http://appreviewtimes.com/ios/annual- trend-graph)

<comment><USER5> > It would be nice to see a final graph of review times across the entire span > the data was tracked. Luckily there's Archive.org to fulfill that curiosity > in some way. Here's 2018:

Yes, I considered doing that but didn't have time and just needed to get it shut down in the end. The original shutdown plans included this but then having to actually get all of that organised was delaying it from actually getting shut down :)

<comment><USER9> As somebody who has maintained free things that are much smaller and less prominent, I salute you. Both for the work, and for shutting it down thoughtfully. Please don't measure yourself against what you might have done! Count instead the people you helped, which sounds like a lot of people.

<comment><USER5> Thank you :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Tl;Dr: the site shut down because review times are about 1 day now and are stable, so the site isn't useful anymore.

The blog did one of those _charming_ things where it tells you that it'll tell you what you want to know... But after paragraphs of history.

<comment><USER11> Actually, it's in the first paragraph.

The rest is history.

<comment><USER10> The second paragraph is:

"Why did the site shut down? I'll get to that, but let's start with a little history"

The history wasn't highly relevant to the explanation. Lead with that and if people want to know more they can keep reading.

<comment><USER9> My word! How shocking! You had to read nearly 800 whole words. You should definitely cancel your subscription. Maybe even ask for a refund.

Seriously, people like you, who whine about free things while contributing nothing, are a real reason people shut down free things. Or don't start them at all. Any time I think about releasing open source code, I go through the calculus of "How many demanding, entitled goofs would I have to deal with?"</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Array Data Structure - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/java-vault/array-data-structure-6bfafc340a07 <comment><AUTHOR> My first share here, on ycombinator. Post concerning one of the basics of Computer Science. Feel free to comment if you have any suggestions or corrections.</comment>


Google+ plays the waiting game to dominate Facebook and Twitter - <AUTHOR> http://mattreport.com/2012/08/google-plays-the-waiting-game-to-destroy-facebook-and-twitter/

<comment><USER2> Honestly I don't want any single company dominate any field to the extent that MS dominated desktop computers.</comment>


The Next Phase of the Retail Apocalypse: Stores Reborn as E-Commerce Warehouses - <AUTHOR> https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-next-phase-of-the-retail-apocalypse-stores-reborn-as-e-commerce-warehouses-11595044859 <comment><USER2> I got a buddy who works for DSCO, a company which, among other things, sells software that makes it easy for brick-and-mortar stores to sell products online and have the products ship from the retailer's warehouses. Around the time of the pandemic, they change their software so that the stores themselves would look like warehouses to the software. That way, they could ship from any of these so-called warehouses and then support ship-from-store on the websites of their customers. This functionality was sort of in in demand before the pandemic, but many potential customer said "no thanks, we'll build it ourselves". After the pandemic hit, everyone went scrambling to DSCO for help to support ship-from-store.

This article seems to talk about the next logical step away from ship-from- store: turn the store into a shipping yard.

<comment><USER3> Honestly I wish there was 'ship-a-replacement' to store.

If something is on Amazon, why can't I pick up from Home Deport and have them ship inventory to Home Depot to replace the thing I just picked up...

<comment><USER4> If the item is at Home Depot and you want to pick it up... why not just get it from Home Depot?

<comment><USER3> Pricing.

<comment><USER5> How would you guarantee the item is not a counterfeit/broken in transit/transported at the right temperatures/etc?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Expensive fulfillment warehouses. If you watch the 2000 interview of Jeff Bezos - the reason he predicted he would beat retail was because the cost of square foot of his fulfillment centers was a fraction of what retail pays.

<comment><USER5> I'm willing to pay Home Depot/Lowes/Best Buy/Target/Costco/REI/Nordstroms/Apple multiples of what Amazon would cost to ensure I don't have to waste my time searching through uncurated AliExpress garbage.

<comment><USER7> man, i often hear people complain about aliexpress, i just don't understand it. i've been buying and using headscratchingly cheap products from china through aliexpress, and seriously as long as you're not a complete newbie to online shopping, it's not that difficult to find a legitimate store selling perfectly usable generic or unbranded products at a fraction of the cost of the branded version and they all work just fine. i've easily saved thousands of dollars over the years this way. i don't understand why people are so against this - a lot of what they buy from amazon or supermarkets in fact come from china as well.

<comment><USER8> Is that stuff tested by Underwriters Laboratories?

It makes sense that if Amazon is just dumping the same stuff under fake brands, why not go to the source. But anything that uses electricity could burn your house down, couldn't it?

<comment><USER7> i mean... that's a legit theoretical concern, but so far i've bought many dirt cheap electronic products from ali for years and so far they've all worked as advertised.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> As everyone moves to e-commerce, a lot of companies are going to be burned by counterfeit products finding their way into their warehouses. This is a problem Amazon just kinda ignores, because it has such a high volume that they can just accept returns no-questions-asked. But when store-that-is-accustomed- to-in-person-sales suddenly has a bunch of people returning items that are wrong, they won't know what to do. Are the customers scamming them, sending back the wrong item? Was it the supplier? The manufacturer's warehouse? Their own warehouse? It's a tough problem, perhaps there's room for a 3rd party company that only traces the source of counterfeits.

<comment><USER10> That's just for the products that can be proven to be fakes. There is also a lot that just are shoddy that you cannot prove, in which case the store loses a repeat customer.

Amazon has already lost me for products where I care about quality. The Pilot G2-05 pens I buy in store ($5 each in Australia) have never had any issues and all worked flawlessly until I drained them of ink. The Amazon 12 pack hasn't had a single pen reach the end of its life.

<comment><USER11> My favorite pens are pentel energel 0.7. Dark black ink, lowest writing effort, never blobby or scratchy. I get them from Amazon, but would be devastated if they started be counterfeited.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> They better make the experience much better. They don't pay the gig workers nearly enough to care and get this stuff right. I don't blame the pickers at all. The stuff in retail stores isn't labeled for warehouse style picking.

When my wife sends me to the store with the list, I have a hard enough time getting exactly what she wants, and I already have a pretty good idea what she wants since I live with her.

A poor hourly gig worker has no chance of getting it right.

<comment><USER13> My local Vons keeps sending me $20 off coupons if I use their delivery service. I've tried; 3 times. All failures.

First, their UI is confusing. I didn't realize at first that I could specify—for each item—if I would accept a substitution or not. And I got about 70% of my order right, 15% wrong, and 15% missing.

The second time, I diligently went through each item in my cart and set my substitution preference. This is another fail. The choices are (1) No substitutions; (2) substitute with same brand, different size; or (3) substitute with different brand, same size.

What I would like is "(4) Cancel the entire order if you can't fulfill this item" and "(5) These _x_ items are all-or-none" But that's a logistical nightmare I assume. They're not going to have the pickers drop the cart as soon as they realize they can't find item #23 on my list. Nor can they criss- cross the store verifying the must-haves before moving on with the rest of the list.

And the failures are not just missing items. Substitution preferences are subjective and personal. On my first order, they didn't have Diet Coke. So I got regular Coke instead. When I got wise to setting the preferences, it still resulted in getting the chips, but no dip.

Perfect, real-time inventory won't solve this. I can order an item that's in stock, then get "front-run" by a shopper who's actually in the store.

FWIW, I have these issues regardless if it's Instacart or Vons' own delivery personnel (They use both). And I don't blame the picker one bit. I used to shop for my Dad when he could no longer drive. He was just as disappointed with my results as I am with theirs :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Why do people keep posting paid articles here? Most people don't have subscriptions

<comment><USER15> If you're not paying to read it, someone else is paying to have you read it.

<comment><USER16> And if you _are_ paying to read it, someone else is _still_ paying to have you read it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> It's going to happen, this is actually why I've re-focused on Supply Chain/Logistics as there is so much room for potential growth and re-capturing losses within them as I saw working in the Automotive side of Logistics and Supply Chain a few years back.

We're going through a very unique, but much needed, transition right now that will likely bring about the automated warehouses, distribution hubs, and transport depots we always read about in books and and sci-fi lore--and that so many feared. It also re-enforces the need for UBI now more than ever, something that not long ago was though to be impossible, yet is being pilot tested by Andrew Yang and Jack Dorsey as well as other places in the US, and even by YC itself!

I'm actually optimistic, and believe if we play it right it could in fact be the seeds that allow for a Post-scarcity economy one day on Earth, as so much is lost in critical supply chains, and having these over-extended international based ones may have done more harm than good, as they accelerated a race to the bottom system in terms of price and quality (even on critical things like Medical Supplies/Drugs) as so much went to China but also made most countries entirely dependent on the CCP and has way more Geo- political consequences than we can predict.

Right now I'm taking a course in Supply Chain Operations and my final will be analyzing the consequences from the displacement of critical manufactured goods (PPE) to China and the affects it has had during the onset of COVID, and now also recently due to the massive flooding in Wuhan and the surrounding areas of China [1].

The most optimistic delays in lead-time are 2-3 weeks, but if COVID showed anything, as we saw with Medical staff in the US and even Australia having to go months without PPE and wearing trash bags in lieu of actual medical grade PPE, is that its best to actually double that to get an accurate time.

But it wasn't all bad as it also saw many 3D printing hobbyists use the technology for ACTUALLY MEANINGFUL potential instated of printing trinkets you use to clutter a work desk. And some other companies, mostly in the automotive Industry, pivoted to making breathing apparatuses.

