Aquaris E4.5 Ubuntu Edition - <AUTHOR> http://www.bq.com/gb/ubuntu.html <comment><USER2> Ok, ordered. Crappy ordering process though, you have to pick a password without any particular reason to (don't ask your customers to make an account if you don't actually need one...), the certificate they use is invalid and they drop you on a page in Spanish after an English language ordering process that does not even bother to confirm you just made a purchase.

Let's hope the phone shows up :)

<comment><USER3> Haven't tried the one you mention, but this is a huge problem with many sites these days. Some don't even bother to have a logical sequence of page transitions (like the examples you give) - and many other issues, which are easily avoidable. I think it's partly due to the mad rush for startups to be first to market and cash out soon as possible.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I hate to be that guy, but I believe I need to share this. I was amongst the "lucky" ones who managed to get one of the phones of the first batch they sold (my Serial Number is lower than 1500). After using the phone for 20 minutes, I realized that the OS is _very_ far from being usable. I was able to spot more than 10 bugs that would prevent any regular smartphone user to use Ubuntu Phone as a replacement of a rudimentary smart phone.

I guess we will have to wait/help/contribute a lot to get it closer to an acceptable quality level.

In the meantime, I wonder if there is any way to install Android on the Ubuntu Edition E4.5.

<comment><USER5> "I hate to be that guy"

No, you really don't. Because if that was the case, instead commenting here, why won't you go to Ubuntu phone bug tracking or whatever and give your feedback there where would be actually useful? Just a though.

<comment><USER6> Hey its useful to me. I am looking for a new phone in around that price range. This is the first I have heard of an Ubuntu phone being available, and useful to get an opinion from others even if it does seem negative.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I have this phone since around 20th of March and like it really very much. The Terminal app is hilarious. I was pleased to find much more stuff in the Ubuntu store than expected. Telephony is perfect.

The one thing I do not like is the runtime of the battery. 44 hours was the absolute maximum I had this phone running before it went black (just turning it on, entering the SIM-PIN, having Bluetooth, GPS and WiFi turned off and doing nothing else). In my typical usage pattern, a runtime of 24 hours is the more realistic value. Have to load it every day :-(

<comment><USER8> I literally don't know anyone who doesn't charge daily (wake up, take it off charger, put it on the charger around 11:30 PM same day), except my dad and me as we use our phones on stand-by and just for calls, and a little bit of messaging. I work from home so I do all my smartphone stuff on my computer, and when I go out I'm with friends, not on my phone. And even then, we tend to charge every 2-3 days.

<comment><USER6> My LG L5 used to average 2 days before the battery started going crap. I am not an especially heavy user though.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I got burned once with a windows phone Omnia 7 as an early adopter and it was beyond useless (lack of apps/configurability) so I will definitely not rush again on unproven phones despite my interest in Ubuntu. Also the price/specs on this phone is horrible compared to Xiaomi Note 4G (190euro) which I own and can recommend to anyone. I hope Ubuntu phone catches on though. Competition is good.

<comment><USER8> The specs on that Xiaomi are really nice value. I'd been looking at the 2nd gen Moto E or G for my parents, but the Xiaomi beats it, although at a higher cost.

It just amazes me how cheap tech has become. The other day I was looking through the Microsoft Store, saw a $90 ish tablet that had various discounts at times bringing it down to an absolutely ridiculous $60-70 range. I checked out some reviews and they were glowing (in terms of value), it actually runs windows 8 and comes with a year of Office 365 and an hour of Skype minutes every month. I can hardly imagine anyone buying Office 365 for a year at $70, instead of just buying this tablet instead haha. Of course it's no Mac Pro, but it surprised me.

HP stream 7 was the name. I just sat there grinning while watching the reviews on this device, computing is truly becoming completely and totally ubiquitous this decade, even consumer computing is becoming a cheap commodity.

<comment><USER10> Just looked it up. Currently $79, with a $25 Windows Store voucher and $69-worth of Office 365. Extremely tempted but I really need to stop buying random tablet-y devices I'll never use.

<comment><USER3> Hehe, that really is a temptation. I wish there was one all-purpose device (maybe modular, like the earlier Modu phone [1] and now Google's Project Ara (still to come).

[1] Read about Modu in TechCrunch some years ago. An Israeli startup backed by Yossi Vardi, IIRC. Not sure what happened to it. But the idea seemed promising.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Took me some time to find the english version, here it is if anybody wants it : [http://www.bq.com/gb/ubuntu.html](http://www.bq.com/gb/ubuntu.html)

<comment><USER12> It was English for me from the start

<comment><USER13> Admins changed the URL from "Es" to "Gb". OP's comment was 3 hours earlier than yours...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Look like they have resolved the licensing issues [1]. Code is on github [2]

1\. [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9225691](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9225691)

2\. [https://github.com/bq/aquaris-E4.5/commit/34cf494bca625acad0...](https://github.com/bq/aquaris-E4.5/commit/34cf494bca625acad06274c3cba10aca148813c0)

</comment><comment><USER15> Interesting price strategy. They're obviously not aiming what you'd think of as the professional developer / early adopter market, otherwise they would have reduced the bezel, switched to a higher resolution screen, increased the specifications, and at least doubled the price. Are they hoping for this to be stocked in retail stores, and directly compete with Android at the Moto G sort of level?

That does sound fairly crazy, but it may well be that's more sensible than it sounds in parts of Europe, for instance Spain, where the early adopters won't have the same money as they do in the US, and the iPhone is expensive enough as to be almost nowhere to be seen.

Seems quite different from FirefoxOS, who have a much more pointed strategy of radically undercutting price, and targeting markets in the developing world.

<comment><USER16> bq is already a very popular brand here in Spain, so I suppose they will be targeting their current market (and if they get devs in the process, better).

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> BQ main office is just 50 meters away from my office. They are like 70-80 people, all very young (<30 years)

Pretty useless comment, I know.

<comment><USER18> They also make an e-reader [1] with open source software. I'm somewhat obsessed with the idea of using it for ssh/mosh as a portable terminal. It would be very cool to hear if someone has tried this, before ordering one. I mailed some random guy at BQ and he said he never tried it, but also found it interesting. If you find it interesting too, maybe you could run down and ask around! :)

[1]: [http://www.bq.com/gb/products/cervantes-2013.html](http://www.bq.com/gb/products/cervantes-2013.html)

<comment><USER19> (I don't know but...) I like the idea of an e-ink terminal, however I fear the slow refresh rate would make editing difficult. I guess someone somewhere has tried it though...

The specs of that particular one show no bluetooth (and no OTG usb), so can't connect a keyboard.

It also has no wireless apart from wifi; and only 512MB (though that's plenty for ssh!)

<comment><USER18> Ah, I didn't realize the Micro-USB port wouldn't accept a keyboard. There are Android e-ink tablets with Bluetooth; I'll probably end up trying that.

Also, difficult schmifficult! I bet ed, the standard editor, will work just fine. Shouldn't be much worse than, say, a 300 baud terminal!

<comment><USER19> Yeah, it has to be "OTG" (on the go), aka "usb host". Seems relatively uncommon.

Beats a line printer! Can relate - I'm ecstatic that (70s era) unix utilities are blazing instant on a phone. I'm sure vim would also work on an e-reader, if you don't need to find the cursor.

I should research this. Working on e-ink/e-paper would be so much better on the eyes - and incredible battery life (they claim 2 _months_ for the Kindle).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Well, that was an impulse purchase. "Delivered in 3-4 days", I've no idea what to expect.

<comment><USER21> Either something groundbreaking or a future rare collectible.

<comment><USER22> Or a doorstopper.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Anyone know whether there's an easy way to get root?

Is there a Terminal app with a local shell?

I'm in the US, so I can't get this one, but these are what I'm hoping for when it gets here.

<comment><USER24> Can we install regular Ubuntu packages on this phone? If we can then I guess you could install terminator, gnome-terminal or something.

<comment><USER25> I saw a video in Spanish of Obijuan installing stuff with apt-get after some configuration, so you can install Ubuntu packages. He showed python.

<comment><USER26> The Force is strong in that one.

<comment><USER27> La Fuerza es fuerte en él.

