A regular expression matcher By Rob Pike and Brian Kernighan (2007) - <AUTHOR> http://www.cs.princeton.edu/courses/archive/spr09/cos333/beautiful.html <comment><USER2> There is a lovely description of the classic Thompson algorithm of building an NFA from a regular expression and then simulating the NFA with a DFA using two stacks :) in the "Compilers" book by Aho et al. There is also a great article from Russ Cox on it: <http://swtch.com/~rsc/regexp/regexp1.html>

I recommend implementing this as an exercise, rarely do you see that much classic CS theory put to a practical use in one place.

</comment><comment><USER3> Can someone explain to me why the matchstar function takes its first param as an integer? to me it should be a char.

        int matchstar(int c, char *regexp, char *text)
        {
            do {    /* a * matches zero or more instances */
                if (matchhere(regexp, text))
                    return 1;
            } while (*text != '\0' && (*text++ == c || c == '.'));
            return 0;
        }

<comment><USER4> The usual reason is to allow c to be EOF, but I don't see why anyone would in this case.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> On a unrelated note.

Adding a few lines of css (setting body width, font-size to 16, line-height to 1.4, Georgia for font and larger font size for headings ) makes for a decent reading experience.

<http://imgur.com/a/KtaEC/>

<comment><USER6> My recommendations, for a more pleasurable reading experience:

        body {
          width: 70%;
          font-size: 20px;
          margin: auto;
          font-family: sans-serif;
          line-height: 30px;
        }

<comment><USER7> _Pedantic nitpick incoming_

Sans-serifs are generally harder to read. Note, for example, how virtually all books are set in serifs. The primary reason sans-serifs are widely used in computers is the lack of decent display resolution required to display the actual serifs. So if you are using a larger font size to read something off the screen, there is no reason not to use a serifed typeface.

<comment><USER8> This might very well be a myth. See e.g. [http://alexpoole.info/blog/which- are-more-legible-serif-or-s...](http://alexpoole.info/blog/which-are-more- legible-serif-or-sans-serif-typefaces/#part2).

<comment><USER7> Everything that has to do with the perception might very well be a myth :)

However, in typography and type designer circles it is commonly accepted that Serifs are superior for consuming large quantities of text. Also in layman terms - serifs make the glyphs more distinct and easier to recognize at a glance, in contrast to the sans where there are several glyph pairs that look virtually the same.

<comment><USER9> "Commonly accepted" isn't worth much when it conflicts with actual science. Lots of things commonly accepted are simply incorrect.

<comment><USER7> Please don't pull a Wikipedia on me here. As an old physicist joke goes -

      Experimental physicist comes to a theoretical physicist office,
      bring a graph from a recent experiment and asks for a help with
      interpreting the results.

      - Well, it's all rather obvious. Here's a peak, here's a dip,
        because of this, that and third.

      - Hold it, hold it... you are looking at it upside down.

      - Ah, right, right. *Rotates the graph*. Oh, it's now even more
        obvious than before.

In other words, the "actual science" you are referring to frequently ends up to be nothing more than a matter of interpretation and a subject to all sorts of biases. Especially when it concerns something as unquantifiable as "comfort of reading". Just pick up a couple of fiction books, one set in serif and another in sans-serif, go through a pageful of text and see for yourself.

<comment><USER9> You can't just dismiss science and fact when it's inconvenient. Well, you can, but then your beliefs have no more backing than those of astrologers, and you're guilty of willfully spreading misinformation. You asserted a falsifiable statement as fact ("Sans-serifs are generally harder to read") and in the face of fairly compelling evidence that it is in fact a false statement, you immediately appealed to "common knowledge". It's also "common knowledge" that Einstein failed math as a kid and that eating before swimming will give you cramps, but these are both untrue statements.

Comfort of reading is very quantifiable. You can present text to a bunch of people in serif and sans serif fonts (double-blind and randomized) and ask them to rate how pleasant the text was. You can be clever and ask questions that measure understanding and retention, or you can ask them how much they enjoyed reading the passage, and these will give you indirect measures of reading comfort. Or you can be blunt and ask if they enjoy reading in the font, though this will pick up biases more. Either way is significantly more scientific than an appeal to common knowledge, though.

> _Just pick up a couple of fiction books, one set in serif and another in > sans-serif, go through a pageful of text and see for yourself._

This isn't science. This is just bias confirmation. ("Wow, I prefer the one I expected to prefer!")

But for the record, my e-reader font is set to Gill Sans.

<comment><USER7> I have no immediate way of verifying that what you call a compelling evidence referenced in that blog post is in fact compelling and accurate. I _could_ go through all linked sources, but I don't presently have time for that. On the other hand I read several books on typography and I am partial to the type design. From that exposure I do know that the common consensus between people involved in creating said serifs and sans-serifs is that sans-serifs _are_ generally harder to read. So when I am presented with an evidence to the contrary, you can be damn sure I will doubt it.

Throwing around power words like "science" and "compelling evidence" based on a couple of references plucked from a blog post - sorry, but you are well in a meta area, preaching about general subject matter without any regard to the context. You are not the only one who's aware what science and scientific methods entitle, but then you should also be well aware of a bunch of junk that gets published in a format of scientific research, gets quoted and re- quoted and eventually accumulates notable status even though it hasn't even been peer-reviewed once. This happens all the time and it's a part of "science", so being skeptical is a part of the package. And the more obscure the area of the research, the more skepticism is warranted. You surely know that being that well-versed in all things science.

      --

Your e-reader doesn't have the resolution required for good quality rendering of serif fonts. Hence the Gill Sans.

<comment><USER9> My complaint is not that you disagree with the blog or that you don't have the time to dig through all the references (neither do I). My complaint is that you've presented something as fact with no evidence and continue to assert its unquestionable truth in the face of contrary evidence. You've made no actual attempt to defend the claim except to say that others agree with you. That isn't knowledge. I'm not even sure it qualifies as an appeal to authority. It's just dogma.

You're right to be skeptical. You're not right to be dismissive.

\--

My phone also uses sans-serif fonts almost exclusively and I read a ton of stuff on it. It definitely has a high enough resolution (>300ppi) for serif fonts.

<comment><USER10> I have a suspicion that 90% of the functional effectiveness of any visual aesthetic is learned experience. Witness the outcry over 48fps feature-length films, for example; people complain that it has a "cheap" or "soap-opera" feel, because cheap productions and soap operas are the dominant media filmed in high-speed. This affects the enjoyment that movie-goers take out of their experience, and thus the overall value of the product.

The inferences we make about functional differences in the aesthetics of type would clearly be biased by this phenomenon. It might certainly be possible for controlled observations to reveal that reading speeds are faster for serif type; but this might be due to the fact that the reader is used to it, as most long works are already printed in serif type, in part due to the assumptions of book designers that serif type is faster to read!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I translated this into Haskell just for fun.

        match :: String -> String -> Bool
        match ('^':rest) text     = matchLocal rest text
        match rex        (c:rest) = matchLocal rex (c:rest) || match rex rest
        match _          _        = False

        matchLocal :: String -> String -> Bool
        matchLocal []            _         = True
        matchLocal "$"           []        = True
        matchLocal (c:'*':restR) (t:restT) = c == t && matchLocal restR (starSkip c (t:restT))
        matchLocal (r:restR)     (t:restT) = (r == '.' || r == t) && matchLocal restR restT
        matchLocal _             _         = False

        starSkip :: Char -> String -> String
        starSkip c (t:rest) = if c == t then starSkip c rest else t:rest
        starSkip _ []       = []

</comment><comment><USER12> For those who don't know, this is Rob Pike's chapter of Beautiful Code, a thoroughly enjoyable book: [http://www.amazon.co.uk/Beautiful-Code-Leading- Programmers-P...](http://www.amazon.co.uk/Beautiful-Code-Leading-Programmers- Practice/dp/0596510047) . Every now and then I read a different chapter, and it's always interesting. I particularly liked Rob Pike's one, and the one about Python's dictionary implementation.

<comment><USER13> This code is beautiful, but it's also busted [1] -- albeit only for extraordinarily pathological input. As to whether this ultimately dents its beauty is up to the beholder, presumably; for me personally, I confess to suffer from a utilitarian sense of beauty when it comes to software -- for me, broken code can't achieve absolute beauty.

[1] <http://dtrace.org/blogs/bmc/2007/07/11/beautiful-code/>

<comment><USER14> I believe Kernighan acknowledged that: "[snip] The depth of recursion is no more than the length of the pattern, which in normal use is quite short, so there is no danger of running out of space. [/snip]".

If you're going to judge this code based on both pathological haystacks but also pathological needle regexs, then you have to admit that this code, which has linear space usage in the pattern length is far better than PCRE, which has exponential time in the pattern length[1].

Considering its succinctness, I find that pretty impressive.

[1] <http://swtch.com/~rsc/regexp/regexp1.html>

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Great code is often deceptively simple. It can lead you to believe it was simple to write.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> For those unfamiliar with pointer arithmetic I wrote a python port here. <https://gist.github.com/siddharthsarda/5538928>

<comment><USER16> Be aware that this isn't an equivalent of the C code. Replacing pointer arithmetic with string copy increases big O complexity of the algorithm.

An equivalent would need to pass indexes to sub functions to avoid additional copies.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> On a related note, Rob Pike's "Lexical Scanning in Go" talk is also worth a look <https://cuddle.googlecode.com/hg/talk/lex.html#landing-slide>

</comment><comment><USER18> It's interesting that this is in a very functional style, no global state is used.