1: [https://www.msn.com/en-us/weather/topstories/record-china- fl...](https://www.msn.com/en-us/weather/topstories/record-china-flooding- impacts-ppe-supply-chain-to-us/ar-BB16VX4L)

<comment><USER18> > I've re-focused on Supply Chain/Logistics as there is so much room for > potential growth and re-capturing losses within them

Could you expand on this some more?

I realized you spoke a bit about this issue in the rest of your post, but I would love to read more specifics.

<comment><USER17> > Could you expand on this some more?

I could talk about this for hours, but I'll keep it as short as I'm still in midterms week. The basics of Lean and Sigma Six are damn near antithetical to the the Chinese model business model of flooding the Market with sub-par quality, albeit incredibly cheap products. There are many reasons why this has worked for them so far, but in the case with PPE it is literately a life and death situation so it should be one of the few Industries that remain in the nation.

So, rather than fumble with delays in leadtime, bad QC/QA and constant shipping delays it is my contention that trying to bypass these incredible losses [1] is a much better solution for all involved (including the Environment), which inevitably leads to this [2] and we finally accept this [3] and we can strategize with key talent that is now fleeing Hong Kong due to the CCP's constant belligerence as they flow into Taiwan, UK, Australia and the US and help them create far more viable and sustainable business models with proper equipment and eventually displace the need for China in this sector.

I think it can be done for food as well, as that is what I was primarily focused on during my Ag apprenticeship (local, sustainable food/Ag supply chains) and my return to culinary as I worked on farm to table models in Europe and the US, and then tried to gather more info from Big Food Multinationals when I was at IBM's Blockchain Lab program, which failed to live up to it's potential and I got fed up with the status quo that made it's 'food safety' program a total farce and instead returned to the Culinary Industry after I shuttered my startup. It was a shame as they had so many Food multi-national's excited about the tech and would it could do to for their bottom line: consider 40% of all food in transport is lost due to perishability and fluctuations in temp/humidity.

Had my plan worked I would have been at SpaceX right now trying to learn their internal logistical network of their food and beverage program to eventually join Squareroots in the future, I was working at Kimbal's place, and try to help be a part of the Team to create a sustainable model for the container gardens for Mars colonization. Suffice it to say I can really nerd out on that sector more than PPE but I'd probably end up doing a Grad Level dissertation instead of actually doing the work.

1: [https://www.businessinsider.in/india/news/after-50000-ppe- ki...](https://www.businessinsider.in/india/news/after-50000-ppe-kits-from- china-fail-quality-tests-india-ramps-up-in-house- production/articleshow/75173170.cms)

2: [https://www.bbc.com/news/world- europe-52092395](https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-52092395)

3: [https://nypost.com/2020/04/18/why-america-desperately- needs-...](https://nypost.com/2020/04/18/why-america-desperately-needs-a-hard- decoupling-from-china/)

<comment><USER18> Fun!

Thank you for the reply — it got my gears turning in a very good way.

Best of luck with mid-terms!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Ship-from-retail-store doesn't work very well. You get some random subset of what you ordered. The online ordering system needs to know the inventory to make this work right. Right now, I can get quick delivery of a random subset of what I order from Safeway, Doordash, or Costco. They send some random gig worker into the store and mark up the prices. I'd rather have two-day delivery of exactly what I ordered.

So how good are these new outfits at that?

<comment><USER20> Can you expand on what you mean by some random subset of what you ordered?

<comment><USER21> I think they meant "random subset of what you can order"

<comment><USER12> No, they mean random subset of what you tried to order. If you use Instacart, at least in California, there is a good chance that 1/3 of your items will be "unavailable" and they just won't get it.

The problem is, if you order flour, milk, and sugar, and then they don't bring the sugar, you can't make the thing you wanted to make. But you also can't return the partial order.

<comment><USER22> And that's legal? The more you know...

<comment><USER23> Speaking as a California scrooge, I still prefer it to the alternatives honestly. My neighborhood has one mini-target and three local grocers one of which is a co-op. All three local grocers are garbage, their quality is fine but nothing wild and most of the price is for pretty looking food that doesn't scare the local yoga moms. Also, because they are all small and the target had to agree not to sell certain things the food variety available is not stellar. Thanks to Instacart I can order from places with real prices and a wide range of grocery products. Instacart is especially great because Amazon Fresh, although better than the local options for variety, is also wildly over priced and so if I want delivery+thrift Instacart is basically the only game in town because the bar is that low. I am thrilled at the idea that some of these local shops might finally have to adapt thanks to the increasing presence of delivery services.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> This is not really the next phase - retail has been on a downward trajectory since the first online sale was made. The spiral down just buffered by a global economy that was growing.

Working with Westfield back in 2008 there was talks already of redesigning mall footprints to have smaller stores that can act as pop-up shops/ collection points etc. However there was an overall equilibrium achieved as malls started playing into the idea that their differentiation was on "experience".

Shopping and going to the mall remains a highly social activity. And I believe will survive well past the pandemic. And perhaps stores will be smaller individually and act as both in-store sales, collection points for online purchases and pop-up stores to market new products.

<comment><USER25> I think malls might be sustainable with just clothing and restaurants (and the Apple Store).

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> Local stores still can compete with speed and shopping experience. Ie the future of stores is hybrid local/e-commerce.

I hope that there will be both types of stores in the future for the city center to flourish. Imagine going as a tourist to a city which only had e-commerce and not stores that would probably not be as fun experience as a live city with local shopping.

<comment><USER27> I might be the only person who dislikes traveling. To me, traveling is an expensive way to explore food, museums and maybe some overcrowded landmarks. I went to Paris, Tokyo, and all we did was followed a guidebook of one touristy place after another.

Instead, I prefer to save that money to do something here locally. Maybe go get a nice dinner at the French Laundry. Or rent a convertible and cruise around in Californian weather. Yes, just because it's local doesn't mean that it's any less. If I lived in Paris, I would want to check out my own city thoroughly. Explore corners of Paris every weekend.

Traveling is overrated IMO. I hate the logistics, I somewhat dislike the experience as a whole but maybe some places are fun. Especially like going to Asian cities where it is a whole another world.

Here in America where I live, there is so much stuff to see already. Just do a cross country road trip for 3 weeks. Totally unmatched experience.

Tourists, no matter how "covert", are basically treated like a commodity and no one really gives a shit about you as a tourist to come and explore the culture.

Tourism was incredible 40 years ago probably when mobility wasn't that accessible. $400 flights to Asia and Europe has killed it for me just by the virtue of explosion of tourism. I want genuine connection with foreign cultures. Off beaten paths are actually quite beaten up, despite of what you think.

<comment><USER28> > I might be the only person who dislikes traveling. To me, traveling is an > expensive way to explore food, museums and maybe some overcrowded landmarks. > I went to Paris, Tokyo, and all we did was followed a guidebook of one > touristy place after another.

> Just do a cross country road trip for 3 weeks. Totally unmatched experience.

It sounds like you do like travelling, but dislike the tourism industry. It's quite possible to get the same tourism experience you describe for Paris in any major US city. It's also possible to travel in Europe without feeling like you're visiting a theme park— ditch the guidebook and just wander.

<comment><USER29> Yeah, maybe not do the standard American thing and visit 5 countries in 2 weeks. Pick one of them and visit more places than just the capital.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> This is becoming more common in retail now. It requires a common set of systems and databases for both the retail and eCommerce business. (Side note - this is the scope of The Phoenix Project)

</comment><comment><USER31> Article appeared on another site without paywall:

[https://www.marketscreener.com/WALMART-INC-4841/news/The- Nex...](https://www.marketscreener.com/WALMART-INC-4841/news/The-Next-Phase- of-the-Retail-Apocalypse-Stores-Reborn-as-E-Commerce-Warehouses-30945947/)

<comment><USER32> Bless you kind stranger</comment></comment>


Show HN: Innovative tool to assess applicants' knowledge of ReactJS - <AUTHOR> https://react.qas.itsquiz.com/ <comment><USER2>
        Created by JavaScript professionals. Powered by ItsQuiz.ai

Next time, make sure "deployed by people who understand wildcard certs" is on the list.

        react.qas.itsquiz.com uses an invalid security certificate. The certificate is only valid for the following names: app.qas.itsquiz.com, qas.itsquiz.com, wall.qas.itsquiz.com</comment>


Open-source geo is really something right now - <AUTHOR> https://trackchanges.postlight.com/open-source-geo-is-really-something-right-now-f8e310c5f57a#.wbks9g5ea <comment><USER3> One thing that mystifies me is a common pattern of attitudes I see regarding capturing knowledge.

Clicking around you'll find repeated references to Leibniz and Descartes dreaming of a way to capture all of human knowledge via axiomatic statements, lemmas, and conclusions; then easily dismissed as impractical.

This article talks about the Semantic Web, which is then immediately made fun of with derisive references to Rudolf Carnap and the urge to "Pokemonize" all of human knowledge.

What I want to know is, even if it is impossible to capture all of human wisdom/conclusions, why does that by definition mean the effort is worthless? After all, when looking at information rather than conclusions - <USER2> isn't complete, will never be complete, but it is still useful for what is there.

<comment><USER4> It's not just that it's impossible to capture everything in one database, it's that it's a waste of time to try. There is no format that can capture all nuances and be useful for all purposes.

Data is messy. The only thing you can do with it is preserve the original format that was used to record it, transform a copy to a format that's useful for the analysis you want to do, and join it to other, similarly messy data.