<comment><USER28> The force is strong in this Juan.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> I want to be able to hook a keyboard and monitor to my phone, and then have a full ubuntu desktop experience.

<comment><USER15> Doesn't seem to be quite there, but it's close. Someone posted this below:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c3PUYoa1c9M](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c3PUYoa1c9M)

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> The technical specs look very, very similar to the Zopo ZP910 I own and which I bought about two years ago, for about 200€. The CPU unfortunately isn't the same (MTK 6589 versus MTK 6582), otherwise it would be easy to port Ubuntu to it based on bq's builds. I don't really have much dependency on Android apps (just give me a browser, a media player and a way to make phone calls/texting), so Ubuntu Phone fits my bill. I would not buy a new phone just to run it, but I'd happily "upgrade" my current phone to it, because the new versions of Google's apps are quite heavy (material design and all that) and the hardware is starting not to cut it.

</comment><comment><USER31> Nice touch that the clock on the screen shows "14:10", which is of course similar to the latest released Ubuntu version (14.10, from October last year). Coincidence? :)

Not sure how the phone version of Ubuntu is versioned ([http://www.ubuntu.com/phone](http://www.ubuntu.com/phone) didn't help), though.

<comment><USER32> Not a coincidence. :)

<comment><USER33> Isn't the ubuntu phone using the RTM archive which has a different version number? :P

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> What is the status of connecting the ubuntu phone to a screen to get a personal computer running ubuntu desktop ?

<comment><USER35> Even if it's possible with this device (which I don't know) that's still an ARM processor you have. It's a Cortex A7 a bit faster from what you get in a Raspberry Pi 2 but not much.

Anyway, those phones or tablets that turn into supposed regular computers are cool, but at the end of the day when I have access to a screen and keyboard there is usually a computer not far. Since my data is in the cloud anyway, I'd rather use that separate computer than my phone.

<comment><USER36> There are plenty of situations where I don't want to trust the available computer with my data.

And I very frequently find myself in situations where the network connection is so poor that streaming my data over the network is an exercise in frustration.

When I then walk around with more and more powerful computers in my pocket, it's great to be able to make use of it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> This is great, specially as it can give some help to Qt on mobile phones.

EDIT: Just noticed that the sale is only available in the Spanish store. The German one still shows "It will be available shortly".

</comment><comment><USER38> [https://www.dropbox.com/s/qcqy4p4z1brpgt9/Screenshot%202015-...](https://www.dropbox.com/s/qcqy4p4z1brpgt9/Screenshot%202015-04-10%2007.26.17.png?dl=0)

> Compatible formats

> Text format .txt/ .pdf/ .xls/ .doc/ .ppt

No .odt?

</comment><comment><USER39> Wow! The bezels on that phone are huge. I personally find that very unappealing, it makes the phone hardware look very outdated.

That said, I'd love to sit down and play with the OS on the phone to see what it does different from other mobile OSes today.

</comment><comment><USER40> I'm holding off until the Meizu MX4 Ubuntu goes on sale -- but perhaps I shouldn't - does anyone know if it is exactly the same as the one being sold now running Android?

If so, I might get that one and install Ubuntu myself.

<comment><USER41> I think it'll be the same but I don't think installing is straightforward until official the Meizu MX4 Ubuntu images are released

</comment></comment><comment><USER42> Being burned by two FirefoxOS phones (mostly burned by not being to upgrade to anything latest and stuck to some version). So I'll be careful this time... But I so much wanted to try it out...

<comment><USER43> _> Being burned by two FirefoxOS phones (mostly burned by not being to upgrade to anything latest and stuck to some version)._

Which ones? I had the same experience with the ZTE Open C but found great community updates for this and other phones. Open C updates are this way: [http://builds.firefoxos.mozfr.org/doc/en/devices/zte- open-c](http://builds.firefoxos.mozfr.org/doc/en/devices/zte-open-c)

<comment><USER42> I can't thank you enough! I haven't looked deeply into other sources, and used the phone as a normal user (I've borrowed it to a friend of ours, when they went to Italy for vacation (we are US based)), and then I used them again when travelling to Bulgaria.

Why FirefoxOS phones there? Because they don't draw much attention, they are cheap, and reliable for basic phone needs - calling, texting, even some browsing. Also the battery life is pretty good.

They are bit sluggish, but still much faster than other cheap phones.

<comment><USER43> You're welcome! They are quite hard to find. I accidently stumbled over the mozfr community builds while figuring out how to compile a current version myself :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER44> Love it. Only one missing feature prevents me from buying it: Ubuntu Phone doesn't seem to have _easy, painless, over-the-air syncing of calendars and contacts_ with third-party applications/services like Google Apps and Microsoft Exchange, for snappy access to that data whether I'm online or offline.

<comment><USER45> Calendar syncing to google should work (but i haven't checked, and i don't know whether it would meet your other qualifiers).

<comment><USER15> It really should have full CalDav and CardDav support out of the box.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER46> Can't wait to be rid of Android. Its endless insistence on upgrading me to the latest version is driving me batty.

<comment><USER47> How can something like that make you batty? For sure Ubuntu phone will never invite you to upgrade ...

<comment><USER48> I guess he meant that once an OS update is downloaded, it cannot be swept right and forgotten, but it stays in notifications forever. I have one Moto G I use as a bike navigation, don't plan to ever update it to Lollipop as I run only OsmAnd on it and it always insists on getting upgraded to 5.0.x.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER49> Anyone know if you can do stuff like use emacs, cc, make, install a JVM etc?

<comment><USER32> Yes and no. The phone image is read-only by default, with RW areas for user data / tmp / logs etc. You can easily make the RO portion RW, and then apt-get or dpkg install random packages. However the caveat is we never test that scenario, so if you break it, you get to keep the pieces. You can then re- flash it to get out of this of course.

<comment><USER36> That still sounds far nicer than Android...

Shame that this phone has such a low res screen or I'd be tempted.

<comment><USER41> If you want higher res/better specs, check out the Meizu MX4

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER50> This phone made me think a lot about the future of mobile in emerging markets. I was reading a lot of great feedbacks about Mozilla with Firefox OS in Africa and some South American countries, they are very happy about the price/value of devices and the fact that these countries have a very basic (or even no) infrastructure, makes them very interesting for these systems, because you can actually build from scratch, using pretty recent technologies.

All this introduction is to try to understand the Ubuntu Phone world, I don't think it can emerge against Android or iPhone, so it should definitely compete against Mozilla in emerging markets, but it looks like is coming a little bit late. I am also curious about how developers will react to the platform, with a native or HTML5 approach, looks similar to the Microsoft strategy. Firefox was able to get devs easily because the HTML5/Javascript is an easy combo and is widely known, native development requires more efforts and has a steeper learning curve. A smartphone is 20% platform and 80% ecosystem, no apps means no users.

I am honestly interested in trying it, I did it for Firefox, writing a simple weather app for it, so I would like to do the same. At the moment, I am not sure the system will be able to compete, but happy to be proven wrong!

</comment><comment><USER51> The phone itself looks great, but the "game" [0] doesn't do a very good job showcasing the usability of the OS.

Also shipping comes around 25€ in Europe. Quite steep for a phone priced at 169€.

[0] [http://www.bq.com/gb/game-ubuntu](http://www.bq.com/gb/game-ubuntu)

<comment><USER52> Free shipping to Austria with 0,99€ for express. Looks like they have vastly different shipping rates.

<comment><USER53> Same shipping options/prices to Portugal.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER54> The battery being a LiPo (lithium polymer) could be a concern (they are quite unstable and explode on contact with water) and IIRC are not allowed to be brought on planes. They can also be permanently damaged if you allow the voltage per cell to get too low and do not have a huge amount of recharge cycles.

<comment><USER55> I couldn't find any indication that there is any difference in terms of regulations between lithium polymer and lithium ion batteries. Are you sure?

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium_polymer_battery#Safety](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium_polymer_battery#Safety)

[http://www.airsafe.com/issues/baggage/batteries.htm](http://www.airsafe.com/issues/baggage/batteries.htm)

<comment><USER56> Never underestimate the ability of manufacturers to screw up a perfectly good label...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER57> I'm uber curious about the technical aspect of it. Software side, how it compares to other OSes in terms of cpu and ram usage, battery life etc. How different is the distribution from the desktop/server images (libc, compile flags, ...).