</comment><comment><USER11> I was once asked in an interview to write a pattern matcher in C for the exact same class of regular expressions as in this post. I'm pretty sure the interviewer was looking for exactly the approach used here as well.

</comment><comment><USER19> I wonder if this would be a good test to give a software developer candidate. Develop a regex matcher that matches a subset of the regex rules in your language of choice (without using regex abilities, of course).

<comment><USER20> I don't know, regexes have a lot of rules so you need to supply a reference, requiring them to remember it is overkill, not to mention some of those rules are pretty arcane.

<comment><USER21> A simple implementation of ?, +, * , [] and non-capturing, precedence-only () hardly needs a reference. Whether greedy vs non-greedy + / * are implemented doesn't really matter.

I will say that the problem is much easier if you have a good grounding in the basics of compilers, while that knowledge is not hugely useful very often. Any positive value as a test will come from correlation with interest in CS IMO.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Altough performance isn't really part of this exercise, beautiful code is also likely to be fast -- efficiently doing the work to solve the problem and no more.

<comment><USER23> Not always true, e.g. brute force searching can often look more beautiful than more sophisticated techniques. The article mentions how performance could be improved by separating compilation and execution of the regular expression (as most "real" regex libraries do) - but this would almost certainly make it less beautiful.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> I saw this in a drdobbs article in the 90s as well.

<comment><USER24> april 1999: [http://www.drdobbs.com/architecture-and-design/regular- expre...](http://www.drdobbs.com/architecture-and-design/regular- expressions/228700838?queryText=pike%2Bkernighan%2Bregular)

<comment><USER25> Thanks for posting this, and thanks to the OP for posting the link as well. :) I must shamefully admit that I haven't read the book, but it is now on top of my reading list!

This was really a most pleasurable and insightful read. True elegance!</comment></comment></comment>


Ask YC: Whats the best tool to load test a web app? - <AUTHOR>

Need to load test our web app - any recommendations for tools that are easy to set up? I heard about JCrawler, but looking for something even simpler. Is there any simple online tool that can do this? Thanks a lot! <comment><USER2> I've used JMeter (<http://jakarta.apache.org/jmeter/>) for a few years now. It's easy to use and extend. The only thing I don't like is it doesn't play nice with AJAX.

</comment><comment><USER3> Checkout this blog entry for some ideas [http://www.sitepoint.com/blogs/2007/05/07/besiege-your- web-a...](http://www.sitepoint.com/blogs/2007/05/07/besiege-your-web- application-load-testing-over-http/)

<comment><USER4> thanks for sharing that link. I'd like to try that out.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Slashdot.

</comment><comment><USER6> ApacheBench is great.

</comment><comment><USER7> I've used grinder with amazon ec2 to load test one of our sites before. It worked really well once I sorted out some issues with the clients communicating with my console but it made it very easy to keep adding machines until the load/speed was an issue.

</comment><comment><USER8> I'm working on a tool now that should be dead easy, but there's not a whole lot out there now for online tools. If you want me to email you when it's ready, shoot me an email. On gmail, I'm ebeland.

<comment><USER9> By "online" do you mean some sort of 3rd party service that you can unleash on your servers via a web app?

That could be a pretty cool service. Of course you would need to prevent it from being hijacked for DDoS purposes (maybe require the admin running the test to upload a file with a key to the root of their web server, to prove it's under their control)

<comment><USER8> By online, I do mean a 3rd party service like you're describing.

I was thinking of something like that for verification. Google webmaster tools does something similar by adding a meta tag, which is a nice way to do it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Fantastic response... exactly why I love Hacker News! Thanks all. I'm going with JMeter for now, but will report back success or failure.

</comment><comment><USER10> <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=138170>

</comment><comment><USER11> I use keynote(www.keynote.com) or gomez(www.gomez.com) Better yet, would be Mercury Managed Services(MMS)

</comment><comment><USER12> httperf</comment>


Ask HN: What should I do the summer after I graduate college? - <AUTHOR> I'm graduating in May and starting a full-time job in early August. So, I have 10 weeks of freedom — no obligations, no responsibilities.<p>What should I do with this time? <comment><USER2> If you have the means: travel.

<comment><USER3> If necessary, do it cheaply. This does not have to involve 5 star hotels. It used to be a tradition to do things like backpack across Europe. Couch surfing also potentially works. I did a lot of travel by visiting friends and family in my twenties.</comment></comment>


Former Columnist Jailed for Facebook Criticism of Myanmar's Aung San Suu Kyi - <AUTHOR> https://www.mmtimes.com/news/ngar-min-swe-given-7-years-facebook-post.html <comment><USER2> Here's a Reuters article from back when he was detained in July [1]. It includes this unflattering paragraph:

"Myanmar has detained at least 38 journalists since Suu Kyi came to power in 2016, according to Athan, a freedom of expression activist organization. These include two Reuters reporters who are on trial accused of breaching the Official Secrets Act."

I'm starting to think that the Nobel Peace Prize should only be awarded posthumously, or perhaps once a person steps down from power (though this would be hard to quantify). Scientific contributions are rarely undone, but a person's overall contribution to world peace can vary quite a bit over the course of their life.

[1] [https://reut.rs/2KVsJq7](https://reut.rs/2KVsJq7)

<comment><USER3> Maybe they should just be a little more careful about who they give it to. Even back when she seemed like a saint, did she really advance the cause of world peace that much? I don't see how.

The classic crazy example would be Obama's prize. It was obviously just a "you're not George W. Bush" prize. Hard to take such a thing seriously. They should stop treating it as "we like your political activism" and start treating it as "you have significantly contributed to world peace."

<comment><USER4> > The classic crazy example would be Obama's prize. It was obviously just a > "you're not George W. Bush" prize. Hard to take such a thing seriously

Tom Lehrer, a satirical musician, once said that political satire became obsolete when Henry Kissinger was given the Nobel Peace Prize.

<comment><USER3> That is a good example, but at least Kissinger did actually contribute to peace, even though overshadowed by his other activities.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> _" It is not power that corrupts, but fear. Fear of losing power corrupts those who wield it"_

~ Aung San Suu Kyi, _Freedom from fear_ , 1991.

<comment><USER6> _All governments suffer a recurring problem: Power attracts pathological personalities. It is not that power corrupts but that it is magnetic to the corruptible. Such people have a tendency to become drunk on violence, a condition to which they are quickly addicted._ \- Frank Herbert, Chapterhouse Dune, Missionaria Protectiva

<comment><USER7> I feel like this comment thread needs a link to CGP Grey's excellent Rules for Rulers video, too:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rStL7niR7gs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rStL7niR7gs)

<comment><USER8> I've read thd book this is based on—its a good book and pessimistically presents what is actually a quite optimistic model of power.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Myanmar seem to have managed the elected transition of power from a military dictatorship to a civilian dictatorship, but not any steps beyond that.

<comment><USER10> Those things take time.

If you don't execute everyone from the old regime, there are tons of rich people, executives, special interests, influential families, etc, that remain in place and are still important after the transition.

(The post-WWII Germany was full of ex-nazi hardcore sympathizers, and nazi executives and officials in all kinds of positions of power until the 80s or so). De-nazification (not the half-arsed, soon abandoned program of the same name [1]) was a big demand of younger germans in the 60s and 70s.

Now, if you do execute all important people from the old regime, on the other hand, you have now had yourself a taste of big corrupting power over others. And unless you kill every relative, friend, etc as well, you have a recipe for civil war and further bad blood between you and those that remained.

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

<comment><USER11> No one expected a miracle, but she was a Nobel Peace Prize recipient! She could have done much more to prevent the atrocities happening to the Rohingya.

<comment><USER12> _She could have done much more to prevent the atrocities happening to the Rohingya._

Such as?

<comment><USER13> Actually using the name Rohingya, for a start¹.

1: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rohingya_people#Denial_of_the_...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rohingya_people#Denial_of_the_%22Rohingya%22_term)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Aung San Suu Kyii's contempt for human rights is nothing new. I referenced this behavior in 2013 in fr.wikipedia :

« How can Aung San Suu Kyi – a Nobel Peace Prize winner – fail to condemn anti-Muslim violence? », The Daily Telegraph, 2013-10-24, [http://archive.wikiwix.com/cache/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fblogs.tel...](http://archive.wikiwix.com/cache/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fblogs.telegraph.co.uk%2Fnews%2Fdavidblair%2F100242929%2Fhow- can-aung-san-suu-kyi-a-nobel-peace-prize-winner-fail-to-condemn-anti-muslim- violence%2F)

« Aung San Suu Kyi is turning a blind eye to human rights in the name of politics », The Guardian, 2013-11-26 [https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/nov/27/aung-s...](https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/nov/27/aung- san-suu-kyi-is-turning-a-blind-eye-to-human-rights-in-the-name-of-politics)

I had to "fight" to add these to wikipedia. My first edits were revoked. When the first accusation of genocide appeared in 2016,there was a editing conflict because I added a paragraph about the Rohingya in the top summary. I finally was allowed to put a single sentence about it, which was preceded by another sentenced explaining that Suu Kyi was powerless against the army. I certainly wasn't very tactful, and I lack experience on such conflicts, but that made me extremely distrustful of _every_ Wikipedia article.</comment>


File uploads allow for cross-site scripting in Wordpress - <AUTHOR> https://nealpoole.com/blog/2011/04/file-upload-xss-vulnerability-in-wordpress/

<comment><USER2> Wordpress users with Author permission can also, you know, write posts with arbitrary HTML.

