Show HN: My first iOS app to track Net Worth. How do you track your net worth? - <AUTHOR> https://apps.apple.com/us/app/balanceviewer-money-analytics/id1476048552?ls=1 <comment><USER2> I use a simple spreadsheet with rows of 1st of every month. First few columns are Assets (Bank Checking, Savings, Retirement, Investments) Then Liabilities such as Credit Cards, Loans). Then the simple sum of these two in next column gives my Net Worth for that month. Next Column adds its to the same of previous month, giving me total net worth. Then a %age change from last month.

All balances are as per 1st of month.

<comment><AUTHOR> I do the same. But using the BalanceViewer it's even more easily and informative (at least for me). And I hope other users will love it as well :)

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> It has always been difficult for me to track all petty expenses, such as coffee, a new T-shirt or a haircut. But at the same time, it is very important for me to know how much money I have in each period of time. I used a lot of expense tracking apps, but usually I forgot to add something, and as a result, the actual balance in 99% of cases does not match with balance inside the app, so every month I added the correct results to the money trackers manually. Also, money trackers usually show Expenses / Income, but I wanted to find out how much money I had just last month, and now, to see the difference in the total amount. I did this in Excel, but then the idea came to me to create an application for these purposes without additional functions, so that people can spend only a few minutes a month, but get excellent statistics about their overall financial balance.

Do you track all of your expenses daily? Do you track your net worth somehow? What applications or services do you use?

<comment><USER3> Seems odd to conflate your net worth with little expenses like haircuts. I see how they are related, but at the same time they aren't.

<comment><AUTHOR> I know, I used expense trackers but they are not pretty good to track net worth, because of this I did track net worth in excel before creating the app)

<comment><USER4> The problem I have with apps like this is its virtually impossible to accurately track networth. At any given time, I am owed money (like a tax refund) or I am making an "investment" (like renovating my house to increase its value).

Does your app calculate the current market value of real estate or vehicles?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Been using YNAB ([https://www.youneedabudget.com/](https://www.youneedabudget.com/)) for about 8 years. Very satisfied with it. The app is pretty good but the philosophy of financial management they advocate is the real seller.

<comment><AUTHOR> Yes, it's good as I know. What features are most important/useful for you in YNAB?

And thanks for your comment :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> I know a lot of people use spreadsheets, but I figure why not take it to the next level? So I'm starting to use a SQLite database with a simple bash CLI front-end for prompting new entries, generating reports, and simplifying some SQL queries. Anytime I find myself dropping down to raw SQL I try to wrap it behind a simple command for the next time.

I want to start adding some REST calls, e.g. to get the current spot price of gold, so I can compare it to my original buy prices.

Good luck with the app, it looks really sleek. And I like how you included a question in your Show HN title to lure me in. :)

<comment><AUTHOR> Very interesting solution to use SQL queries :) However it difficult for a lot of people to use DB to track net worth especially to people who is not familiar with SQL, I think spreadsheets a bit easier XD

Thanks for the feedback, still have a lot of work to do with the app, but hope it will help in net worth tracking. The question was a key! Do you use some kind of tracking app on your mobile device?

<comment><USER6> I agree SQL is way too hardcore for the average person, but the CLI wrapper makes it a little more approachable. Still a little too hardcore for most people but one cool part is that I can generate spreadsheets easily as well.

Anyway no I don't use a mobile app since this is more for long-term tracking and not something I need to update or query on the go, so mobile wouldn't make sense for my use cases. I'm probably a bad example though since I don't use mobile apps at all really.

<comment><AUTHOR> I hope to have a web version of BalanceViewer as well in the future)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Parallel to detailed transaction tracking, I have a spreadsheet called "Simple Net Worth" that approximates the goals of this app. Just a set of balances I update every so often manually, which is good to capture the accounts/assets that aren't easily tracked elsewhere.

The app looks nice but seems to have a deal-breaker: how do I enter debt? My mortgage is very much a part of my net worth calculation, but I see no way to mark an account as a debt or enter a negative number.

<comment><AUTHOR> You are right. We are planning to add negative values in next updates. Have some problems with graphs when negative values is bigger than positive :) As a workaround right now you can copy "-" symbol and paste it before balance value. But note, that graphs can be displayed incorrectly. Will be fixed in next releases.Anything else that need to be improved? And thanks for the feedback!

<comment><USER7> Other feedback would be:

* passcode protection, like other security features, are not good "pro" upsells IMHO. That should be in the free version.

* Maybe too expensive for a basic calculator, especially priced as a subscription. I have little appetite for more subscriptions.

<comment><AUTHOR> Passcode it's just an additional feature, you can keep your data safe by setting iPhone's protection (Touch or Face ID).

About the price, we actively work on other functionality as well. An example tracking all your incomes. Expenses will be counted automatically based on balances and incomes. This is only the first version, so a lot of thing to do, but since I do this using my own savings it takes time :)

Thanks for the feedback!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Quicken Desktop (or rather, the Australian fork, Reckon Accounts). Their licensing is really awful - to the point of the company having faced Consumer Affairs rulings - but it's a really good program, very fast to use, and I have 20 years of data in there.

There's a lot of us out there who would love to switch away from Quicken/Reckon the company, but keep Quicken the product. (Tried Moneydance, GNUcash etc, they're just not quite as good, though Moneydance is closest.)

<comment><AUTHOR> Yes, I read about some problems with Quicken. Do you mostly use Desktop versions only? Or mobile as well? Thanks for sharing these apps, I will investigate them, maybe will implement some of their cool features :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Personal capital is what I use.

<comment><AUTHOR> Nice. Are you satisfied with it, what's the most valuable feature for you there? Or maybe some features that you want to see but they are not there? I've built my app to be simple but effective :)

<comment><USER10> I also use Personal Capital.

Something annoying about finances is dealing with negative numbers. If my credit has changed by -$500, at a glance, does that mean I have paid off $500 or does that mean my debt has grown by $500?

Obviously this can be figured out from digging in deeper, but I like "at a glance" stats.

What I am saying is to add context clues. Rather than giving a plan number with negatives, maybe $500 but green means "paid off" and $500 but red means "grown".

I don't know of a person that would see a red $500 and think they paid off $500.

Negatives are hard, especially when credit is already backwards.

<comment><AUTHOR> An example dept balance -$2000 then it decreases on $500. In that case -$2000 + $500 = -$1500 (+$500 should be green)

I'm I get you right?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Charles Schwab.

<comment><AUTHOR> Cool, didn't hear about it before. I will check it out. What killer feature do you like the most in it?</comment></comment>


There is no universal hierarchy of the senses reflected in language - <AUTHOR> http://www.pnas.org/content/115/45/11369 <comment><USER2> Fascinating, thanks, with links to other interesting books/papers. Seemed strange they didn't mention Lakoff & Johnson, whose books - such as _Metaphors We Live By_ and _Women, Fire and Dangerous Things_ \- talk about exactly this stuff, and call for more research just like this paper.</comment>


First Look at Elon Musk's Boring Company's Tunnel - <AUTHOR> https://www.instagram.com/p/BT_itC8h0Cx/ <comment><AUTHOR> Why can't Elon build an efficient public transportation system as opposed to a tunnel that is meant for cars? Does anybody know the details?</comment>


Fizzbuzzed - <AUTHOR> http://dominickm.com/?p=514 <comment><USER2> "[W]hat is your favorite programming language / platform and why" is less a predictive interview question than it is a Rorschach blot _for the interviewer_.

In most established tech companies --- those with, say, more than 10 employees --- interviewing is performed by a semi-arbitrary selection of line developers.

If you're managing the hiring process at one of those companies, you should keep in mind that for a typical software developer, being involved in the hiring process is the closest they're going to get to participating in corporate strategy. For the time that they're in the room with a candidate, they are essentially the CEO of the hiring process. The more attention I've paid to hiring processes, the more convinced I am that this goes to people's heads. In no other job capacity do software developer's subjective beliefs and opinions get applied so directly to business outcomes.

<comment><USER3> I completely disagree that the question is a bad question. He does not say there is a right answer, only that they are able to make a competent argument about what language they like and why. The point of the question is to see if they have actually put much thought into developing software. Enough thought, in fact, to have an opinion on what they like and why. Furthermore, it tests their ability to verbalize convincing arguments for their opinions with logical evidence for those arguments. These are skills that are needed when working in a development team.

Now if he is saying, "well they said python and I hate python, so they are wrong!" Then, obviously, that is not a good interview tactic. But I didn't find that to be the case from the way it was presented in the article.

<comment><USER2> The problem isn't that there's a wrong answer, it's that it doesn't immediately admit apples-apples comparisons between candidates, it's hard to structure it so it can do that, and even harder (probably requiring several generations of candidates) to tune the apples-apples criteria to find something that actually predicts how candidates will actually perform the job.

Those are the big theoretical problems with questions like that. But the pragmatic problems with it are even worse: they are a lens that focuses and applies subjective biases on the part of interviewers. Developers are terrible psychologists, and subjective interviews are the one time that we demand that software developers perform as psychologists.

The best job interview questions are strictly and (as closely as possible) objectively predictive, and the easiest predictive questions to ask are work- sample questions: "here is a problem we solve routinely in this job, candidate, please solve it yourself."

<comment><USER3> I still completely disagree with you. You are misunderstanding the point of the question, and probably missing the importance of being able to formulate an opinionated argument about development and present it to a team. That is the point of the question.

You should not be apples-apples comparing candidates anyway. Everyone is different, and it is a collection of skills that you need to be a developer.

Candidate A may be a person who isn't as quick with coding, but they can quickly architect a solution in their mind and formulate an opinionated argument about why it is superior.