</comment><comment><USER58> Too bad, LTE 4G not supported :(

<comment><USER59> Honest question here: what does anyone need 4g for?

On HSPA+ (H+) my connection is fast enough for any purpose besides downloading movies, and it's not like I've got unlimited data. Even 3g's theoretical speed is great if they could get that to work for a change.

I have 4g on a company laptop and the speed is better than many places' WiFi, but I have yet to find an excuse to use it ( _someone_ has to pay that data bill). It's not like I don't know how fast it really is, I just don't see the point of it right now. In 5 years 3g really will be too slow for many applications, but as it stands...

<comment><USER60> > In 5 years 3g really will be too slow for many applications

You answered your own question. It's progress, and the sooner people around the world adopt 4G, the sooner it becomes the standard, just like 3G before it.

<comment><USER59> > You answered your own question.

But in 5 years, in all reasonableness, you'd have a new phone. Having no lte on this one doesn't change much. That's what I meant to say.

<comment><USER60> You're right, and my Nexus 4 and Lumia 521 are getting along just fine without LTE as well, and will continue to for the next 1-2 years I hope to get out of them. It will be at least another 10-15 years before 3G is turned off in favor of whatever the baseline is then (hell, we still have 2G which by all accounts should be dead by now).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER61> "Only available in the European Union"

<comment><USER62> The EuroPhone!

</comment></comment><comment><USER63> I'm hopeful, will be glad to consider it when it's available in the US.

</comment><comment><USER64> I'm Looking forward to get a new Phone. I am however undecided on Firefox OS and Ubuntu OS. Leaning towards Ubuntu but this device looks like a first-gen smart phone... once you see the bezel you can not unsee it!

</comment><comment><USER65> I just set up an Ubuntu 14.04 server on Digital Ocean. One "apt-get install mail-stack-delivery", and one edited line in /etc/postfix/master.cf later (just to get 587 submission working) and I have my own mail server including STARTTLS on smtp and imap. Made me wonder, will we see sync options on Ubuntu Phone to sync mail/calendar/own-cloud with one (SSH) account? Seems to me the possibilities are endless and very exciting. Please stay true to FOSS principles, resist the temptations, give the (mobile) web back to the people!

<comment><USER66> Very interesting. Can I encrypt the disk?

<comment><USER65> Certainly you can encrypt the email part, But I'm not sure how NSA proof it will be when the whole server is in the RAM of one that you don't control though.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> These guys started selling branded USB pen drives back in 2007. Their history is quite interesting. Here is a google translated Spanish article [1]

[1] [https://translate.google.com/translate?sl=es&tl=en&js=y&prev...](https://translate.google.com/translate?sl=es&tl=en&js=y&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.elmundo.es%2Fcronica%2F2014%2F09%2F07%2F540b004922601d4f028b4582.html&edit- text=)

</comment><comment><USER67> Does it run Whatsapp? No? What is this, a cellphone? Oh, cool, but we stopped using cellphones a while back, we now use portable computers the size of a cellphone which run _widely adopted_ social apps. It's for a niche market you say? Oh, cool.

Sarcasm aside: I am still waiting for an official FFOS Whatsapp version, meanwhile I am using my ZTE Open as a PC+camera+GCM dongle to run some fun hacks, kindda like a Tessel Machine.

<comment><USER68> WhatsApp actively stops people from making apps for new platforms, so keep on waiting for that FFOS version

<comment><USER67> True, although there is a couple of unofficial APIs that have managed to stay up. Now, the big question, how will FB make its money back? It has to open Whatsapp to advertizers and/or integrate to its platform of services. Or did it buy it to take it down while pushing FB chat as a standalone web/native app?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER69> I couldn't find a way to introduce my VAT number.

If I'm a business with a valid VAT number outside Spain, I shouldn't pay the VAT, right?

<comment><USER70> As far as I know, you need to reclaim VAT; you pay it and claim it back. At least that was the case last time I have checked.

</comment></comment><comment><USER71> There isn't any reason one of these wouldn't work on a GSM network in the US, right?

<comment><USER32> GSM yes, 3G no.

<comment><USER72> Basically like the Jolla phone then, which only has 2G internet in the US.

<comment><USER73> Is the support for all (or nearly all) 3G/4G networks limited to higher-end chips? I believe at least e.g. the iPhone has identical hardware worldwide?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER74> Oh, how I would love this device to be a class leading spec. It's nearly time for a new phone, and I'd love an Ubuntu handset, but don't think I'd be up for the technical downgrade by purchasing this mid-(to-low-)range device.

<comment><USER75> When the first announced Ubuntu for phones they tried to kickstart a phone with class-leading specs but there wasn't enough interest for it to be feasible.

</comment></comment><comment><USER76> OT: If anyone from bq.com is reading this: Why can't I select Germany, France, or Austria as a country to ship to? Why do I have to provide my nationality (personal information, not part of the shipping address)?

<comment><USER77> Looks like at least Germany and Austria have their own shop.

[https://store-de.bq.com/de/](https://store-de.bq.com/de/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER78> Can I run docker on this?

</comment><comment><USER79> From the animation on the site, I notice that pulling from the top to reach the notification hides the top bar. What do you think?

There is a lot of relevant information inside that bar.

<comment><USER53> Does the same on my Androids. Don't see any problem with it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER80> [http://www.bq.com/gb/game-ubuntu](http://www.bq.com/gb/game-ubuntu)

"Telegram is the most secure way to..." or [http://www.bq.com/flexy_templates/game/assets/en/screen-3.pn...](http://www.bq.com/flexy_templates/game/assets/en/screen-3.png)

If you market your phone towards nerds, don't bullshit us with crypto marketing.

<comment><USER81> Would you mind to explain what you are talking about ? I thought telegram are more secure than whats app and etc . I would gladly hear what do you think about these app in general.

<comment><USER82> Telegram is a proprietary network service, which means that there is no reason to believe that it is secure.

<comment><USER83> The protocol is published, and the client is open source, but the protocol has a whole bunch of design issues, and that's the _real_ problem with Telegram.

<comment><USER82> But the server isn't free software, so it's untrustable, even if the protocol didn't have known design issues.

<comment><USER83> If the protocol was properly designed, the proprietary nature of the server wouldn't be an issue as we could write a server implementing the protocol too. For instance, I don't have to worry about all of tarsnap being open source, because I know from the way the client is implemented that the server can't do a damned thing to sniff my data.

However, due to how much of an awful botch job the protocol is, even if the server was FLOSS, it would still be untrustable.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER84> Can anyone share financial details of this company like, is it VC funded or public enterprise ...etc and sources of funding?

</comment><comment><USER85> Will order one next week (paycheck).

</comment><comment><USER86> More mobile fragmentation. I hope Cordova stacks (phonegap, iconic) are made compatible soon.

<comment><USER87> [http://www.ubuntu.com/phone/developers](http://www.ubuntu.com/phone/developers)

        If you've created HTML5 apps or mobile websites for
        other platforms — there's good news: the path
        to Ubuntu
        couldn't
        be quicker. We support both the Webkit/Blink and
        Cordova development standards — and with a separate
        API that enables
        websites to be quickly converted to run independently
        of a browser, with full access to phone notifications
        and
        settings, the same goes for your web applications.

</comment></comment><comment><USER88> When will they release one with a hardware keyboard? This would be worth buying.

<comment><USER89> I'd buy any android phone with a hardware keyboard, but those days are long gone now - with the bigger screens, the manufacturers have given up one them

</comment></comment><comment><USER90> Nice to see it coming to the market, but with those specs nope sorry.

</comment><comment><USER91> Does anyone know if this supports AP mode under WiFi?

</comment><comment><USER92> Success all comes down to the app store.

Just ask Microsoft.

<comment><USER93> WP is dead because of it's restrictions (eg. on WP you can't even install Webkit/Blink based browser)

<comment><USER94> Yeah, because that's what millions of users out there are asking for.

<comment><USER53> Ofcourse they aren't asking for it, they just didn't buy the phones. Why would they ask for it when they are using Android?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER62> no more flash sales! \o/

</comment><comment><USER95> what are the standard apps to replace the google apps?