If you have a malicious user with Author permissions, or who has their account compromised, you're in a lot of trouble already. There's an assumption that if a user can be trusted to write posts with arbitrary HTML, the same user can be trusted to upload a variety of files.</comment>


A Free tool to promote your website traffic - <AUTHOR> http://www.ExactFactor.com

<comment><USER2> I don't understand what it's doing, or what the numbers mean. Maybe I need to spend more time, but I don't know whether it's worth it. I also can't see any way via the feedback (which at first glance I hadn't seen) to tell you this on the site.

I'm gone ...</comment>


Analyst calls agile a scam - <AUTHOR> http://developers.slashdot.org/story/12/07/14/1242237/new-analyst-report-calls-agile-a-scam-says-its-an-easy-out-for-lazy-devs

<comment><USER2> 1\. I do agile at work :-p

I write some code and we release it next week. Our manager prioritizes work for us and protects us from the rest of the company.

2\. I don't do agile at work

We don't have stand up meetings, There is no KanBan nor User Stories, We don't pair program unless we feel like it.

Take your pick both are true.

</comment><comment><USER3> The article (the one inside) simply says that one size doesn't fit all.

Agile (or, as I like to call it, short and iterative waterfall with priority management and pipeline solution), fits some scenarios well, but not others.

It fits startups because it's quick to release. It fits non-scientific products (or non-algorithm heavy products) as features can usually be contained in a single sprint or easily broken into deliverables. It fits huge products on maintenance mode when most of the development are customer features and issues.

However, it doesn't fit algorithm-heavy products (algorithms are usually "one- go" and require a sustained effort), it doesn't fit big products during intense development (architecture can't be ignored or it'll crumble under the product weight), it doesn't _always_ fit corporate environment (because of "impedance mismatch").

[very personal opinion, flame-shield on]

It fits average developers since it maximize oversight, reduce the time an error has to propagate and forces the work to be split into manageable, chewable parts.

It doesn't fit great developers ("distinguished", "level 4", "star"...) because, just like any other artificial framework, it hinders creativity and the free flow of code. On the other hand, a great developer is also measured by his/her ability to ship - which negates the need for such artificial systems.

[/very personal opinion, flame-shield on]

</comment><comment><USER4> The relevant parable: <http://www.ckwop.me.uk/Meditation-driven- development.html>

Looking at the Slashdot, there's a lot of No True Scotsman remarks turning up.

Saying whether agile "succeeded" or "failed" requires a number of things. You need to define "agile" (good luck) and then define success or failure (good luck).

Then you need survey respondents who can answer those questions accurately (good luck) and honestly (good luck).

Perhaps you could come up with a list of practices and indicators that show how "truly" agile a company is. Call it the Agility Maturity Model, and ...

Oh drat, I just reinvented pre-2000 software engineering literature. They'll kick me out of the cool kids club for this.

</comment><comment><USER5> That analyst can go suck an egg. The majority of startups these days use some form of Agile. As far as 'developer backlash' -- you're damned right: backlash against 500 page spec docs that are, for the most part worthless the second the software is released.

<comment><USER6> I'd say many products with 500 page spec docs never even get to the release stage.</comment></comment>


Show HN: Inlets 2.0 – expose your local endpoints to the Internet - <AUTHOR> https://inlets.dev <comment><USER2> I am using

> ssh -R 8080:localhost:8080 my.server.com

and have Caddy webserver running on my server (my.server.com) which is configured to proxy any requests to localhost:8080. It adds LetsEncrypt and makes sharing local web projects easy.

<comment><AUTHOR> Purpose-built UX, Docker images, Kubernetes support, future plans to add LetsEncrypt automation. There are ways to make "ssh" work through a corporate proxy, but normally it's banned. Websockets over HTTPS usually goes through without being blocked.

Multiple upstream sites are supported with ease as well as multiple exit node domains. If SSH is working for your use-case, then I'd say stick with it.

<comment><USER3> At first I said why websockets, when you are using go you could simply had done TCP sockets. But then I realize websockets is probably the right choice. This allows you a single listening port for both inbound and outbound connections as you can simply route /api/proxy or proxy our whatever you are using as your endpoint.

At first I did not like it, and responded like others, over kill for something many people can do (or are doing) without the aid of a fancy tool like this. But then I realized trying to covey to others who are not system programmers how to setup something and realized I would rather spend my time doing something else and just point them to a tool.

Good job on this!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Shameless self plug, but I wrote something that does the exact same thing as this ([https://github.com/antoniomika/sish](https://github.com/antoniomika/sish)) but has some added benefits:

1\. Don't require installing a local client, use something that is installed almost everywhere: ssh 2\. Use a protocol that is already great at multiplexing: ssh 3\. Supports authentication using PK/password auth: ssh 4\. Completely opensource

Nothing crazy or flashy, just simple and does the job.

<comment><USER5> Sish is pretty cool and full of features.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> I also like the idea of "onion-expose"[0], no need for a central server anymore and a stable address for free !

[0]: [https://github.com/ethan2-0/onion- expose](https://github.com/ethan2-0/onion-expose)

<comment><USER7> You don't need a tool. Creating a temporary onion service is trivial.

<comment><USER6> If it's more trivial than an simple "pip install & onion-expose 8000", then please tell me ! (this is theorical, onion-expose is not yet on PyPI)

Also, let's learn from our history: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9224](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9224)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I like that they are using websockets to process the GET requests. I was thinking about this just this week and it occurred to me that the "Host Node" [1] doesn't even need to be a program, it could just be a browser since they also have websockets and a API for getting files. I made a POC (proof-of- concept / piece-of-crap) example for this idea: [https://hostyoself.com](https://hostyoself.com)

[1] [https://github.com/alexellis/inlets#intro](https://github.com/alexellis/inlets#intro)

<comment><USER9> See also fibridge[0][1]

[0] [http://iobio.io/2019/06/12/introducing- fibridge/](http://iobio.io/2019/06/12/introducing-fibridge/)

[1] [https://github.com/anderspitman/fibridge-proxy- rs](https://github.com/anderspitman/fibridge-proxy-rs)

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Seems like [https://ngrok.com/](https://ngrok.com/) with extra steps

<comment><USER11> Except ngrok supports ssh.

These projects really need to consider plain TCP connections. It's a deal breaker for me.

My company installs ngrok on our embedded devices. When there is an issue, they connect it to the internet, type a keystroke, and I'm in.

<comment><AUTHOR> Ngrok is closed source, I do explain the differences in the post. Ngrok is also almost always banned..

<comment><USER11> I haven't run into a single hospital network where it is banned, so far.

You can also use ngrok1, which you can host yourself. It's got the features you'd need. This would get around firewalls.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Is this a direct competitor to Zoom?

<comment><USER13> Comment of the week

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Serveo is another good alternative to Inlets or ngrok that is completely free and pretty flexible: [https://serveo.net/](https://serveo.net/)

</comment><comment><USER15> Interesting, I will definitely try this out. If the Kubernetes ingress integration works well and it's stable, this could be really awesome.

I'm a bit curious about the choice of websockets as a protocol over the tunnel, though. Why is "tunnelling plain (non-HTTP) traffic over TCP" a non- goal? What's the benefit over just tunneling the HTTP traffic over a reverse SSH tunnel or similar?

EDIT: Maybe it's just a question of the author finding websockets "good enough" (despite performance overhead) and wanting to keep the scope small with a single implementation that isn't really going anywhere. Here a suggestion on using WebRTC instead of Websockets: [https://github.com/alexellis/inlets/issues/49](https://github.com/alexellis/inlets/issues/49)

> Thanks for the suggestion. I'll look into webrtc when I get time, but for > the time-being I think web sockets are going to be the way inlets works.

<comment><USER16> That issue was not handled in a way that makes it an open source project I'd want to contribute to.

<comment><USER17> How would you prefer it be handled?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> I also run ultrahook.com for unidirectional webhook only use case.

</comment><comment><USER19> This seems like a solution for sharing a private development server with co- workers.

A decade ago we used another solution which seemed to work well enough: Developers had a Unix accounts on a Linux server. Their workspace was mounted as a remote filesystem. Interactive console access was available via SSH.

Inlets seems to still require a remote Linux server, but seems a like a more complicated way to solve the problem.

By using a shared server, we didn't need maintain container image to keep laptop environments sync'ed. If we wanted to upgrade the development database version, we upgraded the DB once on the shared server and everyone had the new version immediately.

<comment><USER20> I don't believe that's the main use case for this project. The main use case for stuff like this is if you're using some external API like Zuora or Twilio that needs to hit endpoints on your local test box. Something like this allows them to actually contact your machine indirectly.

I've used ngrok before and it's a great solution for quick tests. I guess this is an open-sourced version of that.

<comment><USER19> Thanks for clarifying that. I have occasionally had that need. Some protocols like SAML are actually doing in-browser redirects so they bypass that problem.

I'll bookmark this in case I have this need in the future.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> I've been using [https://github.com/fatedier/frp](https://github.com/fatedier/frp) to expose UDP endpoints for a while. Works pretty well.

</comment><comment><USER22> This looks very useful. I'm currently using localtunnel.me for this but will definitely give this a try too and subdomain option sometimes doesn't work on localtunnel.