Candidate B may be an incredible coder, but unable to explain their methodology, or architect a solution that is generic and re-usable.

Both of these candidates can be an asset to the team in different ways. I find a lot of developers, the "JUST LET ME CODE" types, really don't understand the communication skills needed to develop an application with a large group of people. This question helps find people that will be better in that group situation, regardless of how strong their coding skills may be...because coding is only a portion of the job, in the real world.

Edit: I also pointed out in my reply, that an interviewer who takes a subjective bias when assessing the answer to this question is doing it wrong.

<comment><USER2> You believe that you shouldn't try to hire based on apples-to-apples comparisons of developers. I not only don't agree with you, but I run a (relative to startups) high-volume recruiting practice premised on that belief. We're not going to agree, and that's fine.

In the 12 years of my career prior to discovering objective, work-sample, standardized, data-driven hiring, I hired exactly the way you're advocating. I sought out questions like the one you're advocating for. My favorite question from that time: "if you had to put together a libyou.a that you take from project to project, what would be in that library?" I found it to be a great way to start a conversation with a candidate to get inside of their head, and also liked the fact that it quickly gave me a signal as to whether the candidate had actually done the kind of work we did in our shop.

As it turns out, the ability to project a signal as to whether a candidate has actually done the kind of work we do in our firm is _not actually useful_. What's useful is: "if the candidate is put in a reasonable position to try, can they actually perform the tasks the role requires". Surprisingly --- in fact, shockingly --- I've found _zero correlation_ between the capacity to _signal ability_ and the capacity to _demonstrate ability_. ZERO. Our best performers six months in, as often as not, interview terribly on "signalling" terms, and were hired because work-sample testing overrode those concerns.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I've been programming for a couple years now, part time. I work in IT troubleshooting proprietary software on customer's machines. I've written several vb.net applications to automate things in the office. (Screen scraping/website automation, log file readers/parsers,, etc...) Lately I've been working in python more for my screen scraping needs and also learning web2py. I've thought about trying to apply for a programming job where I work, or at least maybe see if I can shadow a programmer to see what it's like.

I've always been put off by thinking that I'd just be embarrassed because I'm not good enough and they'd laugh at my code. Nobody in my group at work does any kind of coding or scripting, and all my work is proprietary and I can't really share it on the internet for feedback. I've heard of this fizzbuzz test before, but just now looked up what it is exactly. I can't believe how easy that is, and that people are actually failing at it. Makes me feel like maybe I should apply for some of the developer jobs at our company.

<comment><USER5> To clarify, I don't think "Fizzbuzz" necessarily means "printing out Fizz on multiples of 3, Buzz on multiples of 5, etc." Fizzbuzz generally refers to a simple programming test to make sure candidates can actually write some amount of code.

<comment><USER6> I've interviewed people for a junior position recently. I gave the FizzBuzz test, verbatim from Wikipedia. Only about 10% were able to do it on a whiteboard, without help.

<comment><USER7> I can't write any code effectively on a whiteboard in front of an audience. -> I'm a terrible programmer.

TIL I'm a terrible programmer.

<comment><USER8> An audience of one. What about on a piece of paper? In front of a computer. How would do in code reviews? You can state your concerns to the interviewer to see if they can accommodate.

<comment><USER7> I've never seen a whiteboard interview with only one interviewer. The smallest was 2.

Whiteboards are for diagramming things more complicated than lines of code. [e.g. Interactions between several web services or paths of control across entire programs]

I've honestly just accepted that by the standards of many people's interviewing processes I'm a bad programmer. :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> >Pretty much everyone I asked to do Fizzbuzz failed

…I can't help but wonder what that really means? They gave up without producing any work? The program didn't compile because they were typing random characters into the IDE? They were unfamiliar with the IDE, and couldn't find the "compile" button? They couldn't get the program to compile because of missing semicolons? The program didn't write anything out to the terminal? The program never printed out "Fizz"? They printed out "FizzBuzz" on every line? The program never printed out numbers? The program printed out commas instead of newlines after every number? They went from 1 to 101 instead of 1 to 100?

<comment><USER10> >I can't help but wonder what that really means?

My guess: it's the unfamiliarity of the mathematical modulus operator that trips most people up. A lot of CRUD developers will never need to use modulus calculations in day-to-day work. Pull some values from a database record, throw it up on a form, then save it back. Use plus+ for totaling dollar amounts. Use multiply* for calculating sales tax. A LOB programmer can do stuff like that for years without modulus% anywhere in his code. Something like credit-card number validation does use modulus calc but programmers can just copypaste[1] someone else's example or just use a library.

However, a lot of these FizzBuzz discussions talk about _computer science_ graduates specifically. A lot of CRUD devs do not have formal comp sci backgrounds so it's somewhat understandable that they're not familiar with modulus. However, I can't think of a reason why a compsci grad wouldn't know it.

[1][http://www.codeproject.com/Tips/515367/Validate-credit- card-...](http://www.codeproject.com/Tips/515367/Validate-credit-card-number- with-Mod-algorithm)

<comment><USER9> >My guess: it's the unfamiliarity of the mathematical modulus operator that trips most people up.

This is an interesting hypothesis, can anyone confirm that this is a particular sore spot? I wonder if that would show up as a generational gap? If the younger generations are working with web pages and never used much arithmetic, let alone remainders. But older generations grew up with low level graphics programming and arrays in languages like C and assembly where the modulus comes up all the time. So could we come up with the moral equivalent of FizzBuzz that a much larger percentage of the people who failed FizzBuzz could pass? And then I'd like to see how hard I'd think that test was.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> >There is however one last hurdle — a written test in the form of Fizzbuzz.

A "last hurdle"? Shouldn't it be the first hurdle?

I thought the point of using FizzBuzz in its proper context was to be a quick filter to weed out the majority of candidates. That way, you avoid wasting interview time with them.

<comment><USER11> I don't like making job applicants do work -- even something as simple as fizzbuzz -- if it's unlikely I'm going to hire them. Just seems unfair. Also, if I'm giving someone a test, I'd prefer they work on it in front of me, which means it won't be the first screen. And finally, I don't think struggling on FizzBuzz _necessarily_ means "No Hire."

(I actually don't really give these sort of tests at all anymore. Didn't seem that useful in practice.)

<comment><USER10> > \-- if it's unlikely I'm going to hire them.

But how do you _get_ to the "unlikely" determination? Do you want to get a ballpark reading on "unlikely" within the first 10 minutes of the interview or at the very end _after_ investing an hour?

I'm not suggesting that FizzBuzz is the be-all-end-all but for the folks who _already do_ find useful as a low-investment bs filter, it makes the most sense to use it at the beginning of the process and not at the end. Using it as a " _last hurdle_ " makes no sense if you have a stack of resumes to plow through. If you have prior assumptions that 90% of those candidates are not competent at programming, what's the logic in using FizzBuzz as the last step? You want to identify the 10% as quickly as possible before investing too much extended interview time.

<comment><USER11> Yup, you're probably right. If you're at the end of the process and on the cusp of hiring someone to write code but you're not sure whether they can write simple code then there's probably something wrong with your process.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> FizzBuzz is just a bozo filter. Sure, it screens out unqualified applicants. But why are you even getting unqualified applicants in the first place? It's because your hiring strategy is fundamentally flawed.

When I go out to look at job postings, that is all that I see. Single, standalone jobs. What I really need to see is an entire career track within the same company, from green rookie all the way up to the highest non- executive position on that track.

If I saw that, I could self-select for the position that is most appropriate to my current skill level. You wouldn't need to use FizzBuzz as my bozo filter. You would have to use a more difficult task, such as prioritizing a list of bugs and feature requests in a hypothetical program, based on perceived severity, resource requirements, and business needs.

But it seems like companies now only ever want developers with 5-10 years of experience in all the techs from the stack that they already use, and there are no promotions except into management. Where do they imagine those people come from? Where do they think those people go after they age out?

Is there some developer nursery out there that takes green rookies, trains them up into competent developers, and then just forces them to leave? Is there a developer nursing home that hires only grizzled, jaded old veterans and pays them all handsomely to do work that never involves any training?

The reason that you need an ever-increasing amount of bozo filters is because your job openings do not match the profile of job-seekers. Unqualified applicants are clogging your system because your posting is the closest thing they can find to their own skills.

Bozo filters treat the symptom. The only cure is to give all those bozos their own jobs to apply for. If your company is large enough to support that many positions, you really should establish complete career tracks, across all levels of experience, and advertise them as a whole to job seekers, so they can tell you what rung of the ladder they think they should be on.

In short, you advertise all the positions that already exist at your company, the number of vacancies, and how those positions are linked by promotion. Anyone applying for multiple positions spanning more than two mutually exclusive skill levels is automatically filtered out as a resume spammer.

</comment><comment><USER13> I've always been a fan of "walk the walk, then talk". Basically, do FizzBuzz first then follow up with questions. Reason being, if you can't do some basic coding than its not even worth the time of having a discussion. You are, after all, hiring for a coding based position.

<comment><USER14> Doesn't seem very scalable if you have a lot of applicants (unless you let them do the test at home?).

I think asking for code samples up front is the best way to weed out those who aren't good candidates -- you can tell a lot about someone through their work.

<comment><USER15> A few places I've applied have given me coding challenges to work on from home. None has taken me more than an hour, were relatively simple and fun, and I've never failed to get an interview afterward. I'm not entirely sure what all of that _means_.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> I think this Spolsky article provides some insight into why this might be the case: [http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2005/01/27.html](http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2005/01/27.html)

<comment><USER17> We request solutions to slightly harder problems in response to an initial application. Even though this is done at home, it still filters out a large percentage of applicants.

We then do something at the same level at the start of the interview. This filters out about half of the people who have got as far as an interview.