Wikipedia is a perfect example. It's messy as hell. It's blobs of data with connections between them. Most of the blobs are unstructured text (or at best semi-structured) but there are a bunch of images in various formats there, and links to outside datasources in myriad formats and locations. There are some standards and attempts to maintain order, but the whole thing is damn difficult to process by machine. It's a very, very long way from the Semantic Web.

<comment><USER5> It's certainly possible to capture everything a human can know in one database. The human brain demonstrates that it's possible. It might be a bit tricky to capture artifacts that come from messy wetware with something simpler than a simulation of messy wetware, but there is no theoretical barrier to having all human knowledge in one query-able location.

<comment><USER6> The brain is not a computer and the mind is not a database. It does not store discrete data items.

<comment><USER7> If it can compute, it's a computer. If it can store and retrieve data, it's a database.

<comment><USER8> The human brain stores information. I would not call it a database.

Let's start with your statement: "If it can store and retrieve data, it's a database." One of the notable characteristics of human memory is that it is not reliable. It does NOT reliably retrieve the data that it stored -- and I don't just mean that we forget some things, I mean that many of our memories are factually incorrect.

Human memory is extraordinarily USEFUL, but in order for the term "database" to have a useful meaning, I have to categorize human memory as a form of information storage that is NOT a "database".

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> -> [https://openaddresses.io/](https://openaddresses.io/)

</comment><comment><USER10> Interesting. The post references sources such as Mapzen which allows you to extract portions of data for peculiar needs. Mapzen also provides an api for turn by turn navigation and there is a plugin to use it on a web based map. I use DeLorme's street atlas on my tablet. It works great and is inexpensive. Just don't bother with any map pack additions as when you try to download more than a few square miles, delorme then promptly throttles you to 1990 dialup speeds. Viking (sourceforge) is also an option but there is no real time gps with windows.

</comment><comment><USER11> Also check out the work done by LocationTech: [https://www.locationtech.org/](https://www.locationtech.org/)</comment>


How I improved Twitter Handles Search's ranking - <AUTHOR> http://blog.algolia.com/improving-ranking-twitter-handles-search/

<comment><USER2> Seems pretty good, however if you search for "bill", the 3rd result is "Ryan Seacrest"

If there's only a partial match with the description it probably shouldn't rank it so highly

<comment><AUTHOR> You're right "Ryan Seacrest" has +10M followers.

As you might have read on the blog, the user query produces 2 underlying queries. The first targeting top users (having 10M+ followers). This one retrieves "Ryan Seacrest", even if the match was only part of the description. It would be better if replaced by a query targeting the user's followers, but I reached Twitter's rate limits while implementing it. The second targeting others.

<comment><AUTHOR> I've just committed a patch skipping top users if the match was only in the description, with typos. Thanks for your feedback.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Demo is available at [http://twittersearch.algolia.io](http://twittersearch.algolia.io)</comment>


The Top TED talks for startups - <AUTHOR> http://venturebeat.com/2012/08/30/the-riskiest-thing-you-can-do-now-is-be-safe-the-top-10-ted-talks-for-startups/

<comment><USER2> Life as a Bootstrapped Entrepreneur by Richard Branson is spot on.

</comment><comment><USER3> Are startups predominantly run by white males or are they just the one's on the speakers circuit?

<comment><USER4> Why does it matter?

<comment><USER3> It may not matter at all. Then again it could be an indication that a large group of people with excellent ideas are not joining or progressing in an industry.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Simon Senek and David Rose's talks are spot on.

<comment><USER6> Another good Simon Sinek talk: <https://vimeo.com/40979758>

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Someone should do one-minute versions of these TED talks.

</comment><comment><USER8> Is it bad that when I hear David Rose talk I just want to skip to the Richard Branson video?</comment>


Alan Kay on Hoping That "Simple" is not "Too Simple" - <AUTHOR> http://computinged.wordpress.com/2010/04/23/alan-kay-on-hoping-that-simple-is-not-too-simple/ <comment><USER2> _I'm guessing that this is where similar computer students with undergraduate degrees might wind up — essentially doing bricklaying in some corporate notion of architecture._

"Bricklaying in some corporate notion of architecture." That is an excellent description of what a lot of software developers actually do.

<comment><USER3> It's more like plumbing, actually.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I wish Alan had at least hinted at his partitioning of the ways "humans make and do things".

I can only think of it in terms of my undergrad curriculum (where I apparently "didn't learn much that is good"). There's math, which gives us many formal ways of thinking about things. That intersects with CS because most computers have trouble with the natural ambiguity of our minds. Then there's the "Philosophy of Mathematics" or "CogSci", which asks "what are we capable of thinking?", or more precisely "what kind of thinking can machines do for us?", and the practical side of that coin, which is what most of undergrad CS focuses on: hardware architecture, operating systems, networking, compiler theory, type theory, virtual machines, etc.

The latter-most is the bricklaying, I get that. I suppose the compiler and language design might be architecture, and the epistemological questions might be "modeling"? But then how is epistemology split up into three sub-divisions of its own? Does this even make sense?

</comment><comment><USER5> Why doesn't Alan Kay have a blog/site?

<comment><USER6> It's not a personal site, but he founded an institute which does really awesome work on "fundamental new computing technologies", such as creating powerful new languages and techniques for building a full software stack (from OS to user-level apps) all within 20,000 lines of code!

<http://vpri.org/></comment></comment>


Google Recruiter Mike Junge on Startups, the Biggest Mistake Job Applicants Make - <AUTHOR> http://www.pehub.com/130171/google-recruiter-mike-junge-on-startups-the-biggest-mistake-job-applicants-make-and-why-it-pays-to-be-nice/

<comment><USER2> He uses lots of words to say dont badmouth past employers, be on time, be confident, and be friendly.</comment>


Show HN: Appdex – an offline way to manage deeplinks and URLs - <AUTHOR> https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.appdex <comment><AUTHOR> Hey HN! I whipped up this app quickly after I realized there really wasn't a quick way for me to manage and launch deeplinks as an Android developer. The app basically allows you to add a link with a name and it persists it locally to the device ONLY. From there, you can launch the link or delete it if you're done with it!</comment>


Snapchat's Success: Connectivity, Easy Media Creation, And Ephemerality - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2014/01/25/how-snapchat-thinks-about-snapchat/?ncid=twittersocialshare <comment><USER2> Wasn't the whole point of Snapchat undermined by the fact that they weren't really deleting the snaps [1] ? Just renaming the snaps with a '.nomedia' extension? That sort of contradicts the 'ephemerality' they're going for.

[1] [http://www.theguardian.com/media-network/partner-zone- infose...](http://www.theguardian.com/media-network/partner-zone- infosecurity/snapchat-photos-not-deleted-hidden)

<comment><USER3> Someone needs to coin a term for businesses like Snapchat. They offer nil in the way of progress, yet act like they are all about progress. They offer no lasting value, yet you know they store all these snaps and will sell your info later through meta tags. They offer a free service, so you know you're the product. They target teenagers whose minds have not fully developed and sell their info to adults so they can advertise to them more effectively.

They should shut down their service, take the money they have, and make something that improves the world.

We don't really need another leech, or a shell vehicle for the rich to hedge in.

<comment> vezzy-fnord Pretty sure Snapchat falls under the definition of the archetypal cash cow.

 _They target teenagers whose minds have not fully developed and sell their info to adults so they can advertise to them more effectively._

Frankly I have no sympathy for such people, but I agree that ultimately Snapchat is a useless trend. It will be replaced soon enough.

<comment><USER4> I find snapchat hilarious, almost as hilarious as the vc defense/commentary regarding their rejection of 3 mmm as rational. It's a good thing the founders got a partial cash out; but I think that this company will serve as iconic peak idiocy for this investment cycle. But fuck, I've been wrong before.

<comment><USER5> you don't get it. FB's audience are aging out, they are too busy with their careers, dealing with newborns and aging parents. Snapchat is a brand that has an increasing number of new eyeballs to sell ads to. It's not anything to do with how much good snapchat is doing in the world, or how their 'service' is bringing a new benefit to humanity, all that matters is the next generation with purchasing power are looking at it.

<comment><USER4> Like I said I've been wrong before. I recall thinking Zuckerberg was a fool for not taking yahoos offer for a billion. I was wrong, but I didn't know about partial liquidation back then. It's not as binary an outcome. Once you get f u money, might as well swing for the fences. Rock on, Spiegel and Murphy. I can't hate.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Whoever is calling the shots over at instragram needs to be fired for not spending the hour or so of engineering time required to make instragram photos 'ephemeral' when the app first came out. It's basically an anti-feature. I knew I should have patented not saving data back in the day.

<comment><USER7> You clearly didn't read the article or the speech. If every word you ever said aloud was recorded, you'd probably speak differently than have you entire life. The whole point is that by making it ephemeral, in an age where nearly everything can be stored indefinitely and shared immediately, it becomes a mode of communication rather than a preserved expression.

<comment><USER8> It's interesting that you say "imagine growing up in a world where everything you say is recorded" because a key part of growing up for me was being taught that for a large part of my life, that _could_ be the reality.

It's very interesting to try to live your life as if you were always being recorded. It forces you to be more truthful in the things you casually say, while simultaneously tempering your views so you can stay truthful when expressing your opinion. However, I've found it to be a largely worthwhile goal, since it forces a high degree of consistency between ones internal and external state, a feeling that is quite satisfying.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I thought it was the sexting?</comment>


European Parliament requests recommendation to end biannual clock change - <AUTHOR> https://www.breakingnews.ie/ireland/latest-european-parliament-approves-proposal-to-end-bi-annual-clock-change-826985.html <comment><USER2> Thank goodness. Daylights savings time is one of the most god-damned fiddly attempts to optimize something that it fails to achieve, and at the same time irritates most who have to deal with it.