<comment><AUTHOR> Yep, free TLS and free domains.. and it is completely open source. Contributions are welcome too.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> I just have port forwarding on my modem. Changed my aname record on my dns to point to my public IP of my modem. Technically I don't have a static address but until know (3 years?) I never needed to update it. Got my pine64 running an nginx with my java application behind it. Using let's encrypt for SSL certificates.

<comment><USER24> Sadly not possible for those of us poor souls stuck behind carrier-grade NAT. I do have an ipv6 range, but of course, there's no ipv6 connectivity from my workplace! And that's often where I want access from.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> There are many of these so obviously it's useful for folks. What's your favorite use case? :D

</comment><comment><USER26> WRT setting up a desktop as a remote workstation, where can a person go to learn more about how it works? Is it just about setting up port forwarding on your router, then using a proxy to deal with the non-static IP?

</comment><comment><USER27> I use [https://localtunnel.github.io/www/](https://localtunnel.github.io/www/)

Simple and works well

</comment><comment><USER28> Ssh tunnels work well

</comment><comment><USER29> I use [http://holepunch.io](http://holepunch.io) Really stable. Also, much easier than this.

<comment><AUTHOR> It's not the same thing, you may as well use grok, it's just as limiting. [https://holepunch.io/pricing](https://holepunch.io/pricing)

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Inlets is designed to be super easy to use, from provisioning the exit-node, to punching out for your first service / endpoint.

It'd be great some of the folks commenting to try the project and then bring some feedback via GitHub, Slack, Twitter etc.

What did you like? What would you like to see next? What can be improved?

</comment><comment><USER30> Is this different than setting up openvpn and serving with haproxy?

<comment><USER31> Yeah, you don't have to setup openvpn and configure haproxy

<comment><USER30> Is that the only difference?

<comment><AUTHOR> Try it :-) look at the video and how fast the connection is established.

<comment><USER30> If I was going for "establish a connection as fast as possible" I'd go for `autossh -R`. Maybe "inlets" has better naming, is that the reason we need to use it?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> Really good name for this product.

</comment><comment><USER9> Does it support Range requests?

</comment><comment><USER33> sounds a lot like smee.io to me?</comment>


How "Dirty" MP3 Files Are A Back Door Into Cloud DRM - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2010/04/06/how-dirty-mp3-files-are-a-back-door-into-cloud-drm/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Techcrunch+%28TechCrunch%29

<comment><USER2> Wait, I thought the point of anti-DRM was to do whatever we want with the music. We can now do that. As far as I can tell this article calls anything that inconveniences rampant theft DRM.

<comment><USER3> Almost true. I can do anything with it apart from sending it over a not protected network (for example streaming from a shared drive on an open wifi). If anyone captures such file with a sniffer in such situation and publishes over p2p, it's my details that stay in the file.

On the other hand if anyone really cares about such contrived scenarios, they can just recode the file and tag it again - most simple watermarks should be removed that way. And since it's already an mp3, you're not losing that much quality on such operation.

<comment><USER4> _On the other hand if anyone really cares about such contrived scenarios, they can just recode the file and tag it again - most simple watermarks should be removed that way._

Unless your name is Aphex Twin.

(<http://www.wired.com/culture/lifestyle/news/2002/05/52426>)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> "Apple, Google and Amazon are all reportedly in discussions with big labels to provide a cloud music service. ... The labels, say our source, are demanding that a user can only stream music that is watermarked to their username. Change the username, or try to stream music that you've ripped from a CD, and those songs won't play."

It's a stupid idea to propose that you wouldn't be able to access music you put into the cloud that didn't have your personal watermark in it.

Let's assume Johnny has an all-legal music collection dating back 10 years - consisting of iTunes (watermarked) MP3s, Amazon (non watermarked) MP3s and a ton of self-ripped MP3s from his old CD collection (non watermarked).

There is no way Apple, Amazon or anyone else would find success and adoption in a system that would only let him play the watermarked files purchased from iTunes but deny him playing the rest of his legal collection.

Anyone building such a system, regardless of the music industries demands, needs to find a new product manager.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> This is really the only way to crack down on copyright issues, watermark each file with some information pining it to the buyer. When you combined this with the cloud, only or someone with your username can access the media (I'd bet they'd rather some biometrics). Interesting stuff.

</comment><comment><USER6> Seems like a good compromise to me.

<comment><USER7> Shows how much you know.

I unknowingly buy tainted MP3s from a retailer. Under the doctrine of first sale I can re-sell these MP3s. So now I legally sell a full mp3 player or maybe lose it and someone hands it into the police but I never claim it. The new owner now has a means to do me harm.</comment></comment>


The complete John Galt's speech from Atlas Shrugged - <AUTHOR> http://amberandchaos.com/?page_id=106 <comment><USER2> TL; DR: "I spent close to the last decade effortlessly and magically converting your tin cans into pure gold. And the gratitude I get... I'm tired of pretending I'm not special. You can't process me with a normal brain!"

<comment><USER2> \-- Charlie Sheen

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> I feel the plight of my philosophy teacher now, when he has to wade through oodles of lame philosophical BS every semester while grading papers :)

<comment><USER4> Instead of offering pointless invective why not provide at least one reason why you make this comment? Atlas Shrugged has sold six million copies. That's no argument for the thesis put forward in it but its impact on a fair number of thoughtful people over the last fifty years or so at least commands, don't you think, a reasoned comment in that you felt strongly enough to post your one liner?

<comment><USER5> _Atlas Shrugged has sold six million copies._

How does that compare to Dianetics?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> TL;DR; 70 pages of repeating the same thing that has been repeated 100 times in the previous 400 pages. That book could have been pamphlet.

After all of that Ayn Rand grows up and gets on Medicare and Social Security.

[http://www.alternet.org/teaparty/149721/ayn_rand_railed_agai...](http://www.alternet.org/teaparty/149721/ayn_rand_railed_against_government_benefits,_but_grabbed_social_security_and_medicare_when_she_needed_them/)

<comment><USER7> Did she pay into Medicare and SS? If so, she was only getting her money back. I don't understand why this is so hard for people to understand?

I'm staunchly opposed to medicare and SS but will I take them when I retire if they're still around? Hell yes, because I should at least get SOME of my money back.

<comment><USER8> Who needs principles when reality is so convenient?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> can someone do a tl;dr?

<comment><USER10> Really? You really should read the whole thing. Even if you don't agree with it, the Galt speech will tell you all you need to know about the philosophy of objectivism. Agree with it or not, it's not something you should ignore. There are certain political movements that have hooked their wagons up to it and are riding off in to the sunset. That makes it, at least, relevant.

<comment> mkr-hn No one is going to read a novella-length speech unless they're already into the philosophy. Got a summary?

<comment><USER10> Sure: a is a.

<comment> mkr-hn That's an equation, not a philosophy. If Rand took a book to say that, she should have fired her editor.

<comment><USER10> It's a summary of objectivist philosophy, otherwise known as the "Law of Identity".

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

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Who is John Galt's housekeeper?

<comment><USER8> Don't downvote, it's a valid question that shoots at the heart of the entire philosophy.</comment></comment>


Show HN: Haystack, search across your cloud accounts securely - <AUTHOR> https://app.haystackapps.com/code/SHOWHN <comment><USER2> I see nothing that resembles a revenue model, which terrifies me: where's the thing I'm not seeing? Are you rewriting Amazon purchases to use your referral code? Are you selling data about me to third parties? Are you not monetizing at all and hoping to make up in "exposure?"

When I can't spot the money, I wonder what I'm missing. Your lack of privacy policy (at least, I can't find one!) doesn't help.

<comment><AUTHOR> Apologises that is a direct link to access... To see our privacy policy and how we plan to monetize: [https://www.haystackapps.com](https://www.haystackapps.com)

In short, we give out the free version for files, documents, your history. Our paid version allows you to search Sales, Marketing and other information in an aggregated form.

Completely agree though, we probably should put that somewhere on that signup page so that people know how we make money (otherwise it does sound like we would need to do something iffy to still be around in a years time!).

Appreciate the question, also the direct link to the privacy document: [https://www.haystackapps.com/privacy](https://www.haystackapps.com/privacy)

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Hi haystack! Can you describe your favourite haystack user story? I didn't get it from visiting you site. Also, if it's not too time consuming maybe support mobile devices on your pitch site.

Also, what's your tech stack?

<comment><AUTHOR> Sure!

Story: So I was doing a usability study with someone and they were saying how they couldn't find a particular document (I think it was a pitch deck) anywhere even though they'd tried for 20 minutes the day before. They were able to it after a few seconds in Haystack - it turns out they'd mispelt the name so it didn't come up in Drive, GMail or Slack when they looked for it!

Mobile: Fair point, our 'splash page' supports mobile which you can see here: [https://www.haystackapps.com](https://www.haystackapps.com)

Tech Stack: So they extension is written in pure javascript using a framework I designed for some internal stuff I did for a previous company. We then use Babelify and Uglifiy to compile it into usable code. The web server is written in Node, but its very simple as it just hosts the splash page and generates tokens for the extension.

Appreciate the questions, let me know if you give it a try and if we can make it better for you!

<comment><USER3> IC. But how can an extension like your's search through gmail better than gmail's own search? Or better than slack's? Do you use their api's? Did you roll your own full-text search?

<comment><AUTHOR> Great question!

I wouldn't say if you're just looking for something in Gmail that we will be better. The main benefit is that you're able to search through all of them in one place.