<comment><USER96> Google has 88 apps in the Android app store. Which ones are you looking to replace?

Edit: Here's a list of the "core apps". [https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Touch/CoreApps](https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Touch/CoreApps) Notably missing are email and SMS apps, so I'm not sure what they're using for those.

Also, you won't spend as much time in siloed app experiences on this OS. It's all about Scopes: [http://www.ubuntu.com/phone/features](http://www.ubuntu.com/phone/features)

<comment><USER97> The "Core Apps" have a bad name. They are community-developed apps, that may be included in the stock image. What you're really looking for are the "System Apps": [https://launchpad.net/ubuntu-system- apps](https://launchpad.net/ubuntu-system-apps)

<comment><USER96> Oh, thanks! But I still don't see email or maps in either list?

<comment><USER97> (I've been following development on and off — lately more off.)

Email is Dekko: [https://launchpad.net/dekko](https://launchpad.net/dekko) (No idea about the name.) Based on (forked from) Trojitá.

I haven't seen a maps app, but I know they're using Here/Nokia for location services ([https://insights.ubuntu.com/2014/07/30/nokia-here-maps- comin...](https://insights.ubuntu.com/2014/07/30/nokia-here-maps-coming-to- ubuntu/)). I think the BQ phone comes with a location "scope". The Here HTML5 app is pretty good on FxOS, so they could be using that.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER98> brb, moving to the EU...

</comment><comment><USER99> MediaTek? No, thanks.

<comment><USER73> MediaTek is not just a lower-end chip; it potentially has its own unique advanages. E.g. AFAIK only phones with MediaTek chips potentially can:

\- ring an alarm when in 'off' state

\- change their IMEI

I'm not claiming that everyone needs that or that it will be possible on Ubuntu; just reminding that MTK chips have some unique advantages, too.

<comment><USER100> I wonder why you'd need a specific chipset to have an RTC alarm. Couldn't it be added on the board independently? After having so many Nokias, I'm still amazed how so many phones miss what should be a basic feature.

<comment><USER73> I believe noone bothers to add additional hardware for this, but MTK has the hardware on-chip. I, too, hold old Nokias as a standard in this regard.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER80> [http://store.bq.com/en/ubuntu-edition-e-4-5](http://store.bq.com/en/ubuntu- edition-e-4-5)

No [https://](https://) by default. Again, if you market this as towards the nerdy audience: Put _everything_ behind HTTPS. I simply do not want to let others know, what phone I might buy.

Thank you.

<comment><USER101> I don't know why parent is getting downvoted: he is correct, we need to https all the things to improve https for everyone.

</comment></comment><comment><USER102> Perhaps the mods can change the URL to show the English version of the site, rather than the Spanish version? [http://www.bq.com/gb/ubuntu.html](http://www.bq.com/gb/ubuntu.html)

<comment><USER103> Huh, I tried /en/. Generally people use ISO 639 over ISO 3166 for choosing the language to represent.

<comment><USER104> I think the reason is that they want separate pages by countries, not by languages. For instance, they have three different pages in Spanish (Spain, Mexico, Uruguay).

<comment><USER105> Things like that always bug me.

What if I live in Spain and only speak English. What if I live in a Catalan region and want Catalan? What if I live in GB and want to read it in Spanish as it's my first language?

With the world being as global as it is and people readily moving around, geographic location does not equal language preference.

Ideally the site would have geographic specific sections but allow all languages it has translations for in each section. Bonus points if you default language based on my HTTP headers and allow session based overrides.

<comment><USER106> It would be quite a bit of work, to attend a very limited use case.

Every Catalan (or Galician, Valencian, Basque) speaks Spanish, as do the vast majority of the expats I know (and I'm one myself).

You can still access the specific site of the language you are interested in. Or, in the worst case, use Google translate.

<comment><USER107> Obviously it depends on the use case and audience, but language and location should not be conflated by default. Location allows customization of currency, measurement units, legal policies, shipping information, tariffs, dates/times, etc independently of the copy language. There are plenty of countries with more than one major language (there are almost 40 million Spanish-speaking citizens of the US and India has 23 official languages), so websites that guess language based on country alienate a lot of users.

Your browser already tells every website what language(s) you speak in the Accept-Language header, so it's not like that information isn't available.

<comment><USER106> My (very subjective) guess, is that many of those 40 millions Spanish speakers in the US speak English as well, and the percentage of those who don't and would use an e-commerce site is low.

Still, I would imagine major e-commerce websites to add support for a langugage in the website, if the potential userbase is big enough (for example, the Apple Store does).

My knowledge of India is very limited , but it always seemed to me that the unifying language really is English (again, from a very cursory glance, Amazon, Apple and HP have Indian e-commerce stores in English).

My point is that decoupling language and location as a general feature does not make much economic sense in the vast majority of cases.

This is especially true for major e-commerce sites: think about Amazon, and the number of items being sold (millions ?). Many of those are sold only in a particular store, or have variations between a store and another: how much would it cost to translate all the articles for all the stores in x languages ?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER108> is it?</comment>


Financial transparency: where your money goes with MediaGoblin - <AUTHOR> http://mediagoblin.org/news/financial-transparency.html <comment><USER2> It's always nice to see open source projects publishing accounts along with some detailed commentary on what they've done with it.</comment>


Principles of Icon Design - <AUTHOR> https://uxdesign.cc/7-principles-of-icon-design-e7187539e4a2 <comment><USER2> In the 10+ years I've been running a UI/UX design firm for software companies, I've come to the conclusion that icon design, is not very different from logo design and brand design. A Nike swish logo by itself, without context of the brand we have with it today, is just a random piece of graphic. The pixels itself are worth practically nothing. But because when we see the Nike logo, we feel something (Athleticism, motivation, inspiration, energy, etc.) the mark is worth billions. The magic is not in the mark itself, it's in the context and meaning it builds up in the user's mind over time. Same goes for icons. When seeing a play button with a red background and a white triangle, it might suggest you're looking at a Youtube video. Icons, have no real meaning or worth without context that's built up over time. Both are 'investment graphics'. So the purpose of an icon should be to make the user familiar with something and initiate a mental model when you see it (You see Nike, you feel something. You see a Play button, you know you need to click it, etc.). Don't judge icons by their looks, but by their context. In other words: Can the icon you are adding in your UI, _over time and by continuously link the mark to a specific outcome_ , make the product easier to use because it instantly gives the user a mental model of it's meaning and consequence when clicked.

<comment><USER3> The play button points at the direction the tape will roll in your cassette player. It had a very practical function once upon a time.

<comment><USER4> Wow, I completely forgot about that fact. So the play triangle was an arrow saying "tape is rolling in this direction" and fast-forward and reverse double triangles were "tape is rolling fast" in the respective directions.

Did these buttons first show up on cassette players? The reel-to-reels I can think of had multi-position switches.

<comment><USER5> I looked it up and they date back to the 1960s on reel-to-reel tape recorders. The pause button was added later when companies found that they couldn't properly translate the word pause into every language. The idea is that the two bars look like the square stop button and look like a frame stopped while it is rolling to the next frame. The reasoning behind the square is that it's the play triangle without a direction; it is stopped in both directions.

This machine is apparently from 1961, so it must have been quite early in the 60s: [http://www.reelprosoundguys.com/images/1962_GRUNDIG_TK_46.jp...](http://www.reelprosoundguys.com/images/1962_GRUNDIG_TK_46.jpg)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> If I could lodge a complaint to all the UI designers: please stop making all the icons look the same in order for them to have the same "style." If I'm looking at a grid of essentially identical white-on-black pictograms with overlapping forms composed entirely of outlines with no variation in thickness or stroke, then you might as well just use actual words at that point.

<comment><USER6> As a general rule icons take up less horizontal space than actual words describing what they do, which is why designers prefer to use icons.