It was invented out on a whim, and adapted because it sounded good. No results have shown that it saves anything or helps anyone.

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

"Modern DST was first proposed by the New Zealand entomologist George Hudson, whose shift work job gave him leisure time to collect insects and led him to value after-hours daylight"

"Many publications credit DST proposal to the prominent English builder and outdoorsman William Willett,[29] who independently conceived DST in 1905 during a pre-breakfast ride, when he observed with dismay how many Londoners slept through a large part of a summer day.[15] An avid golfer, he also disliked cutting short his round at dusk."

I don't mind people collecting bugs and golfing, but please keep your hands off the society's synchronization mechanism without a better reason.

<comment><USER3> I dislike changing the time twice a year too, but would prefer to stay on summer timer throughout the year instead of winter time.

In autumn when the day becomes smaller, there remains almost no light(day) time after a typical 9-5. Shifting to winter time at this very moment of smaller days makes this 0. (For reference I live in Greece).

I understand though, that people with different schedules have different preferences.

<comment><USER4> It is an insane world where it is easier to redefine how the time is measured than to agree that the job starts one hour earlier.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> A bit of a click bait title ?

'Parliament accepted our proposal to ask the European Commission to come forward with a recommendation that we would end the bi-annual clock change'

So if I understand it correctly, this is a 'proposal' 'to ask' for 'a recommendation' ?

<comment><USER6> Welcome to the European Union. /s

<comment><USER7> Dunno if you're trying to be sarcastic, but at least in this instance it appears they're productively tackling a controversial, thorny, side-effect- laden subject at a sensible pace.

(Edit: OP has added "/s" marker.)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Always interesting how this topic starts (at least?) 3 different discussions.

* Whether your local time should change twice a year

* If the answer is "no", whether your local time should be equivalent to the current DST or standard time (aka "summer" vs "winter" time)

* Whether we should be using time zones at all

Please know which question you're ranting about before you actually rant, thanks. Lots of orthogonality here.

<comment><USER9> > Whether we should be using time zones at all

"So You Want To Abolish Time Zones"

[https://qntm.org/abolish](https://qntm.org/abolish)

<comment><USER10> Strange he doesn't use UTC as his base but rather Australia, I think.

<comment><USER11> That's addressed in the post.

> Oh, where did you think it was going to be? Somewhere convenient for you?

> One of the stronger reasons for adopting a new time zone is to more easily > do business with a neighbouring territory which already uses that time zone. > China, a gigantic country spanning some sixty degrees of longitude (and > therefore, nominally, four whole "hours") has been unified on a single time > zone since 1949. And it was already the largest single time zone in the > world by population.

> So, this phenomenon has now spread globally. Everybody wants to do business > with China and her allies - everybody is China's ally. Everybody is on China > Standard Time, UTC+08:00.

<comment><USER10> He says it is UK time, but then proceeds to talk about Australian times in the UK.

The problem is also not as hard as he implies. Instead of looking up the time there in google, you look up a day/night diagram instead.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Yes!

No more jet-lagged minors twice a year, no more train tickets stamped ~200 years in the future (yes, that has happened to me) and no more confusing server logs with odd duplicates.

Also, contact your local EU parliament member and politely explain why this is good...

<comment><USER13> Nit: Why isn't the server running in UTC?

<comment><USER14> I'm seeing more people recommending this. Is the main reason to avoid the daylight savings time changes twice a year, or am I missing something else obvious?

Disclosure: I don't use UTC, I set the server to local time. I'm very open to learning why I'm wrong and how I can improve.

Edit #2: thanks, responders – makes perfect sense when you put it that way. Today I learned.

<comment><USER15> Local time is very idiosyncratic - the hands of the clock on your wall move forwards, backwards, repeat the same hours, skip hours and dance at the will of your people and politicians.

Needless to say, this may cause issues in computers. The only clocks that stay consistent and dependable are the ones in UTC land.

So the people mirror the clocks of their local government, but computers mirror the UTC clocks.

<comment><USER16> Leap seconds would have a word with you. The only time that's fixed is GPS time, or so I heard.

<comment><USER17> Legend has it there's a secret order of monks that have been going "one mississippi, ..." since 1970. They say it's the only way they can be really sure.

But nobody knows how, when or why they came to be 23 minutes off ...

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> I'm against time changes, but Daylight savings time is better. We should just stay on that year long.

<comment><USER19> No! Let's keep time that make sense, I like the concept that the sun is at its highest at noon. Shit like drawing the shadow of a stick is stuff that kept me interested in school, as opposed to arbitrary/political things such as spelling (in french and english anyway).

If natural light matters, shift society to do everything earlier!

It shouldn't be very difficult, especially in Europe, where governments have such an influence, mandate that schools start earlier, shift transportation peak time (number and frequency of trains and buses) earlier, give some tax incentive for a year or two to companies who let their employees leave work earlier, etc...

I lived in countries where the currency was changed, people got used to it, it didn't turn out to be the end of the world. Some countries shifted on which side or the road cars drove, people adapted.

<comment><USER20> > mandate that schools start earlier

You know it's bad for teenager health?

[http://www.nj.com/education/2014/05/early_class_times_are_ba...](http://www.nj.com/education/2014/05/early_class_times_are_bad_for_teenaged_students_british_researcher_finds.html)

> Because their biological clocks push them into later sleep/later wake > patterns, adolescents on average lose almost 3 hours a sleep on school days, > the researchers found. In addition, they found that middle school students > who start later in the morning had "clear test gains" over their peers.

<comment><USER21> The GP does not propose that teenagers wake up any earlier in the sense of solar time, just that we don't change the clocks. Right now they wake up an hour earlier than they did the previous day, the only difference is that their clock shows the same hour as it did the previous day.

Instead, they should just wake up an hour earlier and have the clock show that they woke up an hour earlier. There's no actual difference in the amount of sleep or daylight that the teenagers get, just a vastly simplified system for figuring out what they wall clock should say.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> I'm an American living in Russia. Russia got rid of daylight savings time in 2014. [1]. I love, it's great.

One of the most confusing part of daylight savings time is that the dates that it occurs on vary between countries. Trying to figure out how to get hold of people back in the states at an agreed-upon time was a huge PITA.

[1] [https://www.timeanddate.com/news/time/russia-abandons- perman...](https://www.timeanddate.com/news/time/russia-abandons-permanent- summer-time.html)

</comment><comment><USER23> Continental Europe permenantly on UTC+2 would move EU further from NY... a nice little boost for the City of London.

<comment><USER24> I really hope they won't do that, but just switch to permanent winter time (UTC+1), which is the closest to solar time.

In fact, while we're at it, the Netherlands, Belgium, France, and _certainly_ Spain should switch to UTC+0. The eastern border of those countries aligns pretty well with 7.5 degrees east.

Then I can finally be fully awake when work starts at 9 o'clock.

<comment><USER25> Netherlands should be at +00:20 UTC to be at solar time, thus having the sun peak at noon. This offset was in use until WWII and was called Amsterdam Time. But having such an offset would be very unpractical to work with.

<comment><USER24> Yeah, I just meant that winter time is closer to solar time than summer time (and then argued that we should get even closer to solar time). I have no problem with using full hour offsets, since they make calculations about times in other zones so much easier. The Netherlands was one of the last countries to switch to a "modern" time zone, in fact it was again a foreign occupier (the first being the French) that forced us to modernize (except that they put us in the Central European time zone instead of the Western European). Until 1937 we even used an offset of +00:19'32.13", using the meridian of the Westertoren in Amsterdam.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Notion of wall clock time is probably unnatural and harmful. Humans for millenia did not follow wall clock time to wake up, go to bed, go to work etc. they rather followed the sun. Following the sun is natural because we all need light. For better mood, for being able to do work outside or for vit d. We should rather sync up our schedules with the sun rise/sun set (while minimizing the total wall-clock delta and confusion people experience).

</comment><comment><USER27> I hope at least they go for summertime all year long then. Instead of wintertime, that would be crazy.

</comment><comment><USER28> But...I really like my extra hour of sun in the evenings in summer.

<comment><USER29> Just do everything an hour earlier.

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> Building Cronitor has given me more experience with local dst customs than I ever wanted to have.

One great thing about dst in Europe is that rather than happening at 2am local time in each tz the way USA does it, it happens across Europe at the same timestamp.

</comment><comment><USER31> Doesn't bi-annual mean every two years?

<comment><USER32> Biannual means "twice a year" [https://www.merriam- webster.com/dictionary/biannual](https://www.merriam- webster.com/dictionary/biannual)

Biennial means "every two years" [https://www.merriam- webster.com/dictionary/biennial](https://www.merriam- webster.com/dictionary/biennial)

<comment><USER8> Notice, however, the 2nd definition. Biannual means whatever the user happens to be thinking at that point in time.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> I once had to write a daylight savings calculator from scratch for a Windows CE system -- its kernel couldn't be updated, and I had to implement the 2007 changes to the DST rules. Good times.

</comment><comment><USER34> > Many believe the clock change negatively impacts on people's mental and > physical health.

This is absolutely not true for me. An "extra" hour of daylight during summer evenings has a large positive impact on my mental and physical health.

I don't find the actual physical change of the clocks to be a problem either. Change them twice a year by one hour, which most digital clocks do automatically now anyway.