The way it works is, we show you "instant" results from files/documents that we have cached from your providers and your browser history. However, we also show you below that results that come direct from Gmail, Slack, Drive...etc.

That way if we don't find the result you're after, you're able to see the same results as if you'd opened up all the tabs and performed the searches in each tool as well. We do this using their OAuth search functionalities.

We do do full text search for documents that you have visited in the past, and the cloud providers often do this as well so that helps ensure we can find you good results.

One big difference is that our search uses a less precise search, which means we support spelling mistakes, different ordering...etc. Which can help us find documents that are hard to find.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: Hacker News, but with 3 sections of Top, Best, New Stories side by side - <AUTHOR> https://hn.sawirstudio.com/ <comment><AUTHOR> Hi, friends. I had a problem to see hacker news top, best, and new stories, and I thought if I could just make those stories appear in 1 view/page, side by side. I also thought that maybe someone could get benefit from this. I hope you find this helpful.

</comment><comment><USER2> Trying to get to the link and experiencing a timeout :(

<comment><AUTHOR> I admit that it takes a quite long time to load all the contents at first since it fetches all the stories upfront. Did you experience a 500 timeout? or was it just keeps loading and loading?

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Too slow to load on fiber.. I waited 10ms.

<comment><AUTHOR> Going to fix this. Thank you for your feedback sarcasmatwork

<comment><USER3> Good luck! Post again when you work out the kinks.

<comment><AUTHOR> Hi sarcasmatwork, I just want to let you know that it has been updated again, with a loading indicator to give users a hint that the data is being fetched or finished.

<comment><USER3> It's better, but each column loads super slow. Not sure from source, or how the content is being collected and regurgitated. Good progress!!</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Microsoft StaffHub - <AUTHOR> https://staffhub.office.com <comment><USER2> They probably spent a lot of time creating this website. Yet it completely fails to explain what the product does.

<comment><USER3> I can't comment on the content, but I like the design.

<comment><USER4> Good design means it does a good job communicating something.

This is most definitely _not_ good design, since it fails completely to communicate anything.

<comment><USER3> Probably I just like how it looks, if Design is to much a loaded term.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> "For staff workers."

Who are non-staff workers? That site has some very strange turn of phrases. Like: "How staff workers live, work, and communicate." Without too much explanation. Isn't this just work scheduling with a work Sharepoint portal? How does it help manage how I 'live?'

Plus then the infographic which is obviously all teenagers (?) doing the pledge of allegiance (?).

The product itself seems acceptable even if quite pricey ($4/user/month for shift scheduling gets pricey after about ten users compared to the competition). I am just pointing out how freaking strange the landing page is, blurbs, and iconography. Feels like they're recruiting for a cult.

<comment><USER6> In this case "staff" appears to mean "hourly shift-based workers", eg restaurant staff. I agree it's a strange use of the term.

<comment><USER7> Looks like Microsoft has taken "Hi I'm PC" to a different level :D

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Super interesting for Microsoft to be releasing this narrow of a product. Don't get me wrong, there's probably a market, but Salesforce would never do this, for a big company it's a platform play, let a partner build the tiny time tracking app.

<comment><USER9> Narrow product? Version 1, perhaps. But any of the millions of companies in the world could use this. It's a huge market. And a huge percentage of that market are entrenched Office users. Embrace, extend, and extinguish...

<comment><USER10> Not really embrace or extinguish... they're embracing the SaaS model, but in a lot of way's that's even more portable and able to move, provided sufficient tooling.

It seems to me that they're offering a compelling competing product to what Google Docs has, and expanding upon it far more/better than where Google has. At least in terms of servicing business. This is actually pretty great. Leveraging a windows monopoly to encroach on other areas and using unpublished APIs for competitive advantage is quite different than this.

I wish MS all the best with this one.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> From the comments, and even looking at the splash page it's pretty obvious MS really failed to point out that this is an additional service on top of what Office 365 (K1 level) offers... hosted email, online office, yammer, etc... and now the StaffHub (however that works in practice).

It's an interesting idea, and the $4 pricing is definitely competing with Google Doc's $5 pricing that I've seen in some bundling. I think the $2/user/mo email only hosting is pretty interesting as well.

</comment><comment><USER11> More info here: [http://www.superfluid.com.au/articles/introducing- microsoft-...](http://www.superfluid.com.au/articles/introducing-microsoft- staffhub)

</comment><comment> xyz-x Bad, rather funky, vibes! :)</comment>


In the Future, We Will Photograph Everything and Look at Nothing - <AUTHOR> http://www.newyorker.com/business/currency/in-the-future-we-will-photograph-everything-and-look-at-nothing <comment><USER2> "Several days later Murray asked me about a tourist attraction known as the most photographed barn in America. We drove twenty-two miles into the country around Farmington. There were meadows and apple orchards. White fences trailed through the rolling fields. Soon the signs started appearing. THE MOST PHOTOGRAPHED BARN IN AMERICA. We counted five signs before we reached the site. There were forty cars and a tour bus in the makeshift lot. We walked along a cowpath to the slightly elevated spot set aside for viewing and photographing. All the people had cameras; some had tripods, telephoto lenses, filter kits. A man in a booth sold postcards and slides-pictures of the barn taken from the elevated spot. We stood near a grove of trees and watched the photographers. Murray maintained a prolonged silence, occasionally scrawling some notes in a little book. "No one sees the barn," he said finally. A long silence followed. "Once you've seen the signs about the barn, it becomes impossible to see the barn." He fell silent once more. People with cameras left the elevated site, replaced at once by others. "We're not here to capture an image, we're here to maintain one. Every photograph reinforces the aura. Can you feel it, Jack? An accumulation of nameless energies."

Excerpt From: Don DeLillo. "White Noise." (published in 1985!)

<comment><USER3> I was with him until the pseudo-babble about auras and energy.

And it occurs to me: that situation was self-selected for those people. See, some folks are not really capable of the perception effort required to really look at something. To experience it fully. But they _can_ buy a camera.

Just go somewhere else. They apparently travelled through wonderful countryside to get there - just stop! Barns are not rare, and many are made on the same plan.

<comment><USER4> The words "auras" and "energies" here have nothing to do with pseudo-babble, new age-ism or whatever.

It's just a quite standard poetic / descriptive use of the word, in fact the term "aura" is used in its most common literal meaning -- those photographs of "the most photographed barn in the world" maintain its myth and it's allure. That's what he means with "auras" there.

> _And it occurs to me: that situation was self-selected for those people. > See, some folks are not really capable of the perception effort required to > really look at something. To experience it fully. But they can buy a > camera._

The idea behind the passage what that those "some folks" are increasing, or even the majority.

It's not about there not still being other people who can appreciate the things they see.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> The last time I was at a crowded museum I spent roughly 20% of the time just trying to avoid getting in the way of people taking pictures. Everyone was taking pictures everywhere of all the installations. I considered doing so too, but realized 20 years too late that there are far better photographs of a work of art (or at least enough) by professional photographers with different takes/interpretations than I could do without decades of training (on average). If you like a piece, there's nothing to stop you from buying a print or downloading a picture. I get it that some people do it more for remembering "that time I saw it in person" instead of trying to capture the essence of a piece, and that's fine (that's why I used to take the pictures), but multiply the amount of time it takes to do that by every piece you come across, plus how much posting it on instagram/whatever/facebook removes you from "the zone", and I think it's just a different way of massively disrupting your attention when the MAIN reason you're there in a museum, for a limited amount of time, is to suck it all up. I'm sure many people don't get distracted by trying to take photos of all the art, but once I stopped and just focused on concentrating and nothing else, a trip became much, much more enjoyable, and even memorable.

<comment><USER6> I went to the Louvre last year a few days after Christmas which I assume is not tourist season (first time in Paris). It was packed, and the Mona Lisa was surrounded by a sea of people 10 feet thick, most of them waving their phones around in the air on selfie sticks.

<comment><USER7> I think it's like this all the time. There's a reason they put it in a dead end hallway. The worst for me in this vein was going to Versailles, and being there at the same time as a big tour group of people, seemingly all of whom had a digital camera, an SLR, and a camcorder (this was in 2004...), and all of whom had to capture every significant artifact in each room and then move on. None of them were looking at the things except through their cameras' lenses and screens. There were so many of them that they made the tour pretty miserable for the rest of us.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> In a way, I also take a lote of notes that I never read back, but the actual process of taking the time to write it makes it easier to remember.

If it works the way, when you take a photo, even if you don't look it back, the fact that you did take the time to photograph a moment may ease to remember it.

just my 2 cents of pseudo-science

<comment><USER9> I think writing notes helps us remember things because we're concentrating on the information being recorded, and because in order to record it we are forced to create a well structured representation of that information which will also be easily remembered.

However, when I take a picture, I'm mostly concentrating on the camera and the spacial aspect of what I am photographing (getting it into frame), which doesn't help me remember any of the details, which are the genuinely important bit.

I do like your explanation though. I wouldn't be surprised if people who are more (for lack of a better word) artistic than myself, focus more on the details as part of the photo-taking process, and so retain those details better.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> It's never been any different, that's how people are. What's different is that in periods of technological change people will engage in new behaviors which are then unfamiliar to us. So we take notice of them and realize that there are a lot of problematic aspects to culture and society. Oh golly gosh, people spend so much of their lives just stumbling through, unthinking, sometimes unfeeling. Anyone who has spent any time studying mindfulness is well aware of how pervasive that mode of living is for all people for most of their lives. It's not that we are automatons, it's just that we are creatures of habit and imitation and we find it very difficult to be truly individualistic. It often takes a great amount of training to be routinely "present" and mindful in every day life.

