Berlin Is Bringing Back Subway Trains from the 1950s - <AUTHOR> http://www.citylab.com/commute/2016/11/the-berlin-subway-is-bringing-back-1950s-trains/506450/?utm_source=SFFB <comment><USER2> Berlin Transport is doing many things differently, check out their TV ads (turn on subtitles):

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2pic3FnvUrY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2pic3FnvUrY) [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xvcpy4WjZMs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xvcpy4WjZMs)

<comment><USER3> Honestly those ads just make me think they don't get it at all. I don't want them to make fun of themselves, I want trains on time, when I need them, clean and neat, with a seat not next to a fat or smelly person.

Of course you can't get that with public transportation, so I just drive my car.

<comment><USER4> I guess you don't live in Berlin. The public transport system is part of the soul of the city. I can't imagine buying a car here. Why would I need to?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> That's so German. Maintenance is taken seriously.

The Berlin Wall had cut several railroad lines. When the wall came down, the tracks were quickly reconnected. Both sides had been maintaining them right up to the wall for three decades.

East and West Germany both had area codes, but although they had different country codes, there was no duplication of area codes, allowing an easy conversion to country code 49 after reunification.

<comment><USER6> The underground lines through east Berlin were not cut, but the stations on the east side were barricaded and the trains didn't stop.

There was an elevated line that was cut, and it took several years after the fall of the wall to restore service.

[http://www.appropriatesoftware.com/BerlinWall/Essay4.html](http://www.appropriatesoftware.com/BerlinWall/Essay4.html)

<comment><USER5> Not transit lines, heavy rail.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> The 'Dora' UBahns can be seen here in the Pyongyang Metro [1]

[http://www.earthnutshell.com/stopping-all-stations-the- pyong...](http://www.earthnutshell.com/stopping-all-stations-the-pyongyang- metro/)

<comment><USER8> Also in the ABC News/Jaunt VR 360 piece, "Inside North Korea": [https://www.jauntvr.com/title/f81fc63d1d](https://www.jauntvr.com/title/f81fc63d1d) (disclaimer: I'm Jaunt's data scientist.)

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> The town I live in still runs 14 trams built in the 50's-early 60's in continual regular service. They were upgraded with AC in the 80's...

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

[https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/鹿児島市交通局500形電車](https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/鹿児島市交通局500形電車)

[https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/鹿児島市交通局600形電車](https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/鹿児島市交通局600形電車)

One has been outfitted for sightseeing traffic [http://www.kotsu-city- kagoshima.jp/wp/wp-content/uploads/kag...](http://www.kotsu-city- kagoshima.jp/wp/wp-content/uploads/kagoden.jpg)

One has been outfitted with bar seating for private events ($200/2 hr) [http://www.kotsu-city-kagoshima.jp/wp/wp- content/uploads/201...](http://www.kotsu-city-kagoshima.jp/wp/wp- content/uploads/2012/10/6f0cee1bf0b9f790369b5d17fe97785b.pdf)

</comment><comment><USER10> Huh, funny thing, we have had train cars from 50s in Moscow subway since 50s

<comment><USER11> The communist murals are also timeless (but seriously, well worth a visit: the subway stations in Moscow are beautiful).

<comment><USER12> I was just there a month ago and yeah, the "normal" stations looked the same or better than the ones back home, and the nicer stations were really beautiful.

There's also the Sparrow Hills station which is a metro station built into a bridge and a fabulous view over the river. The entrance at one end of the bridge leads into the central park.

Other then the noise and really pushy people, I was very impressed by Moscow's metro.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Berlin's trains in North Korea..

On a side Note:

The Stuttgart S-Bahn's can be found it Tunis.

Has anyone encountered other _trains in exile_?

<comment><USER14> There are trams from Milan in San Francisco, I think from other "friend cities" too.

<comment><USER15> SF Muni has streetcars from all over the world running on the F line: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Francisco_Municipal_Railwa...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Francisco_Municipal_Railway_fleet#Historic_streetcars)

<comment><USER16> It's a lovey, romantic notion, but I want to note that SF Muni has put buses into service running the F line due to difficulty with keeping running stock, erm, running.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Sorry but what's the big deal about this? They renovate 3 old trains to serve some tiny tourist line. It will be mostly tourist attraction - train from 50-ties with all the old signs. It is cheaper to renovate than buy new. Is it really that unusual?