<comment><USER35> > An "extra" hour of daylight during summer evenings has a large positive > impact on my mental and physical health.

It would be nice to have the same on winter evenings (or afternoons) too, i.e., "summer" time all year long. No clock changes needed for that.

Of course depending on where you are, "winter" time can help you get out of bed in the morning, and you might find that more important. There is no pleasing everybody, especially in a time zone as big as CET. Its eastern and western extremities are separated by about two hours of solar time...

<comment><USER36> >It would be nice to have the same on winter evenings (or afternoons) too, i.e., "summer" time all year long. No clock changes needed for that.

Exactly. I always hated winter time. Why can't we abolish that? Oh you have a short day where you only get half an hour of daylight after work? Let's make it an hour shorter.

<comment><USER29> The day is the same length you just do everything an hour earlier. You can do that without changing the time.....

<comment><USER36> Do you get all your collegues to get up one hour earlier with you? Do you call the TV station to broadcast one hour earlier? Do you get your gym to open one hour earlier?

Society agrees on time because it's necessary to make the system work. You can't individually live in a different time zone.

<comment><USER29> Of course you are right. But that "impossible" thing is precisely what actually happens when everyone moves the clocks. It's a clever social hack.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> How likely is the EU removing DST to pressure the US into considering the same? Any chance at all?

<comment><USER38> "Pressure"? Probably not. If anyone was able to pressure anyone else, they would have managed to align the switchover dates (they're off by a week, making for two quite amusing weeks a year where everybody is late or early for transatlantic meetings). But doing it and proving it works well (provided that it does) would be valuable arguments in favour of its abolition elsewhere.

<comment><USER39> Used to be a week. Now it's a lot more, thanks to some bright sparks during the second Bush administration thinking they could score some quick points by extending summer time to "reduce energy usage"...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER40> I like DST for all of the reasons outlined here: [http://www.leancrew.com/all- this/2013/03/why-i-like-dst/](http://www.leancrew.com/all-this/2013/03/why-i- like-dst/)

The alternatives are worse. Either you drop DST and the sun rises at 4 in the morning in the summer or you stay on DST permanently and the sun rises after 8 in the winter.

</comment><comment><USER41> But 0h Game Jam! :(

[http://0hgame.eu/](http://0hgame.eu/) (see the FAQ)

</comment><comment><USER42> It would be paramount to look at labour productivity changes after the implementation of this proposal.

</comment><comment><USER43> A lot of hate here for DST. Personally, I like it. In the sense that in northern climates, the really long days are actually pretty nice. Even in London in the height of summer, the Sun didn't set til about ~10pm. That's nice.

I'm not opposed to the clock change but my solution for that is to have DST year-round not non-DST year-round.

All this being said, I'd be surprised if this goes ahead.

<comment><USER44> DST does not change the length of the days.

If your shift begins at an inconvenient hour, or your timezone is misaligned to your astronomical time, those problems do not require manually fiddling with time by multiple countries to solve.

<comment><USER45> Devil's advocate: why don't we all just use UTC? Get rid of time zones, those are only a human conveniences as well...

<comment><USER46> Universal UTC does not change the need people have to know how approximate solar time locally maps to approximate solar time at some different longitude.

E.g., you are in Munich and want to call your friend in Tokyo. You want to call him at a time that is not too early in the morning for him, or not too late in the evening for him.

Let's say you want to call him at lunch time, which you both take around solar noon. Under the current system, where the time in each time zone approximates local solar time, that means he takes lunch around the same clock time you do, which is 12:00. The question you ask yourself is "When his clock says 12:00, what does my clock say?".

You answer that by subtracting the time zone difference (which is 8 hours), so you get that you should call him when you clock says 4:00.

Now let's do this with universal UTC. Your clocks no longer approximate local solar time. Solar noon is around 11:00 clock time at your place. The question you want to ask now is "What time is his solar noon?".

Since his solar time is approximately 8 hours ahead of your solar time, you answer it exactly the same way. You subtract 8 hours from the time from the UTC time you have lunch to get the UTC time he has lunch, so 3:00.

As long as people keep their activities lined up with approximate local solar time and people need to sync things with people whose solar time is significantly different than theirs, we need something like time zones.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER47> Maybe Spain should get back to the correct time zone first?

[http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/12/13/spain-plans- repla...](http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/12/13/spain-plans-replace-nazi- time-zone-gmt/)

</comment><comment><USER48> Maybe it is time to switch one global time and ditch the old system completely. E.g. UTC, but it carries the old semantics with 'high noon' at 12:00. Maybe another system, but UTC is very popular already, e.g. for logging.

Imagine you don't have to deal with different time zones any more.

<comment><USER49> [https://qntm.org/abolish](https://qntm.org/abolish)

Mandatory read every time this comes up.

<comment><USER50> Which completely misses culture-based time differences (depending on culture, in Europe, two neighboring countries in the same time zone may have 3 hours difference in usual working hours)

and mismatched timezones (half a china has a timezone 5 hours off from their local time)

Look at this map: [https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/e8/St...](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/e8/Standard_World_Time_Zones.png/1920px- Standard_World_Time_Zones.png) the timezones already are all over the place. What you think of as 4:25 can be 9:25 or 23:25 thanks to timezone mismatches.

<comment><USER49> That's an argument for _more_ timezones, not less.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER51> Shouldn't this say semi-annual, not bi-annual?

<comment><USER52> Biannual is fine.

I think you're confusing biannual and biennial. Biannual and semiannual both mean twice a year. Biennial means every other year.

<comment><USER53> So what's semiennial mean?

<comment><USER54> Good question. I'm going to say "demisemiennial" instead of "quarterly" from now on.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER55> Greeeat, more code to write to work around it ;)

</comment><comment><USER56> Great. Now US should do that as well.

</comment><comment><USER57> I sure will miss my extra long summer days.

<comment><USER58> This seems like an "up to eleven" argument to me. Why not just wake up earlier in the summer?

<comment><USER59> It's a working-hours alignment thing for most people. Flexible work hours are pretty common in SV Tech, less so elsewhere.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER60> In the United States we do even better. We propose laws for values of pi.

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

<comment><USER61> I don't see the similitude..?</comment></comment>


Why AI is a dangerous dream  - <AUTHOR> http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20327231.100-noel-sharkey-ai-is-a-dangerous-dream.html?full=true

<comment><USER2> I love to read this sort of stuff, because it's my life's goal to show him how wrong he is.

</comment><comment><USER3> I thought this might be something like Eliezer's arguments against developing a GAI until it could be made provably Friendly AI, instead I just got an argument exactly like the ones in 1903 that said heavier than air flight by men was impossible - go back and read some of them, some of the arguments were almost identical. Some of the arguments are currently true, but some of them amount to "I can't do it, and no one else has done it, therefore there must be some fundamental reason it can't be done".

</comment><comment><USER4> I believe this man has let the past failures of AI give him a dark view of its future.

</comment><comment><USER5> > There is no way for any AI system to discriminate between a combatant and an > innocent.

Eh? Why not? Your saying you can't use some sort of NN algorithm trained on past videos of combat situations to learn this? I realize that we'd need to be VERY sure before we deploy anything, but its definitely possible.

<comment><USER6> How does a human do it now? I imagine it would be a lot more like that.

<comment><USER5> I don't know if we could do it the same way, but we could possibly learn things from how humans do it now.

E.g. if one metric is "is the person holding a gun?" then machine vision software to identify guns might be useful.</comment></comment></comment>


On Journeys - <AUTHOR> http://lcamtuf.blogspot.com/2015/03/on-journeys.html

<comment><USER2> As a Polish emigrant who's 15 years younger, a lot of this reminded me of the journey my parents had to undertake to get to the United States. But it's more than that. It's a reflection that applies to the intimidating nature of any major undertaking. I especially recall my parents about the realization that they had nothing more than a little bit of spare money and that they felt like they were "running at the moon with a hatchet," and imagining that it would come down.

Thank you for writing this essay. I emotionally reacted.</comment>


Adhoc.TV – The ESPN of Tech - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/faux-startups/adhoc-tv-the-espn-of-tech-6bf2a2d4405e#.vn5mtuhaw <comment><AUTHOR> John Lennon once said "If I'd lived in Roman times, I'd have lived in Rome. Where else?"

Tech, if you will, is today's Rome. It is the nucleus of our world, it is where our lives and our world are improved.

Yet, the digital tech community is fully decentralized. There is no one true Rome, no one home for tech conversation on the internet.

Instead, those of us who would like to live in Rome must divide our time and attention across a myriad of sites, including Reddit, Product Hunt, Hacker News, Techcrunch, Mashable, Re/Code, Devpost, Medium, and endless newsletters, podcasts, Twitter accounts, and blogs.

What if instead there was one constant stream of 24-hour live coverage of everything tech — like ESPN is for Sports or CNN is for News or Bloomberg is for Business?

Today we're announcing the launch of something that achieves exactly this…

…the Adhoc.TV app, available next month for iOS, Android, and select SmartTV and VR devices.</comment>


Mapping Silicon Valley's Own Private "iWay" - <AUTHOR> http://allthingsd.com/20120922/mapping-silicon-valleys-own-private-iway/?mod=atdtweet <comment><USER2> Fascinating. Not sure on the numbers but does this imply that google just dominate everyone else in terms of numbers of engineers or have they just spent more on busses?