We then do an SQL test, building slowly from "select * from user" to a multi- table with sorting query. This filters out the other half.

We don't hire often.

Anyway, this is a very long-winded way of agreeing with Joel. I meet good programmers all the time - just rarely in interviews.

Alternatively, offering the going rate is too low an offer...

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> I struggled with this when I was responsible for hiring at 500px before I moved on. The key is to ask for code samples ahead of time. It doesn't necessarily have to be open source contributions, though that slightly preferred, but I refused to interview someone that didn't have code samples.

I went from 30 interviews per one hire to about 2 or 3. The most common problem being a potential candidate not knowing enough of the internet stack to be truly useful (for example, knowing _only_ rails, but having no real knowledge of how AJAX worked, or load balancers, or databases, or DNS, etc).

<comment><USER19> How did you handle people with no open source contributions? I'd imagine most non-OSS code would be under an NDA or something.

<comment><USER18> They just sent me code.

It is up to them to make sure that they are following NDAs. Also, sometimes code isn't open source, and it isn't NDA; like 4th year assignments or small contracts.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Makes me feel slightly more confident in my ability as someone who recently finished my CS degree, but I still feel very far behind. I find it very weird that someone even after their freshman year in such a degree program could not understand or comprehend such a simple task. I don't think anyone in my schools department would fail at these tasks after taking the introduction to programming course.

Where are all these students coming from? Perhaps there is some problem with the source. It seems like they aren't being taught to understand, but are instead being taught to copy instructions in some manner.

</comment><comment><USER21> "[W]hat is your favorite programming language / platform and why" while a reasonably good open-ended question, students just haven't been exposed for long enough to different languages/platforms to have an opinion, although this question (as almost any other) will certainly have the "hacker in my own time" types talking.

<comment><USER22> That's why I like it. I add "and what would you change about it if you could?" to identify those candidates who really think about their tools.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> FizzBuzz is the programming interview version of asking UK Chancellor George Osborne what 7x8 is[1].

[1][http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-magazine- monitor-28143553](http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-magazine-monitor-28143553)</comment>


A Message From the CEO - <AUTHOR> http://puppetlabs.com/blog/message-ceo

<comment><USER2> An individual states a strong position in a forum unrelated to their employment and the offended party considers it then reasonable to paint the whole company that person works for as friendly to "hostile brogrammers".

Quote from original story:

"that more people know that there are still unfair and harsh consequences for having the audacity to be a woman on the internet, who has opinions, and says them in no uncertain terms."

So, apparently it is OK to have strong opinions and state them in no uncertain terms if you are a woman, apparently not if you are a man.

It could be that one or the other (or both) persons in this story makes for an awful potential employee that no one would want or should have to work with. Gender does not make you immune from being such a person.

Puppetlabs' response seems to be reasonable and measured.

</comment><comment><USER3> Original accusation and comment from the employee: [https://storify.com/FakeRobotGamer/puppet-labs-employee- gets...](https://storify.com/FakeRobotGamer/puppet-labs-employee-gets-me-to- apply-for-a-job-th)

</comment><comment><USER4> As someone who thinks our industry still has a long way to go when it comes to real equality and tolerance, who is dead-set against discrimination and who was okay with the github outcome (but who, full disclaimer, is male)... this seems like the right decision.

People, especially in non-executive, non-managerial roles shouldn't be summarily fired just because they said one really stupid and offensive thing in "public". Warn, educate, and then if the issue is shown to be even a mild pattern then act, but let's not get crazy with stringing people up over what appears to be a first known infraction.

Let he or she among us who hasn't said/emailed/texted something that could be construed as offensive to some race/culture/gender/religion/whatever throw the first stone; but based on reading the accounts of both sides in this specific case, I don't think firing this person would be the right move.

</comment><comment><USER5> Why the hell is everyone being so offended and gossiping around in this industry as of late?</comment>


Ask HN: Flex/Flash, Authenticating your .swf + decompiling - <AUTHOR>

In a nutshell, we are developing a web app where our app and flex fontend need to share data securely. The problem is that our application server needs to know that the requests we are getting from our flex application are not spoofed.
Right now we essentially have a secret key that is hashed with request data to authenticate the flex app.
Problem is, how do we keep the secret key in the flex app code without someone able to snag it by decompiling? I can think of a million ways to obscure the key into the code, but that only will delay a break in, not stop it.
It seems impossible for there to be any secure cryptographic system if an intruder can see the source.
Is there any good way to actually secure flex from getting decompiled? From what I have seen everything just obscures code. <comment><USER2> Unfortunately, there really isn't a way to do this-

One of the fundamental rules in security training is _never trust the client_.

Anything you can write, they can open. For the most part, it won't even be that hard. Don't waste time obfuscating it..

If it's at all possible, time would be better spent redesigning the infrastructure such that the client never has any data that you don't want the user to have.. The best way to do this is to generalize an API that the backend uses to talk to the front end. Then, modify your client to use this.

We do this with Chron X- We have a generic Card game API that we call from our Client.. It's not perfect, but we're actively making design decisions assuming that someday, other clients may connect, with or without our consent and blessing. We may never allow it, but we have to work under the mindset that the hackers can do anything our Flex can.

I'd suggest writing a middleware layer, which takes in requests based on a sessionID, and then allows only certain commands to go through, and only certain data to come back. That way, you minimize your exposure.

</comment><comment><USER3> Newer versions of Flash Player and FMS include remote attestation aka SWF verification; AFAIK it hasn't been cracked yet (but it hasn't been reverse- engineered by Red5 either).

[http://livedocs.adobe.com/flashmediaserver/3.0/docs/03_confi...](http://livedocs.adobe.com/flashmediaserver/3.0/docs/03_configtasks_22.html#1223759)

</comment><comment><USER4> Hmm... The fact that you're so concerned about requests not hitting your web app without going through your Flex front end raises a red flag...

Anyway, you can obscure the key into the code all you want. If it's a string value there's only one place it will ever be when the .swf is decompiled and that's in the constant pool. If it's a number value stored in a variable or even a few concatenated strings it might be a little more difficult since it's not going to come out and slap somebody in the face, but to say it's trivial to retrieve the key would be the understatement of the decade. Before going this route it might be a good idea to decompile some .swf files to see what it looks like. Check out a program called Describe SWF and take a look at the documentation for Flasm. Lots of good info there.

There's no good way to secure your Flash/Flex code so it's not worth the effort to even entertain the thought. I develop a bot with a custom Flash player and I'm just amazed out how many people do stuff like this. The best advice I can give you is that anything you put in a Flash file is there for the taking as if you were advertising on your home page. Bad idea.

</comment><comment><USER5> Um, isn't this the same problem as DRM? (which we all know cannot be solved.) The fact is, if my computer can execute the code and make the request, so can I. The only thing you can do is to try to mitigate the risk or make it more difficult.

<comment><AUTHOR> Yes, same problem. Bummer...

Has anyone had success with making flash decompiling more difficult?

Anyone used <http://www.amayeta.com/> ?

<comment><USER6> My instinct would be: don't bother. If the data you are protecting is worth enough to someone, they will decompile it anyway.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> If you can trust the client by having them enter in a password, can't you then set up a system that uses the same idea as public-key cryptography (<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public-key_cryptography>)? Once the user has logged in and authenticated with their password they generate their public and private keys and send the server the public key while keeping the private key local. This method would be processor intensive, but good security usually isn't cheap. Or maybe my understanding of how public-key cryptography works isn't accurate and someone can explain why it wouldn't work?

<comment><USER3> Here's the attack: The user writes software which performs the same authentication handshake as the official client, but after the handshake it starts sending evil messages to the server.

<comment><USER7> Isn't that where the password comes into play? Basically you authenticate once by passing the password and the client generated public key to the server. The server checks the password and then if it matches it sends all future communication to the client encrypted with their public key. It can generate a new "public" (in quotes because it will only be shared with the client) key specifically for that client and send it encrypted to the client using the public key passed along with the password. All communication from client to server will be decrypted with the private key that matches the public key given to the authenticated client, and all communication from server to client will be decrypted with the private key that matches the public key the client gave to the server with the password. This is probably more like TLS or SSL (<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transport_Layer_Security>) than I suppose. Which makes me think you could just use an SSL connection since it is supported ([http://livedocs.adobe.com/flex/2/docs/wwhelp/wwhimpl/common/...](http://livedocs.adobe.com/flex/2/docs/wwhelp/wwhimpl/common/html/wwhelp.htm?context=LiveDocs_Parts&file=00001356.html)).

Or am I really missing something and should just stop commenting? :)

<comment><USER8> The password as the basis for authentication and generating the encryption is useful in this instance to be able to "blame" someone when they are using your service incorrectly. At the very least, you can notify someone to change their password because their account has been compromised. You know _who_ is responsible for the request because it was authenticated.

In other words, your EULA/terms-of-service is a long the lines of "you are responsible for the user of this service using your login credentials, which can be revoked at any time if we perceive you to be violating the terms of service". Then becomes a little more manageable as a social problem (which it is), rather than solely relying on a technical solution to a social problem.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> You're authenticating the _client_? Not the person? That's impossible to do.</comment>


Show HN: Xsearch –a bash command line tool to search for a keyword in a folder - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/islem19/File-XSearch <comment><USER2> Why not... grep -R -n ... and it's other options...?

Why rewrite as a 100+ lines of bash with multiple program invocations?

<comment><AUTHOR> yeah, it is indeed! i just been thinkering about it, and i just got an idea to try another way to do it, and maybe package for people who aren't familiar with shell commands.

<comment><USER3> Someone unfamiliar with shell commands will likely have just as much difficulty finding, installing, and using your script/package.