<comment><USER18> well deeper into the article it mentions the line they are on seems to only serve connecting parliament with the main subway lines. to be honest its pretty typical arrangement for such work. promise a big route to serve needed areas but make damn sure it starts where those who wanted it.

but if it saves the authority money then it still is a good move, removes some of the gimmick feeling

<comment><USER19> Unfortunately, that's a bit of spin in the article. I have clipped the relevant part of the route network ([http://imgur.com/a/OR4Ee](http://imgur.com/a/OR4Ee)) and the U55 (brown) connects Main Station (Hauptbahnhof) to Brandenburg Gate where it meets the main north - south light railway (dark green, pink). For reasons, this line doesn't have the best connectivity to Main Station, switching lines at Friedrichstraße is a chore, and U55 will be welcome for passengers of the north - south line.

In a couple of years, U55 will also connect to U2 and make it easier from passengers from some eastern districts to reach Main Station. It also will be _the_ tourist line, connecting a lot of tourist sights in central Berlin.

There's a bit of background about the future gap closure here: [http://www.projekt-u5.de/en/](http://www.projekt-u5.de/en/)

<comment><USER20> On the side note: We built and maintain that posted website. I hope HN traffic doesn't kill it ;)

<comment><USER19> Oh cool, nice site :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> I've only been to Berlin once, but the current carriages don't look particularly modern. I thought they were probably from the 50s. Evidently not. When were they made?

<comment><USER22> Berlin has some modern-looking train models, for example: [https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/BVG- Baureihe_H](https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/BVG-Baureihe_H)

But yes, there is a lot of different models from different ages, and a lot of them have been refurbished at least once. I'm actually not surprised by this, considering how Berlin is spending billions on a hypothetical airport rather than on its actual trains.

<comment><USER23> Oh, they spend money on trains, too. Or, at least, train-associated stuff.

Last time I went to Berlin (Three weeks ago), the papers were baffled to note that among the concerns addressed by the latest series of S-bahn trains, to be phased in shortly, was the doors closing-sound - which has been left unchanged for as long as I can remember (20 years or so.)

:)

<comment><USER22> It should be noted that the S-Bahn is operated by Deutsche Bahn (the national railway), while the U-Bahn is owned by the munipical transit service BVG. So funding for S-Bahn vs. U-Bahn will, at least up to a certain degree, come from different pockets.

<comment><USER23> Thanks for setting me straight - I was certain they were both operated by the BVG. You live and you learn...

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> I wonder why don't more places do this. I mean surely the actual carriage of the train can be reused, but with just the engine refitted.

<comment><USER25> Rust and metal fatigue will wear out the chassis eventually.

If repairs become too frequent, fewer trains are available for use on any given day, which means not all services can be run.

Old carriages might not meet modern expectations of crashworthiness or fire resistance.

<comment><USER26> Also noise and ride comfort. In Warsaw we have some really old Soviet subway cars and a mix of western/homegrown ones

While the bumpy ride is just a nuissance, the noise of those old junkers probably should require everyone to wear heavy hearing protection, if one had to adhere to workplace regulation.

When their crooked boogies start to screech and grind in turns, the noise is physically painful

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> New York City has continually been running its R32 trains since the 1960s, outlasting several newer trains: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R32_(New_York_City_Subway_car)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R32_\(New_York_City_Subway_car\))

</comment><comment><USER28> This shows that no design are olds , just a question of trend. Always good too keep things from the past =D

</comment><comment><USER29> FTA: "about as useful as a chocolate teapot"

</comment><comment><USER30> I think it is fitting to uses trains from the 1950s in the U55.

</comment><comment><USER31> Unskippable 10 second ad, I think I'll skip this story.

<comment><USER32> Works fine with NoScript & uBlock!</comment></comment>


How not to design an Social API, lessons learned - <AUTHOR> http://ahmetalpbalkan.com/blog/how-not-to-design-a-social-api/

<comment><USER2> Great failure story from the Biggest Turkish GSM operators social clone. They managed to be a failure from the very beginning.

</comment><comment><USER3> I don't get it. Is he trying to be ironic?