</comment><comment><USER2> Fascinating. D</comment>


Introducing the Famous Framework - <AUTHOR> https://blog.famous.org/introducing-the-famous-framework/ <comment><USER2> Here is an example of a simple useless todo app, good luck with your complex multipage layout... \- Every js framework ever

<comment><USER3> There's a reason for that: [http://todomvc.com/](http://todomvc.com/)

<comment><USER4> That's not a reason.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> For a UI framework, show me a pretty demo with some example snippet code next to it and I will read on. Otherwise, I'm not motivated -- this is not the way you want people to read about your UI framework.

<comment><USER6> Checkout [http://milk.samsung.com](http://milk.samsung.com) built using famous.

Stackoverflow has lots of famous snippets.

<comment><USER7> Not a _great_ example: a) US-only b) breaks the back button

<comment> L-four Doesn't work on mobile either.

<comment><USER8> Whoever built that site has an interesting approach to error messaging. Consider this scenario:

Environment:

iPhone 5c iOS 8.3 Safari

1) Go to milk.samsung.com

2) Milk displays a message suggesting that you access the site from either a desktop or a 'select Samsung device'. For some insane reason though, they provide a link to "Go to milk.samsung.com.

3) Click the 'Go to milk.samsung.com' link.

Result:

You receive the error message, "You are still on the phone".

My conclusion:

If they know that I'm on a phone that they don't support, why give me another link milk.samsung.com??

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> _We use dependency injection to match State names to parameters of Behavior functions—the State numberOfStates gets injected into any Behavior function that lists is as a parameter, like function(numberOfStates)._

We need to have a talk. First, this isn't dependency injection - you're passing in data. These "Behavior" functions may _depend_ on the data, but that doesn't make this a _dependency_.

Oh, I can understand how you're confused. You see Angular doing it and reverse-engineered the term. But notice how in Angular it is used to pass services into controllers, services that the controller has a _dependency_ on.

Also, notice how this "feature" is broken in production. Any website worth its salt will minify the assets, which changes function parameter names. You did notice that, right, that your clever little hack works great in your development environment but totally breaks when you minify your code? You are testing things minified, right?

Why would you spend any time at all working on a feature that is fundamentally broken in production? Kill your darlings.

<comment><USER4> Wait, are they seriously trying to say that "function(numberOfStates)" is dependency injection?

<comment><USER10> In angular that's basically how it works. The framework actually calls toString on the functions which actually allow you to parse out the arguments names so the callers know which arguments (dependencies) need to be passed.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Asking 10 people to explain what MVC is, and you'll get 11 answers ;) ! Having recently done a dive into this area, I would really recommend interested folks to patiently read this great article by Martin Fowler: [http://martinfowler.com/eaaDev/uiArchs.html](http://martinfowler.com/eaaDev/uiArchs.html)

The web community has been done a great disservice by people popularising the phrase "MV*".

<comment><USER12> Yep. There's also some good discussion on the Portland Pattern Repository, particularly this discussion[1] about how the meaning of "Controller" changed from it's original Smalltalk meaning (where it is the component that updates the model in response to user input) to the way it's sometimes used today (as an object which mediates communication between the model and the view).

[1] [http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?WhatsaControllerAnyway](http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?WhatsaControllerAnyway)

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> It took me quite a bit of scrolling to figure out that Famous is some sort of JS UI system.

<comment><USER14> Tell me what it is.

Tell me what it is.

Tell me what it is.

Tell me what it is.

Tell me what it is.

Tell me what it is.

Oh.

<comment><USER15> Hmm...it's got a user and a machine...k...

Inspired by turtles, LEGO and ICs, k...

"Or with JavaScript in general" \-- there's a hint

"Web Frameworks: Given that we're building a web framework" \-- well, I wouldn't call it a _given_ , but -- mystery solved!

<comment><USER16> Ha, this was exactly my thought process when I was reading!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> The core of famous is really an request animation frame loop that does css transitions to do animations with physics. Their demos uses absolute positioning on everything to get flickerfree animations. On top of that they've created various abstractions like angular directives and react components. It's very cool, but for simple animations in react or angular I turn to snabbt.js.

There are some open source projects that adds turn key components to famous, like famous-flex [https://github.com/IjzerenHein/famous- flex](https://github.com/IjzerenHein/famous-flex) by Hein Rutjes. If you want demo's, then there's the famous "fan site" [http://famousco.de/links/](http://famousco.de/links/)

<comment><USER18> > that does css transitions to do animations

I thought it used WebGL to render animations.

<comment><USER19> you can choose your render target. thats why there is so much abstraction.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Link to the framework page [0]. I couldn't find any demos there or in other pages, though. I couldn't figure out how to run the examples [1] and there's no live links of em either.

This is not specifically directed at Famous... Why don't you [framework creators] show off REAL freaking apps? Show me a reasonably sized application that handles sophisticated user interactions. How do you handle routing? Data fetching / caching? Production builds? Testing environment? Dealing with your everyday CRUD? It's alright if your framework is meant as a framework that only handles some specific things, show a real-world example of the framework to highlight how it makes things easier/better/simpler/faster. I don't want to see TodoMVC or single-file examples. I know it's absolutely NOT sexy, but it's most of what I'll be having to deal with in my day-to-day work as a developer. (The only frontend framework that I know of that does a tremendous job at this is ember. I don't use ember, but I have nothing but the utmost respect for its developers.)

Specifically to famous: You touch on the topic of building large applications with Famous in this link. Your lack of reference applications (although not necessarily unreasonable, as you just announced the alpha) does nothing to gain my trust as a developer. I'd love to see a non-trivial example application that shows the full picture of what an app would look like.

[0] [http://famous.org/framework/](http://famous.org/framework/) [1] [https://github.com/Famous/framework/tree/develop/lib/core- co...](https://github.com/Famous/framework/tree/develop/lib/core-components)

<comment><USER21> Thank you... even in TFA, the handlers all seem to be synchronously bound... how do you tie these into async communication channels?

It really bugs me in this day and age, that frameworks are build without async client-server being a first-class behavior at least by example.

While I really appreciate the various demos for say TodoMVC, which allow some framework comparison.... what I would _love_ to see (from TodoMVC or similar) would be an abstracted interface that is expressly async (even if only using setTimeout) via callbacks or promises for the data access. It's part of the story that is very important. Also, a very simple router... perhaps requiring a hello/login/register screen (user:user) and the todo screen.

I know TodoMVC was supposed to be just trivial enough to show something between the various frameworks... that said, I think we really need just a hair more.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> When I came to the realization this isn't satire, another piece of my soul died.

</comment><comment><USER23> Is this satire? I can't tell. :/

<comment><USER24> I was certain that it was satire until about 50% of the way through. I scrolled to the bottom and sure enough... Github repo...

<comment><USER25> But then the repo has things such as: [http://famous.org/framework/hello- framework.html](http://famous.org/framework/hello-framework.html)

Which has the gem: "Check out the 'Hello World' example below. When reading through the code, think of the tree as Famous-enhanced HTML and the behaviors as CSS styles on steroids."

So "behaviors" are styles? Why is the first line of a "Hello World" example a load of styles I don't understand?

And it's even more confusing: It talks about "components" but there are IDs which means any resuse would duplicate those IDs on the DOM (I think?) which isn't valid html.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> "please don't let it be another JS framework, please don't let it be another JS framewo....ahhh man !" :P

</comment><comment><USER27> The front-end framework space is highly competitive - There are lots of great options to choose from. Many companies are trying to gain developer mindshare in that area.

Famous, AngularJS, Polymer, React, RiotJS, CanJS, ... All really great options.

I think Famous will have trouble competing with React, Polymer 1.0 and the upcoming AngularJS 2.0 in the current 2D browser-based market. I think if something like Microsoft's hololens gains traction, Famous would greatly benefit - Its 3D features would help it stand out.

Most of the value of a 3D interface is lost when you project it on a 2D screen.

<comment><USER28> I have the suspicion that actual game dev tools will have the upper hand for VR. Sort of how native development is the way things are done on mobile. I'd love to see the web be universal, but I think there will just be too many shortcomings.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> I hear from Famous as UI System, but what is (in simple words) Framework - Engine - The Machine - The User... the blog post is really confusing.

Got it after watch the Website:

"The Famous Framework is a new JavaScript framework for creating reusable, composable, and interchangeable UI widgets and applications. It balances declarative with imperative and functional with stateful, and it's built on top of the Famous Engine."

</comment><comment><USER30> Famous is probably most famous for making the front page of HN.

It does look like a cool JS framework though.

</comment><comment><USER31> Seeing how Famous is pretty much yesterday's hype, I'm curious to see whether it can still become relevant.

<comment><USER32> What is today's hype?

<comment><USER31> Last time I checked? Mercury or Om. But neither of them comes even close to the level of hype famous had (back when it was famo.us).

<comment><USER15> Wow, things move really fast in this space. Is "back when" May 2015? The only context I have is the "Didn't you just release Famous in May?" quote from the article.

<comment><USER33> Their first launch was May 2014. The thing they released then mostly didn't actually work, but was very heavily hyped anyway.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> Days since last new JavaScript Framework: 0

<comment><USER35> Don't worry, my new Flux implementation will take your mind off of that!

</comment></comment><comment><USER36> From the blog post it looks like alot of good work is being done here. I think most apps out there probably don't reach the level of complexity that would require a rethinking of MVC, but I have seen it and agree that some web applications have reached the need to think beyond what MVC can provide.

If I had to guess, I think some of the first web-related work (on what post- MVC web will look like) began several years ago when 'reactive' programming started becoming a hot topic.