<comment><USER4> You made a shell script because people unfamiliar with shell scripts might need to find files using the shell?

An alias like alias xsearch="grep -rnw -e" would probably replace what you just built and I hope anyone able to install your script could at least figure out how to edit and source their .bashrc file.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Hudson CI developers vote against Oracle control, "Hudson" name... - <AUTHOR> http://groups.google.com/group/hudson-dev/browse_thread/thread/7d540f26ec249a6c

<comment><AUTHOR> To supply a little context:

Oracle was attempting to leverage their (claimed) ownership of the trademark on the name of the Hudson Continuous Integration system to take full control of the project (otherwise open source). Most notably, they tried to block a move of the central source repository to github.

The response was a proposal to change the name. This was put to a vote among the dev community, who voted in favor, 214 to 14.

The Oracle member of the interim project governing board was invited to continue past the name change, but has apparently declined.

Not a great day for anyone, I guess, but Oracle really doesn't come out of this looking good...

<comment><USER2> Oracle really hasn't done a very good job of managing open source communities and contributors. It makes one wonder if distancing their properties from open source is intentional. I can't imagine they've been honestly trying to make things work, given their heavy-handed approach.

<comment><USER3> Either it's: intentional, or they just don't give a damn.

Considering the sources of most of their revenues, I'd say #2 is most likely. Companies that have been in Enterprise that long, making hand-over-fist money from mediocre products, acquired IP, and vendor lock-in often have a "quaint rag-tag" view of the FOSS development community.

I tend to think it's a myopic viewpoint, but then again we are a tiny indie shop, and they are multi-billion dollar company.

<comment> X-Istence If they don't give a damn, why were they fighting to keep it on their infrastructure?

If they had succeeded what would they have gained?

If they hadn't given a damn then they would have let Hudson choose where to host their software and mailing lists and all that fun jazz.

If it was intentional they could have foregone getting a trademark on the name Hudson, and they could have just asked the Hudson development team to move off their infrastructure.

Oracle's actions in this case seem to be completely random. It is almost as if there was no direction or thought behind what they did.

There seems to be no pattern or reasoning about what Oracle is thinking or attempting to do...

<comment><USER4> It's a classic case of not invented here syndrome mixed with incompetence when it comes to open source software. They wanted it on their servers because they were their servers. No more, no less.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Proposal for the new name: combine "Hudson" and "Larry"

<comment><USER6> Hurry?

<comment><USER7> Lardson?

<comment><USER5> +1

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> It's interesting that they're still willing to give Oracle a place on the board. I have a suspicion that Oracle will decline though.

</comment><comment><USER8> It seems a bit confusing from the title vs the post: 214 in favor of Jenkins is what the original post says.

Also mentioned is "Jenkins is not Oracle's project, nor CloudBee's project, nor my project, nor Kohsuke's project - it's the community's project, and it's going to thrive."

<quote> __"The vote is closed, and the results are in. More than half of the total votes were from ineligible voters, but the result would have been the same either way. The final result of all eligible votes is as follows: 214 votes to rename, and 14 for the status quo. You can see the individual votes at<https://groups.google.com/group/hudson-jenkins-vote>.

So what does this mean now? Well, it means Jenkins lives. We've registered jenkins-ci.org, though it's empty at the moment. In the coming days, we will be renaming the existing Google Groups to jenkins- firstname.lastname@example.com, renaming the Twitter account from @hudsonci to @jenkinsci, and renaming our organization at Github from hudson to jenkinsci. I wanted to make sure everyone had notice ahead of time that this was happening, so that no one gets surprised by changes to their incoming mail, etc. As said before, the initial, interim governance board will consist of me, Kohsuke and, if he and Oracle are willing, Winston. If Winston is unwilling or unable to continue in that role with Jenkins, we will select a replacement interim member. The interim board will work on the details of a more permanent governance process going forward. Discussions on the infrastructure changes (including things like the Maven groupId/artifactIds, etc) will be in public, on these lists. We're working to get the JIRA and wiki contents migrated over to the Jenkins site, and hope to work with Oracle to get that done in the next couple days.

Putting aside logistics, I want to personally thank everyone for voting, and especially thank everyone who voted for renaming for supporting the Jenkins project and its future. Jenkins is not Oracle's project, nor CloudBee's project, nor my project, nor Kohsuke's project - it's the community's project, and it's going to thrive. " _*</quote>

I fail to understand why would someone change names for an established 'brand'. (there are deserving candidates that do need a name change - Go, Closure and few hu la la from Google)

<comment><USER9> Oracle owns the trademark name 'Hudson' and so they'd be able to exert a degree of control over the community that they weren't okay with. This vote is the result of a proposal to rename to 'Jenkins,' so they could get out from under the thumb of Oracle.

<comment> space-monkey And IIRC Oracle had been actively attempting to exert this degree of control, to the point of interfering in infrastructure changes that project contributors wanted to make.

<comment><USER10> Not to mention apparently being complete dicks to Kohsuke Kawaguchi; who not only founded the project, was the primary contributor while at Sun, and remains the primary contributor since leaving; but also has a rep for being a very nice person. Apparently Oracle / some oracle VP Ted were big enough assholes that KK declined to work with them in any capacity in the future [1].

So yeah, Oracle continues making friends with open source folks.

[1] [http://kohsuke.org/2011/01/26/one-last-plea-for- hudsonjenkin...](http://kohsuke.org/2011/01/26/one-last-plea-for- hudsonjenkins-vote)

<comment> X-Istence Oracle has a long history of making friends with Open Source...

This along with the whole OpenSolaris, and various other projects just makes me sad. Yes, they aren't viable business strategies (especially the amount of people Sun employed just to work on various random Open Source projects), but there is something to be said for good will.

All of this is also leaving a sour taste in the mouths of people who have budgets and make decisions, yes many people will continue to purchase stuff from Oracle but ultimately I have a feeling this will come back to haunt them. I know quite a few places that ran exclusively Sun for their servers are now looking at whitebox machines running Linux and BSD.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: advice for my site, happyjobsearch.com - <AUTHOR> http://www.happyjobsearch.com/ Hi everyone,
About a year ago I created a web site to help people stay organized when looking for a job. Since then I've refined it to the point where I feel like it's now a viable product. I'm lacking two important  things, however: a) a business model and b) time to market it.
My preference is to sell it, and I would greatly appreciate advice on selling a niche site like this. In the meantime I want to try and get some traffic to it, so advice on optimizing the 30 minutes a day I have to do marketing would be awesome.
Incidentally, I've been using the site to keep track of some of my marketing efforts. As I search for people to contact regarding the site, I'm storing their information and keeping track of the "next action" - review their site, email, etc. Do any of you feel you'd benefit from using a site like happyjobsearch to keep track of your marketing efforts?
A little more about the site: Its main benefit is providing a tool to approach job searching systematically. I got laid off twice in three months last year, and I found that it was very demotivating to approach job seeking in a sloppy, reactive manner. So I tried to take a GTD approach and do things in stages: collect, review, and respond.  The idea with the site is to spend some time collecting job listings each day without spending a lot of time reviewing them, and definitely not spending time responding. Then, to spend time reviewing listings further and taking the time to send a proper cover letter and resume.
Separating these different processes and being able to keep track of which stage each job opportunity was in really helped me feel more in control and made me feel like I was actually making progress, because I could see what I'd gotten done. In the end that's what I hope it does for other people - help them with their job search on a practical level, but also help in some way to keep people motivated, because looking for jobs can really suck :D <comment><USER3> Hi. I used your site about 9 months ago as my main tool for organizing my job search. I was the guy who emailed you with the suggestion to have links open in a new tab versus navigating away from the site (which you implemented a few hours later!). I am happy to say I am now gainfully employed as an Oracle DBA at a large company. I have recommended your site to friends and they have used it as well.

AAA+++ would use again.

<comment><AUTHOR> That's awesome that you've found a good job! Thanks for the good feedback you gave me, and thanks too for recommending the site. It's very gratifying to hear that you found it useful enough to tell your friends to use it.

<comment><AUTHOR> p.s. thanks once more but I hope you won't need to use the site again

</comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Hi everyone,

About a year ago I created a web site to help people stay organized when looking for a job. Since then I've refined it to the point where I feel like it's now a viable product. I'm lacking two important things, however: a) a business model and b) time to market it.

My preference is to sell it, and I would greatly appreciate advice on selling a niche site like this. In the meantime I want to try and get some traffic to it, so advice on optimizing the 30 minutes a day I have to do marketing would be awesome.

Incidentally, I've been using the site to keep track of some of my marketing efforts. As I search for people to contact regarding the site, I'm storing their information and keeping track of the "next action" - review their site, email, etc. Do any of you feel you'd benefit from using a site like happyjobsearch to keep track of your marketing efforts?

A little more about the site: Its main benefit is providing a tool to approach job searching systematically. I got laid off twice in three months last year, and I found that it was very demotivating to approach job seeking in a sloppy, reactive manner. So I tried to take a GTD approach and do things in stages: collect, review, and respond. The idea with the site is to spend some time collecting job listings each day without spending a lot of time reviewing them, and definitely not spending time responding. Then, to spend time reviewing listings further and taking the time to send a proper cover letter and resume.

Separating these different processes and being able to keep track of which stage each job opportunity was in really helped me feel more in control and made me feel like I was actually making progress, because I could see what I'd gotten done. In the end that's what I hope it does for other people - <USER2> them with their job search on a practical level, but also help in some way to keep people motivated, because looking for jobs can really suck :D

<comment><USER4> Initial impressions are good. Very clean, intuitive, and useful.