<comment><USER7> Word Wrap. Amateurs.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I really think that icons should be judiciously used, in the event of notification of a serious type. An alert, a warning or an immediate attention to a hazard. Icons have a cognitive overhead of learning it - if we design icons of different styles and artistic expression, they lose their efficiency in cognitive detection. An interface with lots of icons without text (For e.g. SolidWorks, 3DS MAX, Houdini) requires professional training and lots of experience. But a universally recognized icon such as the ones defined in ISO 7010 [1] are popularized and standardized - why? Because, if these icons are standardized, they gain popularity and recognizeability. I am guessing, the cognitive overhead in icon detection and interpretation becomes less as we are constantly exposed to these icons. It doesn't have to be officially standardized. For example, Floppy disk icon (save a file) and on/off icons. Ofcourse, designers will continue to do things as a statement of artistic expression at the expense of all kinds of things - legibility, accessibility and as I said earlier, recognizeability. But that would make the world a really boring place, so let's allow creativity.

There are a bunch of people that studied semiology of graphics. Frutiger did a lot of work in iconography. Vignilli and a few other

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_7010](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_7010)

PS - Btw, skeumorphic design is back, watch out for it in the next decade.

<comment><USER9> This screen shot from the message/thread view in Gmail illustrates the problems of using icons without text labels when the icons aren't obvious enough:

[https://i.imgur.com/k7MFzdK.png](https://i.imgur.com/k7MFzdK.png)

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> I've started strongly leaning towards the principle that if I have to choose between either an icon or text on a button, I will choose text. Icons are nice landmarks to guide the eye, but they are absolutely worthless to convey information or to find functions that you do not already have muscle memory for. Text is clearer, and the varying word shapes and lengths gives the eye a lot to work with already for locating things.

Try sitting someone who has never seen your UI before down in front of it, and try to explain to them how to do something without pointing at the screen, and see how much they struggle if your buttons only have icons.

<comment><USER11> Yes! This was exactly the consensus in desktop app UX circles before mobile UX popularized "hamburger menu and heiroglyph" design, which intentionally sacrifices legibility to obtain screen space.

It's unfortunate that many designers these days often jump for hamburgers and heiroglyphs in circumstances where that sacrifice doesn't make sense.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> The author has criticised the design of the "electric power steering system warning light" icon without suggesting a better alternative. What's the point of criticizing then? Some concepts are easier to depict literally, others are not.

The most important part about the car icons is the color: an orange icon means you can go, a red icon means you must immediately stop.

<comment><USER13> The one that entertained me was the water temp warning icon - an icon that's _at least_ 50 years old. Its meaning is as well (if not more) established as the floppy disk as save.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Even if I generally agree with the premise of the article and the tipps it gives, it too falls prey to some of the problems of icons. It presents the Yelp food icons as well thought out and intuitive, and I would not have had the slightest idea why the chinese food icon looks that way or what it should represent, because around where I live chinese food is not served or sold in these kind of boxes. The problem remains: if you don't already know the meaning, you can at best guess, but don't understand it intuitively.

</comment><comment><USER15> I lead the team who built one of the public documentation sites mentioned in this article ([https://polaris-icons.shopify.com/](https://polaris- icons.shopify.com/)), ask me anything!

</comment><comment><USER16> Since we are on topic, anybody has a suggestion for an icon that represents body fat without representing an overweighted person?

<comment><USER17> The Noun Project has a few options that might work (most don't meet your requirements), including a couple showing a lean person with arrows by the midsection instead: [https://thenounproject.com/search/?q=body%20fat](https://thenounproject.com/search/?q=body%20fat)

<comment><USER16> Thank you for your suggestion. It's not exactly what I look for but it can help me as inspiration.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> A much better guide would be to just follow Dieter Rams' 10 principles of good design, which can be found here [1] and elsewhere

[1] [https://www.designprinciplesftw.com/collections/ten- principl...](https://www.designprinciplesftw.com/collections/ten-principles- for-good-design)

</comment><comment><USER19> Arrows aren't really globally understood it's a cultural thing; depending on how you navigate the world. You might understand the arrows differently when used for indicating direction. It's a fascinating study in Anthropology :)

</comment><comment><USER20> This is also a crap article on icon design. Too little focus on context or actual implementation. Every medium article seems to me a crap resume builder, loads of 1st year experts telling you the crap they learned in _profession_ bootcamp.

</comment><comment><USER21> This has literally nothing to do with UX Design.

</comment><comment><USER22> Off-topic question: I see a lot of new posts coming from .cc websites. What is the appeal that .cc provides? Is it that the content is released under Creative Commons? That's not the case here. What kind of messaging or symbolism or underlying meaning one is aiming for when they are going for a .cc domain?

<comment><USER23> I doubt it has anything to do with the conceptual meaning of .cc and more with the practical consideration that uxdesign.cc was available and much cheaper than the alternatives.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> I really like the design of Heroes of Might and Magic 2 spells:

[https://www.pngkit.com/png/detail/204-2044131_spells- heroes-...](https://www.pngkit.com/png/detail/204-2044131_spells-heroes-of- might-and-magic-cursor.png)

Clear, quite colorful, and they communicate the spell function well. In the worst case, they're easy to memorize. I still like the black&yellow style.

HOMM1 is also good.

Heroes of Might and Magic 3 made them more decorative, but they're still clear: [https://www.spriters- resource.com/resources/sheets/38/41309....](https://www.spriters- resource.com/resources/sheets/38/41309.png)

HOMMIV spells - what do these do? [https://images.gog- statics.com/e0b6ea10a02d03060d95cb9f79ebc...](https://images.gog- statics.com/e0b6ea10a02d03060d95cb9f79ebce6e3bc4d8b219bd5b52494df1c543ac17b8_product_card_v2_mobile_slider_639.jpg)

Might and Magic Heroes 5 - you need an art historian to figure these out. [http://www.heroesofmightandmagic.com/heroes5/spells.shtml](http://www.heroesofmightandmagic.com/heroes5/spells.shtml)</comment>


What is the status of Code Anywhere? - <AUTHOR> http://codeanywhere.com
It looks useful and I want to try it out, however their iOS app errors when trying to set up a box, images are missing from their website, and I can't access their support site.
Does anyone here use it or know of any decent alternatives? <comment><USER2> This might be one of the use cases in favor of Android because a user can install GNU Root Debian from the app store and have an environment for development...of course this probably isn't ideal if the goal is iOS development...then again, programming from a device without a keyboard is probably suboptimal...then again again, Bluetooth keyboards are option, but at that point I'm close to carrying a small laptop.

Anyway, back to the original point, or some use cases, Cloud 9 might be an alternative. Or a cheap Android device is an alternative that does not depend on a service.</comment>


Quick, Patent It  - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/08/opinion/08sun3.html <comment><USER2> Since we have some patent people on here, does anyone have any great resources (that aren't the usual google search spam) to show you examples and how to go about filing your patent without having to dish out big bucks for a patent lawyer and someone to help you write it?

<comment><USER3> well quite frankly, you will need to hire someone, or else your patent will probably be worthless. A lot depends on the writing and if you get it wrong, you will lose in court.

<comment><USER4> I second the parent. The typical inventor thinks the description and drawings are important, while they are really secondary to the claims which are what is legally protected. Unfortunately, writing a good set of claims is an art that can only be mastered through a lot of experience and research into what has been effective with the USPTO in addition to what has been upheld in court. While this is not out of reach of the HN audience, your time would be better served by innovating and letting a good IP law firm handle the patent. This will be expensive -- costs are at least $10K, and software patents typically will cost more because prosecution (arguing with the USPTO why your invention is patentable) will be longer. IMHO, the whole process is soul-sucking and why I no longer practice patent law.

However, if you do wish to proceed the best play to start would be with the official Manual of Patent Examining Procedure (MPEP):

<http://www.uspto.gov/web/offices/pac/mpep/mpep.htm>

<comment><USER5> One of the curious things about the system is how infrequently large companies actually own the patents that make up the core of their business. PageRank is owned by Stanford, not by Google. The original Lisp Machine patents were owned by MIT, not by Symbolics. Same with Akamai's core patents. The original ideas behind EBay and online auctions were never patented, because Pierre Omidyar had a day job and his employer probably would've owned it anyway.