Let us remember the era that has just passed not so long ago prior to the advent of smart phones and prior even to the widespread popularity of the internet. An era when many people in the developed world would digest "the news" from only one local source and be satisfied with whatever they got fed. An era when most people would spend half their non-working waking hours watching whatever was on one of a few channels on television.

Yes, people should live their lives a bit more thoughtfully. Yes, people shouldn't be so caught up in all the trappings of documenting and effectively "scoring" their lives via smart phones and social media. But at the same time it's difficult to make the case that this is a decline. This is just different. And compared to people living passive, purely consumptive lives filled with monotony and vast sameness, it's hard to complain. People are doing things, experiencing things, and sharing their lives with their friends. That they are not doing it in the maximally best way is a complaint people could make about any generation in any era. And it's not as though people are wasting their lives in worse ways or to a higher degree than they were before, but merely that we'd grown accustomed to the old ways of doing so, and mentally swept them under the carpet.

</comment><comment><USER11> The author gets it wrong. In the future you only will be allowed to take shot if your camera gets location-based DMCA authorisation clearance to take it. It will be blocked at all other times, and there will be pay per view from camera producer for displaying shots that were already taken, automatically sending money to copyright administration agency.

<comment><USER12> Yeah it's disgusting. Witness the fight to copyright architecture, so that folks must ask for permission to take photos of public buildings.

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

<comment><USER13> I'm not sure if I follow. Could you point me to the section you are referring to? All I found was this, which seems quite positive.

"First, when a building is ordinarily visible from a public place, its protection as an "architectural work" does not include the right to prevent the making, distributing, or public display of pictures, photographs, or other pictorial representations of the work.[13] Thus, the architect will not be able to prevent people from taking photographs or otherwise producing pictorial representations of the building. "

<comment><USER12> The bit you found is reasonable, but there's a movement to forbid it.

For example, it's illegal to photograph the Eiffel Tower at night when its lights are lit:

[http://wiki.gettyimages.com/897/](http://wiki.gettyimages.com/897/)

<comment><USER14> I am boggled.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Yet again, The New Yorker hobbles closer to the realm of click-bait.

After the Malik trots us down the obligatory Sontag shortcut to establish credibility on the subject of photography and authenticity, he goes into some genuinely informative and interesting stuff about Google Photos. But this appears to be a ruse, as Malik pulls back the curtain to reveal that it is yet another article proselytizing about the death of authenticity and the increasing shallowness of us digital heathens. The ensuing unqualified speculation at times borders on the ridiculous:

"We are all taking too many photos and spending very little time looking at them."

Maybe Sedaris and the New Yorker IT dept have developed a secret algo to qualify factual statements like this one? Then there's this factually-stated pearl:

"Photos are less markers of memories than they are Web-browser bookmarks for our lives." How so? Certainly not for myself. Albeit anecdotal, but I spend much more time these days joyfully poring over high-def Iphone photos snapped on trips away or of portraits of loved ones.

Also, its always a bit of a tell with an article's quality when its title commences with "In the future". We only have to look at the amazing HoloLens video on Ars (1) the other day to see that photography may well fall by the way-side once that kind of tech reduces to contact lens size, and virtual imagery will become much more enabled to move at 24 frames per second.

(1) [http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2016/04/hands-on-hololens- on-...](http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2016/04/hands-on-hololens-on-the-cusp- of-a-revolution/)

<comment><USER9> Tangentially related, but Black Mirror has a great episode which covers a similar premise to your 'contact lens size HoloLens' one.

Basically everything you see is recorded, and you can revisit any moment you've experienced any time you want. Which has many negative effects in the show, but which would actually avoid the author's problem altogether, as you no longer have to 'spend time' to take pictures.

If recording of all of your experiences (good and bad) are implicit, then will it improve our ability to live in the moment? Will it dilute the significance of the moments we want to 'choose' to remember if everything else is bundled in there too?

One of the suggestions of the episode seems to be that allowing ourselves to return to the past to such a degree can make it hard to escape from it and move on with out lives.

<comment><USER16> This episode was "The Entire History of You" if anyone is looking to check it out. It is one of the strongest episodes of all the series.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> I don't take pictures. But I like them. I'm still waiting for the vacation- album app - where I just photobomb other people on vacation, then on Facebook it finds all those pictures from other people that I'm in (maybe using my location-info history from my phone) and makes me an album!

</comment><comment><USER17> In the Future, We Will Bookmark Everything and Read Nothing

<comment><USER18> Reminded me of this, from Douglas Adams's _Dirk Gentley 's Holistic Detective Agency_:

"An Electric Monk is a labour-saving device, like a dishwasher or a video recorder. Dishwashers wash tedious dishes for you, thus saving you the bother of washing them yourself, video recorders watch tedious television for you, thus saving you the bother of looking at it yourself; Electric Monks believe things for you, thus saving you what is becoming an increasingly onerous task, that of believing all the things the world expect you to believe."

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> I fit the description of the perp. I take a lot of photos and don't spend a massive amount of time browsing through them. But I do this because I know that one day I will be old and frail and won't have the physical capacity to get out there photographing any more. At that point, I will be content with task of organising and curating them all.

<comment><USER20> How do you know now what you will be content to do when you're old and frail?

<comment><USER21> Um, talking to old frail people who are like you. They are real people who used to be programmers and photographers and surfers and skaters. Chat to them and they often show you their old photos. I assume that because they were like me at 30 then I will be like them at 70.

<comment><USER20> When you're typing, you don't have to write "um" at the start. That has a use in verbal communication but it's superfluous in the written word, and forces me to choose whether you're deliberately giving the impression of being a teenager or you just type as if you were speaking.

That aside, I still disagree. I bet that if those 70 year old people had the choice of looking at things they used to do, or being able to actually do them again as if they were 30, they'd prefer to do them again. They're forced to settle for the pictures because that's all that's on offer.

<comment><USER21> You say you disagree and then go on to agree with me. Huh?

<comment><USER20> When you're typing, you don't have to say "huh" at the end. That question mark you've used can be used to indicate a question; the tonal grunt of "huh" isn't needed.

<comment><USER21> Good lord you are the most boring person in the world, we all read technical manuals all day and some of us enjoy playing with language.

I suppose you watch TV and moan that it's fucking entertaining with amusing puns and clever use of language (fuck Bill Shakespeare eh?) No no NO NO! TV should be a series of facts presented as white text on a black background. You sir are an arse. Why are you even on the internet spewing your hate? EliRivers is a boring bland person. No sense OF FUN and not at all interesting in any way.

I bet a lot of people respond to you with tonal grunts. Is it that they all just wished you'd go away and leave them alone? Huh? Yep. 'fink so.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> I have to add this as I just returned from vacation myself. I have caught myself stuck in what I like to call "click and walk" syndrome when traveling so on this trip I resolved to significantly reduce the number of photos I took.

Being aware of it made me watch the people around me more. A large number of people don't look at sights anymore. They see it through their phone because they hold the device up constantly as an intermediary to the real world. They walk towards something, raise the phone, look at it through the camera/screen, click a photo, immediately turn away. My hobby on this trip was observing the people who really weren't looking at anything at all and it surprised me how many there are.

Made me think back to the trips I have taken where I returned with hundreds of photos of things I had barely taken the time to actually look at. If you're doing that, just travel via the web, it's cheaper.

</comment><comment><USER23> This is how people watch fireworks these days: through small screen of their phone while recording the scene.

</comment><comment><USER24> But this is also a huge positive for future historians. Imagine the huge amount of data they will have to study what today's society was like. Imagine if we had such data for the last couple of thousand years.

<comment><USER25> Historians have had 'too much' data for many decades now. Your photo of the Mona Lisa is probably not going to fill a significant gap in our future understanding of the times.

<comment><USER26> Often, this supposedly redundant data is useful in ways current society can't fathom. Millions of photos of the Mona Lisa taken over decades won't tell you much new about the Mona Lisa. But it will tell you a lot about changes in camera technology over that time.

Also, the long tail is _long_. There are whole cultures and subcultures that would be completely forgotten if not for archives.

At Defcon 19, Jason Scott gave a talk titled Archive Team: A Distributed Presentation of Service Attack[1]. In it, he explains why this data is important. As you rightly point out, the vast majority of it is boring and useless. It matters to no one but the author and their friends. But some of it is weird or funny, and a tiny bit of it is pure historical gold.

The early days of usenet, for example, contain tons of interesting conversations involving people who are now prominent. Thanks to these archives, we can get a better picture of these people's lives than in earlier times.

1\. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-2ZTmuX3cog](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-2ZTmuX3cog)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> That's one of the unanswered questions of our time: how to deal with information overload?

Some hints (that I use for my personal answer):

[https://sivers.org/hellyeah](https://sivers.org/hellyeah)

[https://sivers.org/gifts](https://sivers.org/gifts)

[https://github.com/eniomauro/hamster- gtd](https://github.com/eniomauro/hamster-gtd)

</comment><comment><USER28> "In the future, he said, the "real value creation will come from stitching together photos as a fabric, extracting information and then providing that cumulative information as a totally different package."

What? Obfuscating language that is supposed to sound "profound" or "smart" just sounds like bullshit, which is exactly what it is.