You could add more value in the cover letter and interview reminder section, and also add in a resume section. For example, in the interview section a person could create a list of stuff they need to look at or study, and then check them off as they're finished. Similarly, you could create and save different cover letter and resumes. A user could use special syntax like [[Edit company name]] to just edit the relevant parts and send the resumes off.

I can see this working with a very cheap subscription model ($1-2/month) if there are more features. I dont think have you have enough to sell it right now, since most job sites have their own job tracking system.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for your suggestions. With resumes, I feel like there are a few good web sites out there already. For example, I use emurse.com which is free and does everything I could want it to.

I really like your idea about having multiple cover letters and placeholders in the cover letters. Something like that would have been helpful for me so I could see quickly which parts I needed to change. It would also be fun to code up an interface for it.

On the money side, I was thinking a one-time payment of around $8 would allow use of the site for up to a year. A subscription model sounds good too, and probably the best thing is just to test.

<comment><USER5> The separate slots for resumes is a good idea. I'd like to track what resume version I sent where. I think a one-time payment for access sounds like a good idea. Or maybe even just a donation button for now? The argument there is that people who find jobs might be willing to donate quite a bit more and also you never know when you'll need the site again so having the information readily available would be good.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Brilliant! I've been using Highrise to similarly organize my job search, however your approach is fantastically elegant and will probably begin using the two in tandem.

I've found that the networking aspects of jobseeking are not only critical in breaking past the resume firewall but are also among the hardest parts to manage, particularly trying to balance several open opportunities and inquiries.

The approach of systemizing all open opportunities, though, is brilliant. I'd suggest finding a way to integrate contacts & contact history within the site, almost making it more CRM-like, to make it a jobsearcher's dashboard.

As to a business model, I'm not sure it's immediately robust enough to begin as a subscription service and I'm no longer sold on advertising as a sustainable revenue stream, particularly with niche web apps.

Frankly, partnering with a LinkedIn might be the best outcome, but it's a real longshot. With the market for unemployed jobseekers outnumbering employed jobseekers, it's going to be a tough opportunity to make money on.

That said, best of luck - it's really quite brilliant.

</comment><comment><USER7> I worked in the job space for a while, and I would recommend shopping this around to sites like TheLadders, Indeed, SimplyHired, etc, who are all always looking for competitive features. If they could just buy something rather than build it in-house, I'm sure they would (speaking as someone who worked at a startup which got sold to Monster.com for 72.5 million).

<comment><AUTHOR> Something like this is what I have in mind, but I have no idea how to approach companies to shop my site around. Do you have any advice?

<comment><USER7> I would use LinkedIn, or if you email me I can put you in touch with a few folks who might be able to help.

You'd also be surprised at the recipient lists behind the "contact us" forms on a lot of the major sites. e.g. <http://www.indeed.com/jsp/contactus.jsp>

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you - I'll send you an email shortly.

One thing I'm wondering about is, should you email them with your price or ask them for an offer?

<comment><USER8> Why not just build your user base and work to make sure your feature set is competitive or better? They'll come to you eventually.

<comment><USER7> You'd be surprised at the number of small-scale acquisitions that occur after a casual mention or demonstration of a site.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> This is great! It mirrors the approach I've taken to job hunting in the past -- but on a webpage instead of a text editor.

Business model options (non-exclusive):

\- Advertising: You have a wide range of options for sponsorship, display or performance advertising. I could write all day about them. Happy to give you more info.

\- Subscription/"Freemium": Pay to use. Pay to use certain features. Pay not to see ads. Tip jars. Tons of options.

\- Leap of faith: Focus on scaling up the user base (with or without other revenue) and sell it to a monster/dice/etc

Good luck!

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you!

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> I think this is a great idea. First impression, I would reconsider the colors. I think there's something to be said for being playful, however I'd like to see colors that are a bit more businesslike. The colors say toy, but this is a tool.

Granted, web 2.0 has proven that a pastel color scheme can work, and I do think it can work for you too but you either need to pull back on it or take it a step further and support it with some more stylized design elements.

Specifically, if your site name in the header felt more like a logo and felt a bit playful, you'd be signaling that this lightweight, airy feel is part of your brand identity. Right now there's some disconnect there.

The dark blue you are using is nice, I think maybe just making that a bit more prevalent in your design would serve to ground the overall design a bit more.

</comment><comment><USER11> Several other people have commented on resume functionality, but what I'd like to see is a targeted resume builder -- one where you can list the sum total of all your skills and experience, tag each line item with specific job categories, and then use that to build targeted resumes aimed at specific markets.

I've never seen a site with that feature.

<comment><AUTHOR> That's a really cool idea, and I'd like something with that too.

<comment><USER12> I would also like a fast way to 'build' my resume with appropriately specific pieces from my overall experience and skills.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Awesome idea and clean execution. I organized my last job search in excel and retained a lot of the same information.

One suggestion: It would be useful to cache the job listing the user links to. During my last job search I remember finding a lot of my bookmarks to be invalid because the original post had expired and the recruiter reposted it.

</comment><comment><USER14> THis is something I was hoping to find. It becomes really hard for me to remember which jobs I applied to and to save jobs that I would like to apply to later. This is ideal for me. Thank you !!

</comment><comment><USER15> Out of curiosity, what language/framework did you use for the site?

<comment><USER16> Check le headers.

      Server: Apache/2.2.8 (Ubuntu) Phusion_Passenger/2.0.3
      X-Powered-By: Phusion Passenger (mod_rails/mod_rack) 2.0.3

Ruby on Rails.

(BTW guys, time to upgrade to Passenger 2.2.5!)

<comment><USER15> that's leaky and calls for:

ServerSignature Off

ServerTokens Prod

<comment><AUTHOR> Could you tell me why it's a bad thing? All I can think of is that it gives someone more info so they know where to start when cooking up an exploit

<comment><USER17> If someone is scanning for vulnerable sites, it makes it possible to identify them without attempting the exploit.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> I haven't dug into it yet, will try to tonight, but one thing struck me.

When I run across any sort of site like this normally, one of the first things I look at is news items (in this case the blog) and the forum. If there aren't any posts in either in the last couple of months, I usually assume it's been abandoned, so I don't dig any deeper.

Even a one or two line post every month or two reassures me that some sort of active maintenance is going on.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the suggestion. I've added a blog post and will add an update to the forum as well.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> You're getting some porn spam on the demo account. If you're not already, it'd probably be a good idea to reset it with known good data every couple of hours.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the heads up. I was resetting the data every 15 minutes. I've now simply disabled saving changes by the demo account altogether.

Thanks again!

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Yikes - what's up with the spam here? <http://www.happyjobsearch.com/opportunities>

<comment><AUTHOR> Dang that sucks. The "demo" account is open so that people can see what the site's about without having to log in at all. I doubt people will be enticed by spam for cialis, viagra, etc, though. Looks like I need to install akismet.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the heads up. I was resetting the data every 15 minutes. I've now simply disabled saving changes by the demo account altogether. Thanks again!

<comment><USER12> Another approach is to save all changes made to the demo account to the user's session state, that way I as a user can see what adding, editing, and deleting records looks and behaves like but only I can see my changes (based on my session) and it auto cleans itself when m session ends.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> This looks very nice from what I saw in the demo account. Very clean interface.

I actually have a project I had made initially for B2B sales leads, but there are certain features of automation that I've been thinking lately could really be used for job search. Perhaps we should talk?

</comment><comment><USER21> Very cool site. One thing I would upgrade.

You have your "interview reminders" section. Very cool. The data is entered in a * / * * / * * * style, very intuitive for entry. However, I would RENDER the information in a set of nested ul tags.

Just my $.02

<comment><AUTHOR> Useful feedback that's very easy to implement: thank you very much sir.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> The name feels odd -- like an unedited Chinese translation. Monster only works because they could afford a Superbowl ad. Maybe something that highlights the organizational aspect? MyJobSearchManager.com is open.

<comment><AUTHOR> For some reason the name makes me smile, which is probably a terrible reason for keeping it. Initially it was After the Pink Slip. I also have worksearchtool.com .

Another reason I went with Happy Job Search was that initially I was hoping to add more to the site, so it wouldn't just be about being organized. That's probably a bad idea though.

<comment><USER23> I like the name. It puts a positive spin on what can be a very negative time in life. It's also memorable. I say keep it.

<comment><USER24> Upvoting in agreement.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Google chrome 188.8.131.52 In the first page of the demo, the tables at the bottom stretch wider than the fixed width of the design

</comment><comment><USER25> I'd like to say that I do this already myself but nope. I'm just too lazy. Good idea! Not sure how you can monetize it but good idea.

</comment><comment><USER26> not to be a negative-nancy, but is this that much better than tracking things in something like a Google docs spreadsheet with a few tabs?

Seems like a solution to a non-existent problem.

<comment><AUTHOR> I'm sure a spreadsheet works fine for many people, and from the comments you can see that others have used them for this purpose. Here are some advantages this site has:

* The data to capture has already been figured out for you. When you're first looking for a job you might not really know what to record about each listing.

* The approach has been figured out for you. I did not follow the GTD-esque approach initially, and I'm sure most other people don't. That in itself is useful, as is the site's ability to facilitate it.

* There is a bookmarklet for adding job listings. This saves you time.

* You can subscribe to an ical feed of your next actions, which you can't do with a spreadsheet.

* You can subscribe to RSS feeds from your favorite job sites so that you can easily review new postings in one place.

If you're ever looking for a job, please do give it a try and decide for yourself whether it's better than fiddling with a spread sheet :)</comment></comment>


Babylon.js: JS framework for building 3D games with HTML5 and WebGL - <AUTHOR> http://blogs.msdn.com/b/eternalcoding/archive/2013/06/27/babylon-js-a-complete-javascript-framework-for-building-3d-games-with-html-5-and-webgl.aspx <comment><USER2> The kicker here is they've built a 3d workflow (i.e. OBJ and FBX support, and direct Blender export). This means that, unlike with almost any other option you don't start out needing to implement 3d import from scratch.