Since it seems a new JS framework comes out pretty much every week, and some people express frustration in trying to filter through the noise, I would say to them that this one is definitely one to keep an eye on.

</comment><comment><USER37> One thing that I like with a JS framework is when I can actually play around with a demo or two without cloning the repo. Call me lazy, but I don't see why a framework that is entirely client-side can't just put the demos up?

</comment><comment><USER38> A shame they don't even mention Web Components or custom elements, considering that much of what they are addressing in terms of composability and interop with other frameworks is exactly addressed by these standards.

</comment><comment><USER39> This BEST stuff looks great and I'm looking forward to using it. But it will be a nightmare to search for if this stuff takes off. You should consider changing it to something more unique.

</comment><comment><USER40> The Javascript framework space isn't competitive...it's saturated for the exact same reason that the PHP framework space was saturated.

Javascript and PHP frameworks are all built on top of a language that does everything you need for the web before you even start the framework. Frameworks in both languages are basically an exercise in arranging things according to your personal preferences...and people have a wide range of preferences.

</comment><comment><USER41> So much hate for these guys, it's amazing.

<comment><USER42> I would characterize it as "skepticism".

<comment><USER43> I wouldn't.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER44> Looks interesting. Haven't heard of BEST, is there any documents or articles out there?

</comment><comment><USER45> Seems the same as Web Components/Polymer. Not sure why neither are mentioned...

</comment><comment><USER46> Strange SSL cert on that website - it looks like the site is only partially encrypted and firefox cant detect who it's verified by.

<comment><USER47> [http://imgur.com/u8yIx4G](http://imgur.com/u8yIx4G)

</comment></comment><comment><USER48> It looks great, but I am trying to get documentation of the famous-cli command "deploy".. no idea of how it works..

<comment><USER49> The source code is on Github if you want to check it out ([https://github.com/Famous/famous-cli](https://github.com/Famous/famous-cli))

</comment></comment><comment><USER50> I've seen Famous around for a while, what makes this different than what they were doing previously?

</comment><comment><USER51> "Let Angular be Angular, let React be React, and let Famous be _famous_ "

</comment><comment><USER52> I am curious of what blog-engine they are using. It looks very similar to Medium

<comment><USER53> According to my wappalyzer it is Ghost [http://imgur.com/QAjVXlg](http://imgur.com/QAjVXlg) [https://ghost.org/](https://ghost.org/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER50> This has been around for a while, what's introducing it today?

</comment><comment><USER54> I'm excited about Famous. The initial negative reaction from the community reminds me of the initial negative approach towards React. My gut tells me it is going to be very famous.

<comment><USER55> Famous came with a "WOW" demo then nothing for 2 years, only mail spam. React lib was available from the get go. Famous is a vaporware, the framework didn't exist when they made the "WOW" demo. They got some funding (2M $) and then they had to build something...

</comment></comment><comment><USER56> So is BEST just MVC but a with a different name?

</comment><comment><USER57> Ah, pathetic Famous as usual.

</comment><comment><USER58> I like the fact that development for applications is moving towards what game code seems to have been using. Building components and re-rendering with new state when necessary actually much better than what we're currently doing.

Which is why I prefer React over Batman, Ember and Angular.

Btw, I feel like their concept of Behaviour Tree doesnt' really fit in with the Behaviour Tree's I read about.

</comment><comment><USER59> Relevant: [https://xkcd.com/927/](https://xkcd.com/927/)

<comment><USER60> No. No, it isn't.

And even if it were, it's possible to have a useful response beyond a webcomic link that every idiot posts when anything new happens.

<comment><USER59> That was a joke... but I guess when it comes to front-end frameworks, we can't laugh.

<comment><USER60> Regurgitated links are not jokes.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Write a rapid prototype first (2007) - <AUTHOR> https://terrytao.wordpress.com/advice-on-writing-papers/write-a-rapid-prototype-first/ <comment><USER2> To echo other comments, I've found this works for creative/fiction writing as well.

I forget where, but I once heard that writer's block is what happens when you try to create a final draft on the first try.

<comment><USER3> If Michelangelo did drafts and studies, why can't I?

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> This is great advice for almost any problem, not only math. I've used the same approach when programming, thinking through product problems, even thinking through issues that come up in life- describe the problem and the outlines of potential solutions. I find this brings clarity that's not always present if I just think through problems in my head.

</comment><comment><USER5> The tips on _how_ to prototype are very good. Let me give another perspective though:

You shouldn't _always_ prototype first, before mapping what kind of problem you have, at the risk of reinventing the (square) wheel.

Rapid prototyping is the holy grail software is known for. But prototypes are not always cheap, and almost always go to prod and turn into technical debt. In other disciplines the instinct to just try something first would sound ridiculous (e.g. let's always figure out open heart surgery from scratch, it's just a quick experiment, if the patient dies we figure out later).

I'm a fan of the Cynefin framework [1] as a higher level tool to figure out if I _should_ prototype at all - even if not very precise, because at least it forces me to think about it.

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

<comment><USER6> One necessity for a successful prototype is that you have a pretty clear idea of why you're making it and what you hope to learn. You also want to consider if the cost of making the prototype will be justified by those learnings. With experience you do this instinctively, as part of the process. You know what answers you need and how to get them cheap enough.

In the case of surgery, where someone's life is on the line, it's not going to be worth the cost.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> I do this with code, which is my main creative medium these days.

First I solve the problem, without giving a damn about anything else.

Then I gradually improve my solution until I understand the problem well enough to drastically improve the architecture, at which point I either refactor or start over from scratch depending on which takes less effort.

</comment><comment><USER8> I am a big fan of this approach.

I have seen that if I stop and think about the problem too much in the beginning, it takes a whole lot longer to arrive at a good solution.

Prototype -> Think -> Engineer.

If you are lucky, you get to reuse some code from the prototype, if not that was hopefully a good lesson for the future.

</comment><comment><USER9> > In particular, it is often difficult to make the (important) decisions about > the organisation of the argument, and selection of good notation, until a > large part of the paper is already written

This is very true. When writing a blog post in China during the earlier parts of coronavirus [1], I had drafted an initial version where I just went through my experiences in chronological order. Only after writing it all down did themes emerge in how I finally structured the article.

This really speaks to the power of interdisciplinary concepts though. Writing an essay by writing an outline first and then filling in the details probably predates rapid prototyping by eons. It's cool that it all circles back to writing academic papers only through this leap!

[1] [https://wanderlog.com/blog/2020/01/29/coronavirus- observatio...](https://wanderlog.com/blog/2020/01/29/coronavirus-observations- on-the-ground-in-shenzhen-china/)

</comment><comment><USER10> I wonder how often "proof of concept" or "rapid prototype" scientific papers get "pushed into production" before they're finished by managers?

I wonder if papers written this way suffer from "second system syndrome", where the rewrite stage totally changes the underlying arguments and conclusions "in response to feedback from stakeholders"?

<grin>

</comment><comment><USER11> I find it very surprising that he suggests writing the introduction at the end of the paper. He doesn't explicitly mention the abstract, so I'm assuming the introduction includes the abstract of the paper. If that's true, I find it impossible to write any paper without first working out a fairly fleshed out abstract. It usually takes about 50% of my time to just write my abstract.

The way I structure my prototypes, I have to have a sense of the existing state of the art, which I then leverage to propose my hypothesis. I do a version of this for programming as well, I try and identify state of the art methods in the field, and use that to guide my implementation.

<comment> Ar-Curunir It's much easier to write an abstract and intro once the rest of the paper is concrete and correct; it tells you what the strengths and important points of your paper are. You don't necessarily know these until you've done the hard work in the rest of the paper

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> He talks about how to begin a daunting task: linear order, easiest/most straightforward first, or a top-down "skeleton" first.

If it's daunting enough to be discouraging, consider doing tasks that quickly give you some sense of progress towards what like about it. To sustain your interest - your most precious resource.

This mightn't be most efficient, or give the best structure, but if it motivates you to do it, it will be far more efficient and better strucured than nothing!

<comment><USER3> This is like an _MVP_ , where you quickly find out if people actually _want_ it; if they do, you get motivation. A step earlier is an actual _prototype_ , where am inventor sees whether the idea _works_ or not; if so, it's motivating.

Not sure how this applies to proof, which has to be perfect to work at all. Pehaps Tao's skeleton, then filling in the most crucial parts first, is exactly this.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> > [paraphrasing] get some good idea along the way devote a minute to write > down a "stub" for that (just enough to jog your memory when you return), so > as not to break your concentration or momentum

This "stub" or _aide-mémoire_ doesn't define the idea, just evokes it. So you better come back while that _memory_ is still fresh, or you will not be able to work out what it was!

</comment><comment><USER12> Title missing a (2008).

<comment><USER13> The oldest version in the WaybackMachine is from July 2007 [https://web.archive.org/web/20070703081456/https://terrytao....](https://web.archive.org/web/20070703081456/https://terrytao.wordpress.com/advice- on-writing-papers/write-a-rapid-prototype-first/)

and here say May 2007 [https://terrytao.wordpress.com/?s=Discovering+a+solution](https://terrytao.wordpress.com/?s=Discovering+a+solution)</comment></comment>


16 Startups Poised to Disrupt the Education Market - <AUTHOR> http://www.inc.com/ilan-mochari/16-startups-that-will-disrupt-the-education-market.html

<comment><USER2> Founder of Accredible here, #16 on the list!

Happy to answer any questions.</comment>


Show HN: HTTPS Is Broken and How to Fix It - <AUTHOR> https://okturtles.com/ <comment><USER2> I saw this a while back, and was so excited by it.