The future of photography as predicted in this article sounds depressing as hell. How much further can our society be dumbed down and turned into a superficial shell of itself? That said, there is no guarantee that the future of photography will unfold as predicted here.

But a society that values only money and denies ever growing numbers of people a stable future and the fair chance to earn a decent livelihood is a society that is on the road to revolution. The rise of a demagogue like Trump is a warning shot across the bow. There is more at stake here than photography. Laugh, roll your eyes or downvote but people who predict unpopular, fantastic sounding societal change are often laughed at...until they are proven right.

</comment><comment><USER29> A variation of this is being with people but not actually being present, i.e. texting, updating Facebook status, email, etc. etc.

How often do I see a couple at a restaurant, or a group of friends at a social gathering, who are barely interacting with each other but all have their noses glued to their smart phones and frantically typing away.

</comment><comment><USER30> _"...based on the ultra-conservative assumption that we each upload about two photos a day to various Internet platforms, that means we take about four billion photographs a day."_

2 per day? I guess I'm a massive luddite then. 2/month possibly.

<comment><USER31> Yeah. I find that the ease of taking photos has ironically made me do it less. I used to think I had to take as many photos as I could. Now I only take them when I think I'm going to want to look at them.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> This is already as it is now.

<comment><USER33> This certainly doesn't apply to me. I'm one of those nuts who gets annoyed by people taking out their shitty camera phones to record video during fireworks displays. It's so irritating to have everyone with their bright screens whiting out the night vision required to properly enjoy the show. Nobody even watches the fireworks anymore, as they're too busy staring at tiny blobs of color on their phone screen or preview window on the back of their camera.

I've stopped going to fireworks shows. I also no longer go to the cinema, lest I murder a fellow moviegoer for using their fucking cell phone during the movie. If the cinema wants my dollar, they're going to have to install Faraday cages / jammers. Which will never happen, because "Think of the children - what if the babysitter has an emergency!" and "What if I need to call 911!". I can't imagine how people managed to watch a movie back before cell phones were the norm. How in the world did people disconnect from the digital network for 90-120 minutes?! It's unfathomable!

<comment><USER34> You do sound like a nut. Watching fireworks is not stargazing, it's never that dark to begin with. And unless you're in NYC on the 4th of July, it's not that hard to find a spot a few feet away from someone with a camera and ignore them.

And yes, cell phones at the movies are annoying. Sometimes people are annoying. If they didn't have cell phones, they would talk, or open loud snacks, or something. It's not a sacred temple, it's a movie theater, get over it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> I remember when camcorders with flip out screens started to appear, and everyone commented the same thing - people only think something is real if they are watching it on their camcorder screen. I guess the smart-phone has replaced the camcorder now, but this is hardly a new phenomenon, and it didn't end the world the first time...

EDIT - just realised this is a three-day old comments page, nm

</comment><comment><USER36> This article reminds me of this picture:

[http://static.boredpanda.com/blog/wp- content/uploads/2015/10...](http://static.boredpanda.com/blog/wp- content/uploads/2015/10/senior-woman-living-in-moment-no-smartphone- celebrities-movie-premiere-black-mass-fb1.jpg)

<comment><USER37> For the people in the back, the phone is acting like a periscope. It's probably improving their view.

<comment><USER36> And everyone on their phones in the front? Is the digital zoom enhancing their view?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> I enjoy taking pictures of the people I know, not so much their surroundings. Video is even better!

The future of recording is an interesting thought exercise... photographs will become antiquated as video takes over, but what comes after that?

</comment><comment><USER39> Headline reminds me of one of my favourite poems: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w5IERp2OdJs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w5IERp2OdJs)

</comment><comment><USER40> Maybe in the future we will actually look at everything and have to photograph nothing because it's being done automatically by our brain chip.

</comment><comment><USER41> Computers will look at everything and organize, link, collate, combine,and transform the mountains of data and metadata we generate.

<comment><USER42> Pretty much this, but I'd take it a step further.

We are, collectively, only marginally more aware of our role in a larger system of observation and cognition/emergent behavior than a rod or cone in our retinas (or, more aptly, an extraocular muscle) is of its roles in our own individual visual system.

We are, increasingly, sensor platforms for leviathan.

</comment></comment><comment><USER43> Soon you won't have memories, only pictures.</comment>


Apple agrees on licensing terms for use of iconic Swiss clock design - <AUTHOR> http://www.theverge.com/2012/10/12/3492896/apple-sbb-licensing-agreement-ios-6-clock-app

<comment><AUTHOR> The original press release (in German) is here:

[http://www.sbb.ch/sbb- konzern/medien/medienmitteilungen.news...](http://www.sbb.ch/sbb- konzern/medien/medienmitteilungen.newsdetail.2012-10-1210_1.html)

Nice to see Apple and SBB come to quick licensing terms on this. Apple was clearly infringing on the Swiss railway's clock design. Loved how the SBB opted for "an amicable agreement and compensation" as opposed to immediate legal action. You can't argue that the Swiss don't have class!</comment>


Show HN: Free Covid-19 Check-in System for Businesses - <AUTHOR> https://shielded.app/ <comment><AUTHOR> Hey HN,

My name is Marcus, I'm a foodie/programmer who wants to help hospitality businesses get back on their feet.

With the recent COVID-19 cases, I though the best way I could do this was by providing my COVID-19 guest check-in website [https://shielded.app](https://shielded.app) for free.

The software works by letting guests provide you with their details via their phone (using a QR code or NFC) instead of virus spreading pen and paper.

Feedback is welcome!</comment>


'By the people, for the people': Kim Dotcom to launch alternative internet - <AUTHOR> https://www.rt.com/news/410606-kim-dotcom-meganet-internet/?spotim_referrer=recirculation <comment><USER2> Will never happen. If it did I wouldn't trust him provide me the 'freedom'.

</comment><comment><USER3> I'm callin' it. He will do absolutely nothing with this.</comment>


DontEat.at: Check into a NYC restaurant, get texted of health code violations - <AUTHOR> http://donteat.at/

<comment><USER2> A bunch of us decide to go out to eat. We look up retaurants on yelp, menupages etc and pick a place to go. When we get there, we check into donteat.at and we get notified of a bunch of health code violations, at which point we decide to find a diff place to eat.

Wouldn't the user experience be better served by allowing ppl to enter a restaurant name into donteat.at from anywhere (like from their desktop after reading about it on yelp) and getting the health code violations? Wouldn't this save a lot of time and hassle?

Whats the point of getting notified after getting to the restaurant?

<comment><USER3> > Whats the point of getting notified after getting to the restaurant?

I don't know about you, but I'm not adding another step to the list of things I have to remember to do (manually) when picking a place to go. Foursquare is one of those things that some people will _always_ use when they arrive somewhere, and so for them it's a 0-extra-action way of saying "Careful."

Now, I don't actually use Foursquare, but I get why this would be neat for someone who does.

<comment><USER4> I'm with rumpelstiltskin on this. Being persuaded to not eat somewhere _after_ getting there (maybe you made a reservation, even) and then having to make the decision to leave and find another restaurant is a total pain in the ass. Especially during, say, dinner time when the whole area is trying to eat as well. Maybe you went way out of your way to get to that restaurant. Maybe you told your date where you were going and she got all excited about it, now you're stuck eating there -- health code violations or not.

That said, I think the idea of this service is totally cool. It just needs the ability to check before getting to a restaurant. That will complete the service IMO.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Ignorance is bliss.

I went through Philly's health code reports page and didn't eat out for a few weeks.

<comment><USER6> have you ever been to San Jose....I literally get scared to eat out more than 2-3 places that I have eaten at for years.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> The FourSquare integration is kinda neat, but it seems like the inspection data would be more useful _before_ you go.

In Seattle/King County you can look up that info on a website or use the iOS app 'Seattle Inspections' -- <http://inspectapp.com/>

</comment><comment><USER8> Wow, thanks for submitting my app. DontEat.at is my submission to the NYC BigApps competition (<http://nycbigapps.com/>). Let me know what you think.

<comment><USER9> It would be helpful to have a little more info about the app on your site.

For example, it seems like it might only be for NYC restaurants given that it is an NYC BigApps submission and with 4Sq being so NY orientated.

For example, will it notify be of a bad restaurant in Palo Alto?

<comment><USER8> Good point. I didn't expect it to make HN. To answer your question: no, it does not work outside of NYC. It uses data provided by the city.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> This could be exactly the kind of spark 4square needs.

You know, what scrabble was to facebook and "googling my name" was for google.

</comment><comment><USER11> \- waiter! an omelette and a pair of kind words here please!

gloomy unhappy waiter comes and puts the omelette on the table.

\- waiter! and where are the kind words?

\- okay. don't eat this omelette.

</comment><comment><USER12> Hmm,

I am not in the least the crusading defender of restaurant owners, but this thing seems kind of unfair.

Should not a health violation that's bad enough mean the place has to be closed and anything else mean that the place is OK? If the health departments are "corrupt" and not shutting down places, why would we put credence in their inspections at all?

The whole approach seems like an exercise in interpreting data in a fashion in which it wasn't meant to be interpreted.

You could extract similar sorts of _poor_ of quality markers from lawsuits filed against businesses or whatever.

Am I missing something?

</comment><comment><USER13> Seems like this would be very useful in a city that doesn't have an already corrupt restaurant inspection culture.

<comment><USER14> My thought was of Guido from the movie _Risky Business_ : "never fuck with another man's livelihood."