I guess the takeaway for new entrepreneurs is to focus on making _money_ , not patents. Because once you have money, you can hire good people, and then you'll own the patents that _they_ produce. It's kinda odd that giant corporations own huge patent portfolios, but almost never the patents on the inventions that spawned the companies. I guess it makes sense when you consider employment law and the need to earn a living, though. If it works for Google, E-bay, Akamai, etc, it ought to be good enough for us.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I'm sure glad this one got filed before the door closed on protected innovation forever: [http://www.google.com/patents/about?id=T2QKAAAAEBAJ&dq=P...](http://www.google.com/patents/about?id=T2QKAAAAEBAJ&dq=Patent+6368227)

<comment><USER7> That's awesome. But from the last page of the patent, it looks like it was re- examined a month and a half later and all the claims were revoked.

<comment><USER8> I'm pretty sure someone went to a playground and directly observed "skilled practitioners of the art" independently discovering the methods. I think there might have been some prior art on a few million 8mm film reels in people's attics as well...

It would seem immediately apparent to most 2 handed children. I do find it interesting that the patent missed out on the method of elevating one's ass by pressing outward on both chains. Now that's technology.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> "If the court sides with these patent applicants it would open the door for all sorts of "processes.""

Patents are already granted for software and if software is not the description of processes, I don't know what it is. So why say it "would open the door"?...

</comment><comment><USER10> This is Bilski <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_re_Bilski>

<http://www.patentlyo.com/patent/2009/06/bilski.html></comment>


Rackspace accused of patent infringement for hosting Github - <AUTHOR> http://www.scribd.com/doc/106190890/PersonalWeb-Technologies-et-al-v-Rackspace-et-al <comment><USER2> _11\. Venue is proper in the Eastern District of Texas under 28 U.S.C. §§ 1391 and1400(b). PersonalWeb is a limited liability company incorporated in Smith County, Texaswith its principal place of business in Tyler, Texas. A substantial part of the events giving riseto the asserted claims occurred in this judicial district, Defendant transact business in this judicial district, and the patents were infringed in this judicial district_

I think maybe its time for all technology companies everywhere to boycott a certain district in East Texas. Don't ship there. Geolock all services so they aren't useable there. Hell, if Hulu can keep the Canadians out, this should be easy.

If nothing else, it would send a message to the people living in that area that their local courts have been hijacked to do some very unfortunate things. It would send a pretty good message to other jurisdictions as well : "make a national nuisance of yourself, lose your interwebs."

Want to stay out of patent court? _Don't mess with Texas._

<comment><USER3> Not a fan of net neutrality I take it?

As much as I hate patent trolling, I'd hate politics and ridiculous laws to restrict the free flow of information _more_ instead of less.

<comment><USER4> Noonespecial is talking about private actors, not the state. This is essentially a call for a boycott, and I can't see this as a reflection on noonespecial's views on net neutrality one way or the other.

<comment><USER5> The whole point of net neutrality is preventing private actors from manipulating the flow of information.

<comment><USER6> Flow is not the same as supply. Noonespecial is talking about blocking things at source not by an intermediary.

<comment><USER7> _Flow is not the same as supply_

Its like a synthetic variation, not a logically novel form of argument. The flow is cutoff when the supply is witheld. The supply is withheld when the flow is cutoff. Etc.

<comment><USER6> Cutting off flow is not the same as withholding supply.

<comment><USER7> Functional equivalents, and often the Law will see through such transparency. Are you going to withould supply from [an ethnic group, or a protected class] for example?

<comment><USER6> I'm not sure we're talking about the same thing.

I was trying to say that noonespecial's suggestion for "technology companies everywhere to boycott a certain district in East Texas" isn't about net neutrality as schmichael objected because net neutrality is about intermediaries blocking or throttling access to services, whereas as the boycott noonespecial suggested would be by the providers of the service.

<comment><USER7> No, i do understand; but you are missing the point of the comment that you replied too -- which is that the purpose (public policy) of net neutrality is to prevent the collusion of private actors from acting against the common good. This type of collusion has issues associated with it that are far broader than what you are thinking of. And there are other laws/policy ideas beyond net neutrality to consider. This consideration isn't optional or arbitrary. [And this isn't an adversarial or snarky comment its just how the world works.]

<comment><USER6> But those private actors that the policy applies to must be middle men or acting on middle men in a network. Net neutrality as I understand it is about placing restrictions on network operators and regulators can do so that they cannot restrict access to content. So Wikipedia blocking access to it's own website would not be a network neutrality issue, but an ISP blocking access to it would.

 _And there are other laws/policy ideas beyond net neutrality to consider._

I was responding to a comment about network neutrality to say that it didn't apply. I wasn't discounting the possibility there could be other issues, although if Wikipedia decided to block access in Texas for a day (perhaps only allowing access to pages about patents, prior art etc.) I think that would be for the public good.

<comment><USER7> _the collusion of private actors from acting against the common good_

Net neutrality is not, per se the issue. it is one policy x of a set [X]. The argument/stratgem maybe far too narrow in scope to address the entire set [X], if for no other reason that its technical reference x not [X]. That was part of the larger point being made. There are alot of [laws] one may be breaking at the same time. If you are cute withrule Z an equally-hypertechnical look at law W might not be good. And if you try to undermine some of them (viz: a sythetic transaction) they are structured to see through to the end effect (don't care about the structure). So, if you are cutting off [insert name here] services to legally protected classes, for example, net neutrality might be the least of one's worries. And it might not matter the method. etc

Just something to think about. Also, this comment doesn't have anything to do with texas or whatever. Its just a general precaution. The issue is one of pre-texted market collusion, which being subject to abuse, is a dangerous precendent to allow.

<comment><USER6> Are you saying it doesn't matter if you are targeting legally protected classes specifically or if you are cutting off access to a wider group that includes them?

What is a sythetic transaction in this context? I tried googling it but couldn't find a good definition.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I can't view the link because it's expired, so I'll just post my rant here.

The _entire point_ of patents, as delineated in the U.S. Constitution, is "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries." So patents are a _means_ , of securing an _end_ , which is "the progress of science and useful arts". Is anyone actually arguing at this point that our current patent regime is accomplishing this end? Would the world be a better place if git and github did not exist, and the only entity that could use the technologies in these patents were the patent holders?

<comment><USER9> Patents cover areas of technology where developing a solution that can be commercialized at scale is much, much more expensive than software. Without patents, how is a pharma company expected to pay the enormous cost of research, development, and FDA approval of new drugs? Let's not let obvious flaws in software IP protection condemn the concept of patents in general.

<comment><USER10> > _Without patents, how is a pharma company expected to pay the enormous cost > of research, development, and FDA approval of new drugs?_

How about taxes? Drugs that are useful for millions of people can be subsidized --internationally even.

It will make the system even less commercialized (i.e prone to go for quick bucks and BS drugs instead of proper medicine).

Most of the more expensive drugs are of marginal utility anyway. Basic sanitation, running water, staple vaccination and such have much more to do with the general health and long living than even much touted breakthroughs like "heart surgery".

Not to mention that billions have been spent for BS like Viagra and ADD (non)drugs, while 60% of the world's population doesn't even have basic food and vaccines.

<comment><USER9> You are essentially arguing for a central planning approach, and we have ample evidence from the 20th century that this does not produce better outcomes than a market-based approach.

<comment><USER10> > _You are essentially arguing for a central planning approach, and we have > ample evidence from the 20th century that this does not produce better > outcomes than a market-based approach._

What "ample evidence"? The USSR? For one, they had a mighty fine space program.

Second, one example of central planning, that also carried other kinds of rubbish with it (cutthroat politics at the top level, being enforced on a backwards, non adequately industrialized country, dogmatic ideology, and having to fight a foreign superpower) does not "ample evidence" constitute.

Central planning != 20th century communism. We have much better examples of central planning, successful ones, in the western world.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> The patents in question:

<http://www.google.com/patents/US5978791>

<http://www.google.com/patents/US6415280>

<http://www.google.com/patents/US6928442>

<http://www.google.com/patents/US7802310>

<http://www.google.com/patents/US7945539>

<http://www.google.com/patents/US7945544>

<http://www.google.com/patents/US7949662>

<http://www.google.com/patents/US8001096>

<http://www.google.com/patents/US8099420>

<comment><USER12> The titles of the patents:

5978791: Data Processing System Using Substantially Unique Identifiers to Identify Data Items, Whereby Data Items Have the Same Identifiers.