I wish the world would hurry up and use the blockchain for domain names and secure communications already. I love bitcoin, but the blockchain can do so much more.

IMHO, letsencrypt.org is an amazing initiative to lowering barriers for encrypted comms, but I'll feel safer when the average Joe can spin up a blog, and get all the encryption perks immediately, and for free, all in one fell swoop.</comment>


Ask HN: How Wordpress can help startups/MVPs? - <AUTHOR> <comment><USER2> Without any further description about what you're trying to do, it's difficult to answer the question.

There are millions of different ways:

You can do your landing pages in WP and easily integrate with newsletter pop- ups and all the other growth hack tricks.

If you have a SaaS you can run the whole subscription system (accounts, billing, renewals, etc.) using WooCommerce.

You can sell digital downloads of your software using WooCommerce.

You can keep your user-facing documentation in WP.

There are plugins for turning WordPress into a CRM so you can track your leads/sales.

etc.

The possibilities are literally limitless.

</comment><comment><USER3> WordPress is a content management system. Content is where it shines. If your SaaS is mostly content presentation, WordPress will work just fine thanks to its wide array of plugins.

For my new book notification service app [http://anynewbooks.com](http://anynewbooks.com), I took a hybrid approach. The frontend is WordPress (in need of a makeover) while I wrote the backend in Rails since no plugin could replicate the functionalities I needed.

I took this approach because I wanted a proof of concept and threw it together in a matter of days. 7 years later is still standing. So I don't regret it and I think relying on WordPress is a valid option. Developers might frown upon your choice, but that should be the least of your concerns.

That said, when I finally manage to rewrite the app (I know, I know) I will likely go with an app from scratch (e.g., probably in something like Elixir/Phoenix or Clojure) in order to customize the app to my liking with no bloat from features I don't need.

Ultimately, you have this option too. You can start with WordPress, validate your idea, and if you run into limitations you can't live with, you can then switch to an app from scratch.

</comment><comment><USER4> I've given a talk on using WordPress for rapidly developing SaaS app MVPs. You can watch it here: [https://wordpress.tv/2017/06/05/corey-maass-rapid-web-app- de...](https://wordpress.tv/2017/06/05/corey-maass-rapid-web-app-development- on-wordpress/)

It's great for certain types of apps, and solves a lot of the first 90% of your app out of the box (user management, marketing pages, etc). So you can concentrate on solving the core problem your app is trying to solve. As mentioned in other comments, you might run into scaling issues over time, but that too depends on the app.

I've built a couple dozen apps on WordPress, some of them have grown beyond MVP and are going strong. Let me know if you have any specific questions.

<comment><AUTHOR> Would love to know more about these actual examples and see how these work.

<comment><USER4> A good examples is Timerdoro.com which uses custom post types to manage objects and social signin for rapid on-boarding. I would not build that by hand.

Another new site is plugindirectory.info. The core of the app talks to an api and charts the results. It took me about 20 hours to build. I didn't have to create pages, user management (registration etc), curl calls, db schema, and so much else. The core of the app took a couple hours, then I just concentrated on the code that actually makes the app.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for taking the time to answer. Appreciate it. :)

<comment><USER4> Sure. Email me through gelform.com if you want to discuss more.

<comment><AUTHOR> I actually saw your talk and found it really helpful. Thanks for sharing :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Sorry, I should have been more specific. After some googling...SaaS + WordPress sounds interesting to me. So, I want to explore how SaaS startups can leverage this framework. Since wp is open source and startups have to operate on a shoe-string budget, it would be interesting to know how one can build a SaaS with WordPress. Are there any real-world, existing examples for this. Thanks.

<comment><USER5> There are some examples out there. (see links below)

I would recommend only using Wordpress for the public facing website or blog though.

Use Rails or Laravel for the actual SaaS application.

WP is difficult to work with when you start moving beyond CMS features. Also WP has ongoing security issues.

Rails and Laravel are made for building apps, is easier to work with and more secure. Also checkout Laravel Spark, it's a SaaS App in a box and can save you tons of time.

Definitely possible to build it directly in WP, but I wouldn't recommend it.

[https://raison.co/building-saas-startup- wordpress/](https://raison.co/building-saas-startup-wordpress/)

[https://www.dtelepathy.com/blog/products/wordpress-saas- appl...](https://www.dtelepathy.com/blog/products/wordpress-saas-application- platform)

[https://www.npgroup.net/blog/4-reasons-you-should- reconsider...](https://www.npgroup.net/blog/4-reasons-you-should-reconsider- building-your-saas-on-wordpress/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> I started [http://www.apnijobs.pk](http://www.apnijobs.pk) on WordPress just to validate the idea and later move to custom code. 14 years down the line, it is still on WP :)

</comment><comment><USER7> Lean startups should always find ways to minimize costs and use an efficient way to market products. Wordpress could be very helpful if used correctly

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Thank you guys. Really appreciate for taking time to answer this.

<comment><USER5> no problem, if you're already using PHP for WordPress development I would highly recommend checking out the Laravel framework for app development.

Laracasts.com is a great place to get started learning about it.</comment></comment>


Survey about FileZilla - <AUTHOR> What's up guys? I'm a student of Computer Science at Universidade Tecnológica Federal do Paraná (UTFPR) and I'm working with colleagues on a project for a Human-Computer Interaction course. We are reviewing the FileZilla software, and for that we need to collect some data. We would appreciate if you, FileZilla users, could answer the questions in our questionnaire, if possible. It would only take around 4 to 7 minutes, and it would help us understand more about the software and it's community. Thank you<p>https://goo.gl/forms/cuwcc9XWQCAPzU7S2 <comment><USER2> I filled it out for you.

<comment><AUTHOR> thank you :) I appreciate</comment></comment>


How to make a faraday cage wallet - <AUTHOR> http://howto.wired.com/wiki/Make_a_Faraday_Cage_Wallet

<comment><USER2> Much though I love duct-tape wallets, they're unsuitable for many applications. I wonder if there's a slick way you could retrofit an existing leather wallet....

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> hey its a way to save money... its prolly more durable than my leather wallet

</comment><comment><USER3> very cool idea!</comment>


Long S - <AUTHOR> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_s <comment><USER2> I think the most amazing part of this is just how quickly it disappeared. That graph showing it almost entirely disappearing — after being used for hundreds of years beforehand — in just 15 years is pretty amazing. The explanations in this article, sadly, aren't that in-depth about why we see such a big switch so quickly...

<comment><USER3> It's almost a perfect logistic curve:

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

<comment><USER4> An _S-curve_ , you might say. (See the first paragraph of that WP article.)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Interestingly, google's book indexing project shows that the word 'fuck' used to be a much more popular word back in the day than it is now - [http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=fuck&year_s...](http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=fuck&year_start=1600&year_end=2000&corpus=0&smoothing=3)

I read some place it's because google's character recognition automation interprets the long S as an 'f' instead of an 's'

</comment><comment><USER6> One of my favorite uses of the long S in an Achewood comic: <http://achewood.com/index.php?date=10192004>

</comment><comment><USER7> Fell out of usage with the advent of industrial printing presses, it looks like?

<comment><USER8> Now that we have Unicode fonts, we can bring it back!

"Dear Mr. Jones: I am pleaſed to reply to your meßage of Tueſsday laſt, requeſting my ſervices as a ſoft-ware engineer..."

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> "The long s survives in elongated form, and with an italic-style curled descender, as the integral symbol ∫ used in calculus."

Did not know that.

<comment><USER10> Always remind myself that the (Reimann) integral is generally a sum: sum of the areas of all the rectangles under the curve. It becomes more accurate as their bases shrink (as x becomes smaller, and the rectangles become thinner. They eventually become almost lines, completely saturating area under the curve.)

The limit of their diminishing IS the Reimann integral. So it makes sense to use 'S' for sum.

Big-Sigma (∑) is used for _s_ ummation in general, and Big-pie (∏) for _p_ roducts.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> A good article was submitted a while ago, discussion at <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2059173> and article at <http://babelstone.blogspot.com/2006/06/rules-for-long-s.html>

</comment><comment><USER12> You might notice the long s in Arth Guinness' signature. <http://www.irishfair.org/assets/images/GUINNESS_NAME.gif>

</comment><comment><USER13> Too bad we gave up on that.

<comment><USER14> English is a living language, you can always try and revive it. It might give your resume a certain _je ne sais qua_ ;)

<comment><USER13> Actually, my `we' meant the Germans. And not so much only the long-s, but also Fraktur.

The Nazis banned Fraktur, probably because Hitler didn't like it, and we never re-introduced it. As an irony of history, for some people Fraktur now carries connotations of the Third Reich. (See <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antiqua- Fraktur_dispute>)

I have a few old books in Fraktur. Faust and translations of Shakespeare's plays.

P.S. For my resume, my name only has the wrong kind of s.

<comment><USER15> I have a large number of old books in Fraktur (mostly Lutheran theology). I read so much more German in Fraktur that I find it easier to follow than the Latin script. It always amazes me that there are a good number of Germans who cannot read it at all. My wife (who also is well-versed in Fraktur, as well as the old German "saw-tooth" cursive) has had a number of German-speakers ask her to transcribe Fraktur to modern script. I mean, sure, it's different. Some of the capitals are especially strange, and there are a few more ligatures, but it's not _that_ hard.

<comment><USER16> Hey, we number theorists still use fraktur all the time! Prime ideals in Dedekind domains are usually denoted with fraktur letters.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>