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> If possible, you should also raise flags for restaurants that have low scores in their initial inspection, but corrected it in the follow-up. You'll see lots of restaurants hit with a failing number of points, then they get the mandated follow-up visit the next week which they "clean" up their act and get an A (and all its privileges). I want to know if the restaurant I'm eating at is one of those so that I can make an informed decision and possibly avoid it. The grade postings only show the last grade, and not the last 5 or 10 point scores.

You can also issue a warning for a serial offender, one that makes a habit of repeated high and low scores.

<comment><USER8> Good points, thanks. According to the NYC health department, the followup visit is "roughly" within the next month after the failed inspection -- but my guess is that they fall behind often. This is truly a MVP but I will continue to develop it if there is enough demand.

<comment><USER15> Indeed, according to the fact sheet ([http://www.nyc.gov/html/doh/downloads/pdf/rii/restaurant- gra...](http://www.nyc.gov/html/doh/downloads/pdf/rii/restaurant-grading- faq.pdf))

 _Initial Inspection. Every restaurant is scheduled for an unannounced inspection at least once a year. A restaurant that scores 0 to 13 violation points on this inspection, called the "initial inspection," receives an A grade.

Re-inspection. A restaurant that does not receive an A on its initial inspection does not receive a grade until it receives a re-inspection. The re- inspection will occur at least a week after the initial inspection, giving the restaurant a chance to improve its sanitary conditions. At the end of the re- inspection the restaurant will receive a grade card. If the grade is an A, the card must be posted immediately. If the grade is a B or C, the restaurant will also receive a card that says "Grade Pending."

The restaurant has the choice of immediately posting either the grade card or the Grade Pending card until it has a chance to be heard at the Health Department's Administrative Tribunal._

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> These guys will get their buts sued to oblivion. Is it libel? It will be, the minute they are out of date or have a data error.

The place isn't closed, because the violations are not bad enough. If they Should be closed, then the health code is not strict enough. Is it right to panic people with alarmist reports? Are diners sophisticated enough to interpret those reports?

</comment><comment><USER17> this is a great use of public data! more value add for checking in and using foursquare.

</comment><comment><USER18> Actually eating in .at isn't too bad, it's just not very good for you. Neighboring .it is healthier and has more variety:-)

</comment><comment><USER6> very interesting concept for sure...How do you plan to distinguish from Yelp and people commenting on Facebook?

</comment><comment><USER19> Clever, but really, you should have checked how it would look when posted on Facebook.

</comment><comment><USER20> This is either highly coincidental or a rip off of "Don't eat that!", based in PDX: <http://www.flickr.com/photos/aaronpk/5049962228/>

<comment><USER8> Pure coincidence. I've never seen that app before and can't find it on Google. Can you link it to me?

<comment><USER21> here: <http://donteatit.heroku.com/>

But dead link. It's the link in the seen picture at full rez.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Nice job, MaxS!

</comment><comment><USER23> thats nice .. how will you monetize it ?

</comment><comment><USER24> someone bought a domain name before they knew what to do with it...</comment>


Science Considered Harmful (2013) [pdf] - <AUTHOR> https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/1528/db5fbf573f64004c4515173a2bc85966b5b4.pdf <comment><AUTHOR> Note that "INT" stands for Intelligent Narrative Technologies, or AI for understanding and generating narratives.</comment>


Robot Priests Will Change Human Spirituality - <AUTHOR> https://onezero.medium.com/how-robot-priests-will-change-human-spirituality-913a19386698 <comment><USER2> What? No.

A real priest/minister/pastor/rabbi/imam is someone who... well, let's split this into two possibilities.

Possibility 1: God is actually there, and has told us real things about himself and how we are to relate to him. A real priest/minister/pastor/rabbi/imam has _lived_ some of that, and can relate to you as you try to live it, and hopefully help you. In contrast, a robot can give you answers programmed into it by some Silicon Valley engineer.

Possibility 2: God is not actually there. All that spirituality is junk. The only thing religion has is, maybe, some wisdom in how to live well. As I'm trying to live life and run into challenges, a real priest/minister/pastor/rabbi/imam has still lived some of those challenges, and has some idea of how to live as a human being, and can maybe help me as I try to do so. A robot, on the other hand, give me answers programmed into it by some Silicon Valley engineer.

In both cases, the robot is less helpful, because it doesn't actually know what it's like to _live_. But it's worse if case 1 is true. It's still worse if I, the seeker (or whatever term) _think_ that case 1 is true, because I'm just about dead certain that the robot _hasn 't_ lived the spirituality that it's trying to help guide me to.</comment>


Ask HN: I'm hiring my first employee – literature recommendations? - <AUTHOR> I run a small business that is scaling and I'm about to hire my first employee to help me with copywriting and content creation. The plan is to start with a part-time employee in order to both get some experience in being an employer and also to try the employee out. I will therefore hire a student within the field that wants to make some extra cash.<p>I have two questions for you: (1) Does anyone have any experience in this that they want to share? (2) Are there any recommended literature out there that I really should read being new to this? <comment><USER2> This is what I do for a living and I interview writers somewhat often.

You need to find someone who sees the difference between writing as an art and as a profession. Look for someone who can research and write fast. They're not going to know what they're doing and since you're not going to get high- quality work you need to get a lot of decent work out of them.

As part of the interview process, ask them to pitch you a blog topic. Then dig deeper and find out how this post is going to benefit your business, etc. Finally, ask how long it would take them to write this blog post of say, 1000 words. The red flags are anyone who says this would take them more than 6 or so hours and anyone who can't explain the business value of their work.

<comment><AUTHOR> Very interesting, thank you

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> The Prince - Machiavello. Just kidding, if you are in the technology business I strongly reccomend The Manager's Path. It is a very good book to learn how people interacts with the leaders and how to manage your own leadership.

<comment><AUTHOR> I have read the prince but I'm not sure I want to foster that kind of company culture... ;) I will definitely check that book out, thank you!

<comment><USER3> Your question could also lead to a nice submission about how you did. That would be interesting to share: wins, fails... Thanks.

<comment><AUTHOR> I'll make a submission if it results in something interesting.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> If you are hiring a student, then consider selling it an internship. A few reasons why:

1\. You can place a clear timeframe (like "internship during the fall semester, potential to renew internship during spring semester and summer"). This way you start them with a clear end date. That way if you are not comfortable firing someone, you have a natural excuse. As a new manager, that may be valuable.

2\. Some local governments may have workforce development grants to cover parts of the expense of an internship but not just a regular employee. I know that is the case in my state (in the US).

Also if they are a student then by definition they are not an expert. For best results expect to spend time mentoring them. This likely means spending time in advance to outline the general path. In my experience, the more structure you have to start the better your results. After they get going, you can probably reduce the required structure (assuming they are a good hire). If not, get a new intern at the next semester.

Keep a list of all IT things you configure for them (email accounts, slack, other saas etc). This way you have an easier time to disable them when they leave.

Lastly treat them like an adult with real company email address, etc. The more professional you look to them, the more professional they will look to the rest of the world. Also, they will certainly talk to their peers about you and your company. So make a great impression.

</comment><comment><USER5> 1.) When I hired co-op students in a previous position, I had a lot of luck with an interview style that a cognitive psychologist friend of mine suggested. I would switch between memory questions and creative questions. For example, I would ask:

"Can you tell me about a specific time when you have had a conflict with a co- worker?"

then

"Imagine that I am Steve Jobs and you are pitching me on some new features that would make an iPod more useful. What features would you recommend?"

I found a couple of things with that style. First, it was an easier way to figure out who they are and what they were like to work with. Second, it showed me a lot about how they could think on their feet and come up with creative solutions on the fly.

Also, honestly, don't overthink it. You're trying to hire someone who you are going to want to spend a lot of time with. Don't expect perfection off the bat, and if I were you, I wouldn't optimize for skill or experience. Instead, optimize for someone you want to spend 40 hours a week with for the next twenty years. Your relationship with this person and your ability to teach each other things will be key to the relationship.

Also, when you hire them, I strongly encourage you to build a culture where you encourage them to teach you how to become a better manager. This starts during the interview - be upfront that this is a first for you and you want to learn how to become the best boss they've ever had. Ask them to give you frank feedback whenever it comes up. Ask them to do performance reviews on you. And schedule frequent one on ones where you encourage them to teach you how to become the best boss they have ever had.

That kind of culture is amazing because the more comfortable and skilled they get giving you feedback, the more comfortable and skilled they will get receiving feedback from you.

Good luck!!

2.) I'd avoid books. In fact, if I were you, I'd be very careful about taking any of the advice I gave you in #1. Those are just things that worked for me, and books are generally composed of things that work for the authors. You need to figure out your own style and what works best for you and your organization. Once you figure that out, hiring will get easier because you'll have an idea what you're selecting for.

I can't believe I just wrote a wall of text, then told you to disregard what I said. :)

<comment><AUTHOR> I agree with using open questions to assess the candidate. I somewhat agree, as the saying goes "planning is everything, the plan is nothing".

<comment><USER5> I've gained a lot from switching between open memory questions and open creativity questions, preferably back to back.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Literature does not help a lot. It's an add-on to your personal experience, nothing more. If it's your first time then it's a good idea to get someone with strong background is psychology to take part in the interview process. Psychological profile is very helpful in hiring decisions.

<comment><AUTHOR> I would like to stand on the shoulder of giants, when possible.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> the best reference i can think of: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secretary_problem](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secretary_problem)

i have used it myself, feels somewhat precise.</comment>