On the down-side they do not appear to have implemented 3d animation yet. Assuming we can go from animated FBX to Babylon fairly seamlessly, this starts to look pretty useful.

The next thing would be a halfway decent positional sound library.

<comment><USER3> Three.js has OBJ support natively (I've written a extension to allow you to view them directily on your github[1]). COLLADA and glTF, which provide support for animations, are also supported[2].

Cannon.js is a promising physics engine[3].

Nonetheless, it is exciting to see Microsoft not only supporting WebGL, but also promiting open source libraries to ease development on the platform.

[1] [https://github.com/danielribeiro/three- hub](https://github.com/danielribeiro/three-hub)

[2] [http://threejs.org/examples/webgl_loader_collada.html](http://threejs.org/examples/webgl_loader_collada.html)

[3] [http://cannonjs.org/](http://cannonjs.org/)

<comment><USER2> I tend to be dismissive of OBJ support since it's so easy to do and doesn't get you terribly far, but yes that's nice.

Collada support is a lot more impressive, but FBX support -- even though FBX is proprietary -- is much more useful given the wider and broader support for FBX out there (even Blender can export to FBX).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> This is really awesome, and it seems like proper WebGL games are going to become a common reality soon.

Chrome handles these samples very well, except for one thing which I think would be a major distraction for games: there's a ~1/sec stutter, which I assume is a GC pause. Google touts their stop-the-world GC as being ultra efficient and accurate, and in many ways it is. But I'm not sure that STW is an appropriate approach for games.

The stutter has improved in recent updates, but it's still there. I wonder if they'll consider an alternative GC approach for situations involving continuous rendering.

<comment><USER5> The samples work fine is Firefox 22 too (30 to 60 FPS 1.8 GHz Core i5), without the pause you're describing.

<comment><USER6> Firefox has been working on an incremental GC

<comment><USER4> I believe that they have been using an incremental GC since version 16.

<comment><USER7> Correct. In profiles I typically observe incremental GC running in 1-5ms increments, which makes it easier for it to fit in between frames without causing visible stutter.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Babylon.js seems to have evolved from Babylon Toolkit, a 3D framework for Silverlight 5:

[http://babylontoolkit.codeplex.com/](http://babylontoolkit.codeplex.com/)

</comment><comment><USER9> Link to the website of the project: [http://www.babylonjs.com/](http://www.babylonjs.com/)

You can see demos directly there.

</comment><comment><USER10> Looks like the goals that inspired the quirky, far too limited VRML standard ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VRML](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VRML)) have finally been realized.

</comment><comment><USER11> Please note that we've also worked on a companion framework named GameFX: [http://blogs.msdn.com/b/davrous/archive/2013/07/23/introduci...](http://blogs.msdn.com/b/davrous/archive/2013/07/23/introducing- babylon-gamefx-a-framework-to-build-html5-webgl-games-in-a-few-lines-of- code.aspx)

As Babylon.JS, it's open source, mostly done on our free time and works well on every platforms supporting WebGL such as Chrome, Firefox, Opera, Android, Firefox OS and of course IE11 (win 8.1/RT).

</comment><comment><USER12> This is a 3D renderer like three.js. Does anyone know how they compare?

<comment><USER13> As far as I can tell they copied the major features and concept of Three.js, added a few extra features, but implemented it in such a way that it is only performant in a specific version of Internet Explorer. In other words, embrace, extend, extinguish.

I don't understand why people keep falling for this crap. Microsoft will do the best that it possibly can to disrupt WebGL with compatibility and other issues, just as it has always done with every key aspect of web technology. This li brary is the latest example. They could have easily made improvements to Three.js or some other existing library that was tested on other browsers but they did not. There are too many billions of dollars on the line. 3d gaming in the browser means the end of the Windows PC monopoly and Microsoft knows that whether the rest of you do or not. No I'm not exaggerating.

<comment><USER14> I think competition is good. Soon after babilon.js got released I took a look at their file format and did a loader for three.js. This made me see how much three.js needed some geometry structure refactoring (moving towards a bunch of flat typearrays). I'm slowly working on that but I still need to find a nice API for it [1].

[1] [https://github.com/mrdoob/three.js/issues/3672](https://github.com/mrdoob/three.js/issues/3672)

<comment><USER14> *babylon.js

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> People wanted XNA 5, not yet another WebGL framework.

</comment><comment><USER16> And tonight was the night where I was going to figure out how to use my Oculus Rift with WebGL.

This looks to have awesome potential. Well done!

<comment><USER17> Just in case you're still looking: [https://github.com/benvanik/vr.js](https://github.com/benvanik/vr.js)

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> Breathtaking! 120 FPS in all demos (because my video driver settings limit FPS to 120). Chrome, gtx680.

</comment><comment><USER19> Version 1.2 is out :) [disclaimer: I'm the author^^] Major rework of the API to remove GC pressure New 3D charting demo

</comment><comment><USER20> "Sorry but your browser does not support WebGL..." Wait. What?

Apple Mac OS X 10.7.5 Intel Chrome 28.0.1500.95

<comment><USER20> BAH. Apparently Chrome blacklists certain scenarios. Dumb.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> "Please note that babylon.js use a left handed coordinate system"

Thank you very much and please close the door when you leave the room.

<comment><USER22> Why's that so bad? A comment in this discussion ([http://programmers.stackexchange.com/questions/17519/why- doe...](http://programmers.stackexchange.com/questions/17519/why-does-directx- use-a-left-handed-coordinate-system)) suggests that it is trivial to transform one system to the other.

<comment><USER21> It's actually not that bad but OpenGL (and thus WebGL) is a right-handed system by default (It supports whatever system you want though). And right- handedness is also kind of a standard, think about cross-product, Counter Clock Wise direction, etc...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Oculus Rift + Babylon.js = <3

</comment><comment><USER24> I don't do game development at all, so please take my comment with a grain of salt.

How is this better than Flash/Flex/whatever Adobe has to play games? I mean waiting time is still there and I don't think Babylon.js works on all browsers the same (i.e. single code base for your game).

Second question: if I want to develop a game to be played on browsers AND mobile (iOS + Android) and I'm a single developer, isn't Adobe my best bet?

<comment><USER25> Well, flash support on mobile is somewhere close to non existent and last time I checked the various flash 3D libraries (Away3d etc) the performance left something to be desired.

<comment><USER26> Yes, but you can export iOS and Android apps with Flash. The iOS browser still does not have support for WebGL.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> 1\. Microsoft 2\. Not open source

<comment><USER28> This is just another technology connected with Microsoft that we should lament - right along with C#, Mono, Knockout, and TypeScript. Microsoft earned the ire of geeks everywhere in the 90s and it's a grudge many can't let go. Meanwhile you let Apple and Google steamroll you all by showing you what a real closed ecosystem monopoly really looks like. And you swallow it down because they do it all under the banner of 'open source.'

<comment><USER29> This makes absolutely no sense. Apple (iOS, OS X as examples) generally is a very closed ecosystem, though not a monopoly, and certainly don't operate under the banner of 'open source'. Google (Android, Chrome as examples) is a pretty open ecosystem, also not a monopoly, and actually is open source, no idea what "banner of 'open source'" means but they just are open source.

On the flip side, there's no reason to hate everything Microsoft do, c# and Mono are great. Maybe people should get over dismissing anything open source that Microsoft do, but the rest of what you've said makes no sense.

<comment><USER30> > On the flip side, there's no reason to hate everything Microsoft do, c# and > Mono are great.

Microsoft didn't do Mono, it did .NET which Mono cloned in a form supported on a wider variety of platforms.

<comment><USER28> Mono is pretty much ostracized from the open source community along with many open source C# projects. Remember the whole ordeal about including Mono in Ubuntu?</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


The Occupy Font - <AUTHOR> http://clienthostonline.com/occupy-font-download/

<comment><USER2> One of my favorite scenes: [http://youtu.be/kwk_Ot8orPY](http://youtu.be/kwk_Ot8orPY)</comment>


Static analysis of an unknown compression format (2012) - <AUTHOR> http://blog.lse.epita.fr/articles/8-static-analysis-of-an-unknown-compression-format.html <comment><USER2> This guy's a genuine detective. Love how he documented every small insight and what it led to.</comment>


What Start-ups Should Know About Hiring a Lawyer - <AUTHOR> http://www.thedailymuse.com/entrepreneurship/what-start-ups-should-know-about-hiring-a-lawyer/ <comment><USER3> TL;DR: Since dealing with high-end lawyers is often tough, contract someone to do it for you.

At my company we went through a handful of lawyers, mostly from big firms. We were extremely unhappy with the experience, especially since we did not seem to get reasonable value for our money, ours being a very small account for any established law firm.

Eventually we found a solution that was perfect for us. We now work with a freelancing lawyer who caters to startups and is an absolute joy to work with. He does all kinds of stuff on his own, kind of like our own part-time in-house legal council, but the big thing for me is that he can decide when we need some more muscle (i.e. big law firm, specialist in some type of law), and then we pay him to find, subcontract and manage all contacts with other lawyers.

I can not extract anywhere near maximum value from an expensive lawyer - <USER2> guy has a much better shot at it. As the CEO, I save a lot of time and anguish by only ever speaking to one lawyer, and the most pleasant one I've met at that.

If you want to get in touch with my legal guy - based in Stockholm, Sweden - ping me and I'll send you his contact information.