6415280: Identifying and Requesting Data in Network Using Identifiers Which Are Based On Contents of Data.

6928442: Enforcement and Policing of Licensed Content Using Content-based Identifiers.

7802310: Controlling Access to Data in a Data Processing System.

7945539: Distributing and Accessing Data in a Data Processing System.

7945544: Similarity-Based Access Control of Data in a Data Processing System.

7949662: De-duplication of Data in a Data Processing System.

8001096: Computer File System Using Content-Dependent File Identifiers.

8099420: Accessing Data in a Data Processing System.

<comment><USER13> It would appear, based on many incidents underway at the moment, that the software patent apocalypse is beginning.

All software infringes something, so it should get interesting. Hopefully the absurdity will stink so badly that even the U.S. congress will do something.

<comment><USER14> I am hopeful about what happens N years _after_ the patentocalypse, when everything has been broadly patented a million times over and then _all of those patents expire_ , and it is no longer to patent anything again.

<comment><USER15> 1\. Prior art doesn't stop the patent office from issuing patents, so that's not going to help.

2\. Patentocalypse is a great way to kill off startups that actually succeed and open source projects, so big business campaign contributors will keep congresscritters from doing anything about it.

3\. This won't really hurt the big public corporations _too_ much, once the dust settles a little, because they'll just reach detente to avoid mutually assured destruction.

If something changes things for the better, it will almost certainly be the general public ultimately reaching a point where everyone ignores patent law altogether, thus making it irrelevant.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Rackspace isn't the only one being sued by the troll today.

Rackspace[1] Nexsan[2] Yahoo[3]

It also appears that this is the second round. (From 2011)

Caringo[4] NEC Corportation[5] Google[6] EMC/Vmware[7]

[1][http://www.scribd.com/doc/106190890/PersonalWeb- Technologies...](http://www.scribd.com/doc/106190890/PersonalWeb-Technologies- et-al-v-Rackspace-et-al) [2][http://www.scribd.com/doc/106190872/PersonalWeb- Technologies...](http://www.scribd.com/doc/106190872/PersonalWeb-Technologies- et-al-v-Nexsan-Technologies) [3][http://www.scribd.com/doc/106190829/PersonalWeb- Technologies...](http://www.scribd.com/doc/106190829/PersonalWeb-Technologies- et-al-v-Yahoo) [4][http://www.scribd.com/doc/75152879/PersonalWeb- Technologies-...](http://www.scribd.com/doc/75152879/PersonalWeb-Technologies- v-Caringo) [5][http://www.scribd.com/doc/75137853/PersonalWeb- Technologies-...](http://www.scribd.com/doc/75137853/PersonalWeb-Technologies- v-NEC-Corporation-of-America) [6][http://www.scribd.com/doc/75142772/PersonalWeb- Technologies-...](http://www.scribd.com/doc/75142772/PersonalWeb-Technologies- v-Google-et-al) [7][http://www.scribd.com/doc/75152912/PersonalWeb- Technologies-...](http://www.scribd.com/doc/75152912/PersonalWeb-Technologies- v-EMC-et-al)

<comment> Tuna-Fish My google-fu is failing me, how did the round 1 end?

<comment><USER16> Using PACER it appears all of the 2011 cases are still active and are in discovery. They are all set for trial in November of 2014.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> I'm pretty fed up with this kind of stuff so I decided to join the EFF today.

</comment><comment><USER18> The patents were issued and the law must be enforced. You might not like it -- so change it! Reminds me of when Teddy Roosevelt vigorously enforced prohibition to the point that is really pissed people off. The point that I gleaned from this was that he wanted people to stand up and change the law.

I hope that patent trolls raise a stink and enforce their rights because it will _hopefully_ lead to change.

UPDATE: see comments below.. I was incorrect in that he enforced prohibition. It was liquor sales on Sunday that he was enforcing as police commissioner in new york.

<comment><USER19> Wrong Roosevelt. Teddy was President from 1901 to 1909, and died in January 19. The Prohibition amendment was ratified 10 days after he died, and took effect one year later.

The Presidents who were in office during Prohibition where Woodrow Wilson, Warren G. Harding, Calvin Coolidge, Herbert Hoover, and Franklin D. Roosevelt.

Franklin Roosevelt assumed office on March 4, 1933, when the effort to repeal it was already well under way. On March 22, weak bears and wines were legalized, and in December of that year Prohibition was repealed. I don't think there was ever any vigorous enforcement under Roosevelt. You must be thinking of someone else.

<comment><USER20> Pragmatism prevailed once it was discovered how much wine it actually takes to weaken a bear.

<comment><USER21> My bear history is a bit shaky. I thought that weak bears were against the US constitution, as bears have a right to be armed as a defence against presidents who want to turn them into stuffed toys. Have I got that right?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> How many of these ridiculous lawsuits will it take before lawmakers realize how bad software patents are?

This will waste a lot of time and money for something that shouldn't even exist.

<comment><USER23> The more lawsuits the better for the lawmakers, who get campaign cash from both sides of the issue. Frivolous patents is somewhat a campaign finance problem.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> Some of these seem really questionable at first glance (note that I haven't read the entire patents yet)

> United States Patent No. 6,415,280 "Identifying and Requesting Data in > Network Using Identifiers Which Are Based On Contents of Data."

This sounds alot like hashing the contents of a file to get and identifier for it. If anything it sounds like maybe Git itself violates this, but I thought that Git hashed the difference between all the changes of a commit to get the hash. Some of the others sounds equally obvious at first glance.

I don't really understand why they are suing Rackspace for the Github service other than the fact that it is hosted by Rackspace and it seems they are an easy target since they are based in Texas along with the plantiff putting them in the same jurisdiction.

It seems like some of the more generic patents related to "Controlling Access to Data in a Data Processing System," "Distributing and Accessing Data in a Data Processing System," and "Accessing Data in a Data Processing System" could apply to lots of other services and cloud providers anyway. Why not go after Amazon or someone else that does Git hosting?

<comment><USER25> Git doesn't violate this in any way. Read the claims. They're talking about distributing data throughout a network of servers, using an hash as a key to know from which servers to request the data. It's more similar to database sharding.

<comment><USER26> > They're talking about distributing data throughout a network of servers

Hmm... We used that to shard the MySQL databases for our WordPress setup too...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> Interesting that Level3 - yes, that Level3 - is a 50% owner of the patents.

<comment><USER28> It would seem that Level3 has a chance to be a hero by licensing these patents to whomever for a nominal fee.

Edit: replying to the comments. Licensing for a nominal fee isnt pure, but it is practical. It would certainly discourage the trolls. I dont think you can put something in the public domain if you are only a partial owner.

<comment><USER29> They could be a hero by placing them in the public domain. Licensing them for even a nominal fee would be extortion. $1 for something that should be $0 is an infinity too large, besides it would still require you to get that license.

If someone were to charge me 'right of way' tomorrow to leave my house and the cost would only be $1 I wouldn't pay up, I'd shove them out of the way. There is not 'right' price for extortion.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> They're not even trying to hide the fact that they're patent trolls:

"We are located in East Texas, and we are developing innovative technologies and products. We have a team who is responsible for some of the web's most popular software and applications, and we own some really amazing patents."

</comment><comment><USER31> "Access denied", what is going on? S3 is messed up or they pulled the page?

<comment><USER32> [http://www.scribd.com/doc/106190890/PersonalWeb- Technologies...](http://www.scribd.com/doc/106190890/PersonalWeb-Technologies- et-al-v-Rackspace-et-al)

<comment><USER33> Wait, Level3 is a patent troll now?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> Access is denied. any mirrors?

</comment><comment><USER35> Luckily I own the patent on the business model of suing for infringing overly broad software patents.

I want 10 billion from the folks suing Rackspace for patent infringement, for infringing my patent, of suing for patent infringement.

<comment><USER36> Old Slashdot joke. Sorry.

<comment><USER35> Damn. Prior art.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> If only it didn't cost 10's of thousands to have patents re-examined by the Patent Office -- we could put a lot of trolls out of business and destroy a lot of nonsense patents.

</comment><comment><USER38> In an interesting addition it looks like Personal Web Technologies was recently involved in an acquisition that resulted in these patents changing hands.