<comment><USER4> This is such awesome advice. Find and hire one good lawyer, who the deals with _all_ your other lawyers.

It might not apply if your investors have their own legal muscle that they can introduce. But, if you are <10 employees, it is _insanely_ expensive (manpower-wise) to deal with finding, retaining, and managing decent legal counsel (to say nothing of replacing them due to a sudden conflict of interest, when you unexpectedly find yourself facing a huge firm like Apple/J&J/Halliburton/etc, who seemingly contract 99% of all law firms).

<comment><USER5> Do you think that other startups would be interested in this type of in-house counsel-as-a-service?

This would give teams the benefit of having single source that knows all your issues and goals, but could also negotiate effective rates with specialists.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Here's what I learnt in law school:

Do you have a legal question? _See a lawyer._

A few hundred dollars now versus an uncapped downside later? You're basically crazy if you don't.

Your lawyer and accountant are to your business what a doctor and a dentist are to your body. You see them regularly, they give you specialist advice and they can save you _serious_ trouble if you take their advice. These individuals see more permutations of business in a week than you will see in a year.

So stop double guessing whether your company will need a lawyer. You will. You just might not understand it yet. Lawyers and accountants are part of the cost of being in business. It's not their responsibility to be cheap. It's _your_ responsibility to produce enough value for _your_ customers that a profit gets made somewhere in the mix.

Like the article says, shop around. I'm the middle of getting a patent drafted. I picked my lawyer[1] based on the fact that he had a computer science degree and industry experience. You can do the same. Ask. Inquire.

And remember, lawyers are like drug dealers: the first taste is usually free. Go meet them. If you don't like them, see someone else. It's business, after all, not your personal life.

[1] [http://www.ghfip.com.au/ws/principal- attorneys/index.jsp#Tho...](http://www.ghfip.com.au/ws/principal- attorneys/index.jsp#ThomasHaines)

<comment><USER7> In US certainly, but here's what I learnt living in Europe. You basically do not need lawyer. Ever. You can live happy life and run happy business. Without lawyers, without fear that somebody/anybody can/will sue you of anything. Wthout fear of shady contracts, shady business practicies etc. And even in very rare occasion when somebody decides to sue you and this case goes to court, even then you do not always need a lawyer. In Europe you can go to court without lawyer and win. I did, so can you.

<comment><USER8> > Without lawyers, without fear that somebody/anybody can/will sue you of > anything. Wthout fear of shady contracts, shady business practicies etc.

That is just not true. Nowhere can you be happy-go-lucky about the contracts you sign. Even where there is a degree of protection for consumers like in Sweden, and I wouldn't just assume that everything will work out fine even then, b2b is very caveat emptor.

> In Europe you can go to court without lawyer and win.

What does "in Europe" even mean? There is nothing unified about the legal systems here, even in basic principles. Navigating the UK legal system is wholly unlike doing it in Italy.

> I did, so can you.

He did, maybe you won't be so lucky, get a local lawyer.

<comment><USER9> "Navigating the UK legal system is wholly unlike doing it in Italy"

Especially as there isn't really a single UK legal system.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> For a non-Valley, non-VC, non-swing-for-the-fences (Sand Hill Road cookie cutter) startup, think about where your risks really lie (who is going to sue you; when; why; and for how much). If you have partners, then having someone walk you through all the 'what if things go wrong' stuff may be useful. If it's just you, then you can even postpone incorporation. As for tax - that's a nice problem to have, but it's not one that's going to loom large on day one (or even year one). I would be amazed if it made sense for the median startup to register any trademarks. And if you "need" patents, really drill down on what that "need" is (if it's just a tick-the-box exercise for eventual VC's, then one jurisdiction might be enough; if you need a global patent protection strategy to secure your fundamental business value, you're doing it wrong).

When you do hire a lawyer, get an estimate up front, make clear that you want to know in advance if the bill is getting anywhere near the estimate, and require monthly interim billing if there is something ongoing. If you can fit in some scornful laughter at the idea of billing for photocopying and phone calls, that would be good, too. Many lawyers pay lip-service to the idea of fixed fees for defined projects: think about calling their bluff. And ask about other value-added services they might provide, such as introductions to other clients who might be interesting to know. This will be like pulling teeth, because lawyers are pretty terrible at everything in business except (if you are lucky) the legal stuff.

But they probably do know the legal stuff better than you, so don't try to impose irrelevant constraints, like "I want a one-pager for this".

<comment><USER11> I'm not so sure about the trademark thing. I've just started that process with my partners non-tech new business. Here (in Australia) you can do a bunch of searches online, and enter a trademark application on a government website for $120, and if it;s approved you pay $300 for 10 years trademark protection. Once you've got all your domain name / twitter handle / social media accounts and pages lined up, a few hundred bucks for trademark protection in your area of business seems like money well spent to me, even if all it does is discourage someone from making a claim they've got more rights to a domain name or social media account name than you.

Of course that adice mostly applies to trademarking names which clearly have no existing claimants (or at least none in your area of business) which would complicate things enough to require law firm time to resolve...

<comment><USER6> Yep, trademarks are fairly self-service in Australia. Generally you can leave the lawyer out of it unless and until a dispute arises.

That being said, some lawyers only charge a pretty minimal amount over and above the underlying IP Australia fee and it can nice to delegate the paperwork to them.

It really depends on what your time is worth.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> That's incredible how much a lawyer's hourly rate is. A senior partner >$1000/hour? It's amazing how expensive risk reduction services are that, in my mind, equate to a blame shifting strategy.

<comment><USER13> Somewhere, some lawyer is probably wondering why it costs $1000/hour to develop what she believes is just a simple website.

<comment><USER14> Do you actually know a web firm anywhere that will charge $1000/hour? Such a rate is unheard of in software consulting as far as I know. Maybe someone like EDS who has huge public companies in their pockets will charge these rates, but I personally have never encountered it and I don't know anyone who charges it.

The most expensive software consulting I've seen in the wild is $350/hr, and that was for a very specific niche. I know other very specific niche service providers who charge $200/hr.

As I've said previously, I think the fact that most other professionals max out around the rate that the cheapest and least experienced lawyers start shows there's something perverse with the law industry.

<comment><USER15> > _Such a rate is unheard of in software consulting as far as I know._

$1000 is not unheard of at all. Yes, you're right, the likes of EDS, IBM, Accenture, etc. are easily charging the upwards of $1k/day. But any decently sized firm (50+ employees) is going to charge roughly that amount. You'd be shocked to hear some of the price tags on corporate website development...

I think this is the overall point. Go for a small specialist who will treat you like a king/queen. You don't need a corporate law firm. There are too many transaction costs that you simply don't need (assuming you're small) or can risk accept not having.

<comment><USER14> >Yes, you're right, the likes of EDS, IBM, Accenture, etc. are easily charging the upwards of $1k/day.

I said $1k PER HOUR, not per day.

I'd like to know of software consultancies that charge that much money per hour, excepting the typical fleecing when your deals are built on backroom backscratches like you'd find with the public companies served by EDS et al.

Percona has over fifty employees and they charge $350/hr for standard services and $450/hr for premium service. You only go to Percona if you have a very, very specific MySQL problem that needs to be resolved, and the staff at Percona is populated with as many major MySQL players as are willing. They definitely represent the big guns, when you really, really need your MySQL stuff fixed ASAP and can't fiddle around with people who aren't core MySQL developers, the people who invented the system. They are the top of the line in their niche, and they charge as much as a fresh-from-college lawyer.

A normal, generic consultancy will charge between $100/hr-$200/hr and often their employees aren't anything to sneeze at either, they're just less specialized and therefore have a less compelling case for such high rates. I know of no one in the realm of standard or even most niche commercial software consultancy that rakes in $1000/hr+.

If you know such a company, I'd like to learn their strategy so that I can start charging that much.

<comment><USER13> First of all, that $1k per hour was pulled out of my ass. That was my piss- poor attempt at using humour to point out that people tend to underestimate someone else's value just because we don't understand their profession. I'm pretty sure a lawyer's work involves more than "blame-shifting".

Secondly, $1000/hour works out to about $240,000 per month. It's a high figure, but I have worked on a 3-month project that cost the client $1,000,000 before. Granted it wasn't a 1-man job, and God only knows I didn't get to see much of that money, but still, that was how much the client was billed for.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> I think they chose the wrong lawyer to speak with. From what I can tell, he's a lawyer more versed in dealing with much larger companies and venture capital transactions as opposed to the typical start-up (if such a thing exists).

Particularly in the field of web (contrasted with physical products/live events for example), the need to consider compliance is reduced. If you are providing a good service to users, it is unlikely you will run into issues in terms of consumer complaints.

I would caveat it by suggesting that intellectual property is (obviously) an important area to consider. However, there are online tools for patent searching which will be able to give you an idea of whether your product could be patentable (no patent search even done by a lawyer or patent attorney would be exhaustive in any event).

As to brand protection, trade mark registration in the territory where you are based will be relatively cheap and will give you a degree of leverage if someone else starts up a similarly named service. Although it must be said that the main reason people will copy a name is to piggyback on goodwill which will not be a relevant consideration for most start-ups.

Many actual start-up lawyers will be willing to give a few hours of their time for free or at least should be, to talk with you about your business and highlight any initial concerns and make recommendations to help your business.

If they do provide recommendations, I suggest that if they haven't done already you request a fixed rate for any one particular piece of work. If they can't provide a fixed rate, I suggest you look elsewhere. There are sufficient good lawyers out there to enable you to find one who will be willing to be more flexible on fees than rigidly sticking to an hourly rate.

In terms of tax, I would suggest the above but in relation to an accountant, the basics of corporate taxation are relatively simple and you should be able to find an accountant willing to give you time for free.

On a side note, although it is easy to bash lawyers' fees, if you are a large corporate operating in an area where legal compliance is crucial, an hourly rate of $1000 per hour is a drop in the ocean if it saves you many multiples of that in avoiding costs. Blame shifting in ensuring you have someone that you can sue if they make a mistake can be priceless. But that doesn't mean it's appropriate for start-ups particularly considering monies could be spent better elsewhere.

</comment><comment><USER17> the most important skill is DEAL MAKER. A lawyer that will guard your interests while aware of the other side needs. There are so many lawyers that guard their client while totally alienating the other side.

</comment><comment><USER18> Interestingly the red flags section would apply to programmers with only minor changes.

Probably to any profession, but programming is the one I know about ;)

</comment><comment><USER19> Not sure how George Grellas hasn't been mentioned yet (HN's "grellas"), but if you're a US startup, I recommend his firm.

</comment><comment><USER20> Better call Saul

<comment><USER21> IMO, this is true.

1) Saul: "sometimes you need a _criminal_ lawyer". 2) Startups: "sometimes you need an _entrepreneur_ lawyer". I've always heard that the difference between competent and great lawyers is that competent lawyers will tell you what you can do within the law (i.e. how you can handle a financing round, etc.), and great lawyers will help you figure out how to do the best thing for yourself and your business while remaining within the law.

<comment><USER22> It's true, but it's also pretty hard to figure out whether you're actually remaining within the law since things are so rarely tested (at least in the startup world).

<comment><USER21> For really crazy stuff people get no-action letters from SEC in advance of doing crazy things ("private letter rulings").

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> What kind of startup can afford $350-$800/hour lawyers?

<comment><USER24> When you're a really tiny startup, you don't really have any legal needs that take a lawyer more than a couple of hours to do. When you're bigger, you still don't have a ton of work in terms of hours.

The startup I worked at had a quarter-million in legal fees one year. That was about as much as just one of our hired-gun contractors.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Usually engineering jobs are plentiful – is this a time to stay put? - <AUTHOR> I've been passively looking for a new position for a year and have generally been (purposely) rather picky.
Maybe coincidence but 2016 seems like there's been less opportunity. I would guess Yahoo and Twitter (and others) are losing engineers which are hitting the market.
Is this a good time to look or better to keep a "safe" job? <comment><USER2> Always look for a better job, always try to learn new things in your current job, never stop re-inventing yourself.

If you are not learning anything in your current job then you are wasting time. Figure out something to learn, it will make your job more interesting (and more fun) and it will help you in the future with knowledge.

Engineering jobs are always plentiful and scarce at the same time, they are plentiful for the people who know and/or have experience in the new hotness, they are scarce for people who have skills for things that people are not using in abundance.

<comment><USER3> There are jobs where everything is perfect except pay... This is when it's hard to risk and take a higher paid job.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I work in the NY area and engineering positions are still plentiful. I think what you're seeing in the SV market is in part a response to the venture capital crunch. That said, I wouldn't worry too much about finding a "safe" job. The only thing worth worrying about is whether the company you're joining is going to be impacted by how difficult it is to get venture capital. I don't see any companies or money completely pulling out ala 2000, but it has become more difficult to get vc money if you are a border-line success

</comment><comment><USER5> > Is this a good time to look or better to keep a "safe" job?

No such animal as a "safe job", even the postal service is eliminating people.

As you evaluate a prospective employer-- consider their business model and markets they serve. Are they expanding? Does the senior leadership have experience and stability?

Relative to Yahoo/Twitter engineers-- some of those guys are getting fat severance packages and plan to chill on the beach for the next 18 months. Don't worry about them. Move when the right opportunity lines up for you.

</comment><comment><USER6> I may offer an opinion different from other responses you receive...

If you're not unhappy where you are--adequate salary, good living conditions-- then take things slowly...

Land the next job before leaving your current one, and only if it represents a step up in responsibility and seems interesting, or otherwise improves your "life"...

Look at the headlines on the worldwide economic situation just now...yes, things are a bit uncertain...do your homework before making a jump...

And don't undervalue having a job when things are uncertain...just think about the alternative...

</comment><comment><USER7> The global economy has been showing signs it's slowing down for almost a year now: [http://monetarywatch.com/2016/02/22-signs-that-the-global- ec...](http://monetarywatch.com/2016/02/22-signs-that-the-global-economic- turmoil-we-have-seen-so-far-in-2016-is-just-the-beginning)

It could very well be affecting the tech market.

</comment><comment><USER8> I think it's important to stay "up to date" on technology. If you have an opportunity to work on something fun and interesting I would take the leap. With that said, I agree the market is probably tougher. I talking general market.

</comment><comment><USER9> I would expect skilled technologists to still be in demand. Perhaps there will be a decline in new full-time hires, but that would likely be offset by increased demand for contract positions. I don't, personally, anticipate significant removal of existing full time positions. If you're more comfortable with an employment arrangement, it might be worth locking one in soon.

Overall, though, the American economy is continuing to improve. Greater world events are rattling the markets, and tech has taken a hit, but it doesn't seem out of the ordinary.

</comment><comment><USER10> Not OP, but I'm wondering much the same thing... specifically is it a good time to look if one is underpaid?

<comment><USER11> It's _always_ a good time to look if you're underpaid!

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> I suppose it depends on location. Now is still a fine time for engineers seeking jobs in Seattle.

</comment><comment><USER13> Meh. Developers will always be in demand. Yes, unicorn startups like "Yo" might have a bad time but, aside from that, I'd feel safe in continuing to be a bit picky.

</comment><comment><USER14> You should have shared more about your current rule, considering your question directly asks whether you should keep your current role.

</comment><comment><USER15> Are you referring to the local SV market or more generally?

<comment><AUTHOR> Sorry - good point.

My question is SV-centric, but broader viewpoints would be useful as well.</comment></comment>


Bootstrapped Saudi dev reaches #1 in appstore w/ 3MM+ users in 2 mths - <AUTHOR> https://twitter.com/sarahah_com?lang=en <comment><AUTHOR> Not too sure how well his retention efforts are going, but his growth is impressive</comment>


Ask HN: Is there a bsc computer science certification exam - <AUTHOR> Is there any bsc certification exam for computer science one can take without having to use 3-4 years in school to get a bsc degree? <comment><USER2> My degree was far more than just an exam, I think it was only 40% of the final grade. Coursework and group work made up the remainder.

</comment><comment><USER3> Very unlikely because universities would miss out on charging you years of fees.

The meritocratic thing to do would be to have national standardised exams for every level of education : but no one has that.

</comment><comment><USER4> The closest to that is CSPA.io, but they don't confer degrees. It's billed as the SAT for software engineers.</comment>


This code comment changed my life - <AUTHOR> http://siavashg.posterous.com/the-comment-that-changed-my-life

<comment><USER2> That's a very cool way to recruit.</comment>


Rich, poor, red, blue: why Americans vote the way they do - <AUTHOR> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5JYiJwDob1w

<comment><USER2> Great video, but man, that cough is annoying.</comment>


Ask HN: What does it mean if others have failed doing what I'd like to do? - <AUTHOR>

I have always wanted to provide a service online, and I would also like to make money while doing it. So far, there were two ideas that got me excited, both times I thought they were completely original and on the right track. However, both times, while doing research I've found that other people have had the EXACT same idea (in one case, their execution was even better than what I had planned) and then abandoned the project.<p>Should I take the hint and move on from these ideas or does this not mean much? <comment><USER2> If someone did the _exact_ thing you were planning to do and it failed, it's probably not a good idea. "Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result." -- Albert Einstein

If someone did something _close_ to what you want to do and it failed, that doesn't necessarily mean much. The success drivers for a breakthrough business are often really subtle, and if you miss one key aspect you miss the market. It's quite possible for a previous product to be _almost_ there but not quite, and then someone to do it just slightly different and be a huge success. (See: Altavista vs. Google, GO vs. Microsoft Tablet PC vs. the iPad, LiveJournal vs. Friendster vs. MySpace vs. Facebook, Google Video vs. YouTube).</comment>


Jeff Hawkins talk on entrepreneurship at Stanford's Entrepreneurial Speaker Series [video] - <AUTHOR> http://edcorner.stanford.edu/authorMaterialInfo.html?mid=39&author=16

<comment><USER2> "Hawkins believes entrepreneurship is a means to an end, as opposed to an end in itself."

This sounds wise. The goal is more important than the form.</comment>


How A 16-Year-Old Launched Mac Bundle Box And Made His First Million In Sales - <AUTHOR> http://mixergy.com/christian-owens-interview/ <comment><USER2> Wasn't there an article on this a couple of days ago? Perhaps it was one of these:

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1601253>

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1601494>

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1601706>

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1602598>

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1602986>

<comment><AUTHOR> I guess he's been getting a lot of coverage lately.

But where the other guys raved about and admired what he did, I got into the details of how he did it. It's the kind of interview that would bee too detailed for a mainstream audience, but I think would be helpful to entrepreneurs.

<comment><USER2> Interesting - thanks for the reply.</comment></comment></comment>


History of Mathematical Notation - <AUTHOR> http://www.stephenwolfram.com/publications/talks/mathml/mathml2.html <comment><USER2> Probably should start with the introduction:

[http://www.stephenwolfram.com/publications/talks/mathml/math...](http://www.stephenwolfram.com/publications/talks/mathml/mathml1.html)

(Just to hopefully be helpful. It took me a minute myself to notice the "previous" link at the bottom. Thanks for the article.)

<comment><AUTHOR> _nods_

I really think it picks up near the middle though, so that's the part I want to point to. Thanks for taking the time to point this out, though.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Nice article. Thanks for submitting this.</comment>