[http://www.personalweb.com/media/20110928_PressRelease_Perso...](http://www.personalweb.com/media/20110928_PressRelease_PersonalWeb.pdf)

<comment><USER38> Part I found most interesting:

"PersonalWeb has been working closely with the University of Texas at Tyler and other community participants to develop products in the search, social network and content filtering technologies.

BDE CEO Kevin Bermeister said, "We are excited by this next phase in the business and are looking forward to working with PersonalWeb to pursue development, licensing and participation in businesses that use our patents for content addressable storage, cloud computing, search, social networking and other important developing technologies in the rapidly growing distributed computing category."

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> Could anyone translate the legalese into plain English for us lay-men.

<comment><USER40> The gist (ha) is that Github and Rackspace themselves use some techniques that are described in those patents. Because of that they're now being sued for patent infringement.

It's an 'obvious' patent troll, I doubt these patents would even hold up in court but 'till then...

<comment><USER41> How is it really possible that there are companies that just holds patents and are allowed to sue others who does things. No shame. What a world we are living at... This seems to be company who is suing Github and Rackspace. [http://investing.businessweek.com/research/stocks/private/sn...](http://investing.businessweek.com/research/stocks/private/snapshot.asp?privcapId=25360579)

<comment><USER42> I think it's perfectly legitimate for a company to just hold patents and sue others based on those patents (or, more likely, license them). That's a core aspect of the patent system.

The problem here isn't patent protections. It's bad patents. We're still going to see submarine patents for the next ~16 years, and I'm sure patent trolls will exist beyond that (unless there is reform), but the patent system isn't the problem here. It's just that so many bad patents get through.

<comment><USER43> > I think it's perfectly legitimate for a company to just hold patents and sue > others based on those patents (or, more likely, license them). That's a core > aspect of the patent system.

I could understand "inevitable consequence", but I can't see where you get "core aspect". Explain?

<comment><USER44> The patent system is meant to reward inventors, including inventors who don't have the capital for commercial manufacture of their invention (i.e. by licensing it to someone who does).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER45> Rackspace just issued a response:

<http://www.rackspace.com/blog/patent-trolls-make-them-pay/>

</comment><comment><USER46> For a moment, based on the backtrack (amazonaws.com), I thought Amazon was suing Rackspace. It'd be nice to get that fixed.

</comment><comment><USER47> One question, how much would it cost to buy EVERY software patent? Millions, billions?

</comment><comment><USER48> Not a link.

</comment><comment><USER49> sigh...</comment>


Show HN: Discover career opportunities in your network with CareerSonar - <AUTHOR> https://www.careersonar.com/invitation/hackernews

<comment><AUTHOR> The most promising career opportunities are those in which the person has an inside connection that can help them get in the door. CareerSonar makes it easy to discover these opportunities in your social and professional networks, without having to manually cross check hundreds of job listings against your contact list (not to mention your 2nd connections, etc). The benefit for active job seekers is apparent, but we also help those who are employed keep on top of their best opportunities out there (because everyone is curious). Our ranking algorithm is currently patent pending, and we like to think that it gives results that are much more relevant than anything else out there.

We just entered private beta and would love to get some feedback. Thanks!

</comment><comment><USER2> This appears to be Facebook based (Facebook login required). Is that true? Why wouldn't it be LinkedIn based?

Some prefer to keep Facebook for personal and LinkedIn for professional relationships.

<comment><AUTHOR> We actually allow you to add LinkedIn as well during the signup process. Your opportunities don't discriminate so we help you mine both your social and professional networks.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: How to extract text from popular document formats - <AUTHOR>

I guess this is probably the best place on teh interwebz to get this kind of information.
I'm looking for a library, tool, whatever widget that would enable me to extract raw text from popular document formats (pdf, Word 97/2003/2007, OpenOffice, rtf - any others would be a bonus).
The tool does not need to be OpenSource - commercial tools are also welcome, as long as they are not prohibitively expensive.
The use case is extracting text for full-text indexing via Apache Solr. I am aware that Solr can handle indexing whole documents - however I would rather not have it juggle loads of raw documents. And I simply haven't enough time/motivation to roll my own parsers.
Update: Too lazy to google it for myself? Apache Tika: http://tika.apache.org/
Thank you a lot. <comment><USER2> antiword (<http://freshmeat.net/projects/antiword>) works well for Microsoft word documents.

Are you trying to create an index/search utility for documents? If so, maybe we can combine efforts. I was planning to build one, wrote a small amount code, but then got busy with other stuff and the project fell through the cracks.</comment>


The elephant that brought the house down - <AUTHOR> http://www.mystaffordshirefigures.com/blog/the-elephant-that-brought-the-house-down <comment><AUTHOR> I found the clip! [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ghozb8NdSqM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ghozb8NdSqM)</comment>


Ask HN: What Cloud storage provider(s) do you use? - <AUTHOR> Dropbox, Google Drive, One Drive, S3, etc?
Why?
If more than one, do you put specific files in one over the other? <comment><USER3> Onedrive. Microsoft gives out storage every time I turn around. I think I have upwards of 300GB available at this point.

<comment><USER4> We know someone with office 360 license so were added to that for free because up to 4 licensees can be added iirc. Gets me 1Tb of cloud plus all the office apps.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> S3 because I am essentially tethered to the AWS ecosystem after receiving AWS credits from Y Combinator Office Hours. This is no complaint, I love the ecosystem.

</comment><comment><USER6> Dropbox for syncing between computers S3 for backups and photos with mirroring to Google Drive (For faster restores) S3 for blog/static sites

</comment><comment><USER7> OneDrive as I've got an O365 account and it backs up my pics on my Android phone :)

I've got a (paid) Google Drive account too and I'm considering using it for replication. Does anyone have an IFTT recipe to copy files between providers?

Forgot to add that I've got a free Dropbox account with old, unimportant stuff.

<comment><USER8> FYI, Google Photos[1] automatically backs up photos, besides being a decent gallery app.

It also doesn't use up any storage if you choose "High Quality" (probably visually lossless).

[1] - [https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.google.and...](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.google.android.apps.photos)

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> I use SpideroakONE

[https://spideroak.com](https://spideroak.com)

( even though it's encrypted, I still encrypt it on the cmd before pushing it into the cloud )

</comment><comment><USER10> Personally I use dropbox, blackblaze. In my day job we use Google Drive, S3.

try rclone.org

<comment><USER11> Thanks for sharing the link for rclone.org I'll give it a try asap!

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Google drive for everything important, dropbox for random stuff.

</comment><comment><USER12> BackBlaze B2 - <USER2>

</comment><comment><USER13> Google Drive for random things

S3 for photos

</comment><comment><USER14> Dropbox</comment>


Spark Gift (YC W15) – Give Stock as a Gift to Friends and Family - <AUTHOR> http://recode.net/2015/03/13/two-former-googlers-backed-by-y-combinator-want-you-to-give-kids-the-gift-of-investing/

<comment><AUTHOR> Spark Gift founders here, happy to answer any questions!

We're supporting fractional shares, so you can give a gift of as little as $20 of stock with just an email. You can receive a gift from family without giving up your SSN (unlike savings bonds or other investment gifts) so if you're lucky enough to have someone who wants to give you or your children such a gift, you can do so with some privacy.

</comment><comment><USER2> Related story: Grew up receiving stock gifts from my grandfather who was a lifer at 3M. He gave us 10-15 shares of 3M or Medtronic every year for Christmas.

Unfortunately, when I turned 18 I sold it all (for something like $15-$20k) and wasted it during college. Had I kept it, with the splits and dividend reinvestments, it'd be worth roughly $150-$200k now. Would have paid for my kids schooling.

Giving stock is a great gift, if you also take time to help teach responsibility, otherwise you're just handing them a post dated check.

<comment><AUTHOR> It's a great point. I think people are getting better about teaching kids about finances, but it's still a difficult conversation for some. Kids receive many signals about how to be a consumer, but perhaps could benefit from more focus on how to make something, grow something, save or invest. Thanks for the feedback, it's something people have mentioned to us and will guide how we message kids about gifted stock, and which educational materials we develop.</comment></comment>