<comment><USER2> Yes. But this is a true story from Turkey's biggest GSM operators social platform API.</comment></comment>


Are clueless politicians holding IT back? - <AUTHOR> http://www.zdnet.com.au/insight/software/soa/Are-clueless-politicians-holding-IT-back-/0,139023769,339299345,00.htm?omnRef=http://twitter.com/ <comment><USER2> Even worse. All efforts to empower common man will be resisted because legislative, judiciary, administration & business community will not allow their clout to be diluted.</comment>


One easy step to increase your iOS/Android app downloads - <AUTHOR> http://www.appFresh.us/index.html

<comment><USER2> Absolutely, screenshots & icon are the first hook to an app. In my opinion screenshots greatly influence my decision if I'm presented with two unknown apps of potentially same value/ratings.</comment>


FlyByChat, iteration 2 -- feedback please - <AUTHOR> http://beta.flybychat.com/?hn=2

<comment><AUTHOR> All the big feedback from my prior submission[1] has been implemented. I'm trying to make sure the site is good enough before making the first big marketing push, because chat obviously has the chicken-and-egg problem in a big way. Right now I think it's ready, but would love to get some more eyes on it before proceeding.

[1] <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1447160> . I haven't been able to repro the Chrome sizing issue -- please let me know if you're able to.

<comment><USER2> When my chat partner disconnects, I shouldn't have to exit the window to get the big GO button again - it should either show automatically, or just start looking for another partner immediately.

<comment><AUTHOR> The idea is that you might want to copy/paste or otherwise review your chat log.

<comment><USER3> Then draw a separator or something, don't make me click

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Couldn't make the big "WELCOME TO FLYBYCHAT" left pane go away, so it felt like there was a lot of screen real state that was left unused.

Also the HN lurker I was chatting with raised a good point: there should be different colors for "You" and "Them", would make it much easier to see the flow of the conversation.

EDIT: Would also be easy to add a horizontal bar, to track the last portion of chat you saw before you switched tabs/removed focus from browser

</comment><comment><USER2> Things I'd appreciate:

#Different colors for people in chat (just assign randomly from a few distinct colors, or let people choose)

#Bold the chat from my Facebook friends

#Let me tab complete names

#have it beep when someone uses my name and make that line visually distinct.

</comment><comment><USER5> It wasn't obvious to me how to start chatting with someone without creating an account.

</comment><comment><USER6> If I just click the Go button without signing in it just spins for a while (~5 mins) so I shut it down. Not sure if this means you have to be signed in or not.

Using Firefox 3.7 nightly 20100627

</comment><comment><USER7> Dude the website is bad ass.. you did a good job with getting us in asap now make it sticky and get a hooker in there!

(figuratively speaking of course)

</comment><comment><USER8> you should make links (sent over chat) clickable</comment>


Flypad (YC W12) Wants To Turn Your iPhone Into A Steering Wheel - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2012/03/02/flypad/

<comment><USER2> It's great to see this kind of innovation in controller development and I'm very excited to see the way in which these controllers evolve. Having said that, I think touchscreen based controllers are bound to bring disappointment. Most serious games require the player to maintain a fine balance on the controls and tactile feedback is a huge feedback factor to the gamer. Touchscreen based controllers cannot provide this tactile feedback.

Another factor is that when I hold a button and stick controller, I dont have to look at the joystick, I can give my full attention to the game. Again with touchscreen based controllers I have to keep looking at the controller to make sure I'm pressing the right button, and the split second I spend look at the controller could get me killed. it will be interesting to see how these problems are worked around.

<comment><AUTHOR> Hey @mds101; Flypad isnt here to replace the controller you have and love. We're building a new kind of game. Videogames have been shown to support a wide variety of formats from simple social games (zynga-esque) to hardcore FPS style games (like Halo). Flypad wont replace what you use for either game, it will bring a whole new kind of game to life.

<comment><USER2> But according to the article you intend to provide an API to allow programmers to integrate the iPhone as an input for their existing games. Does that not mean that you are positioning the iphone as an alternative controller? Or am I seriously misinterpreting the article?

Also, I'm quite curious about this 'new kind' of game that is suited to touch controller gameplay. Could you give some details on that?

<comment><AUTHOR> The API allows programmers integrate the iPhone as an input for their existing games - that being said, its merely a gateway and serves to get the game developer community more familiar with this mechanic.

Simply put, this will be fantastic for some use cases, and not for others; we've no intention of being everything to everybody.

As far as games uniquely suited for this - it's important to remember that the iPhone is much more than a touch controller. it 1\. is mobile and with you all the time 2\. enables motion of many different types (both tilt control and wii style control) 3\. enables swipes, sliders & gestures 4\. enables privileged information (that only you can see) and dynamic information (changing what you see in real time)

That's MUCH MORE than touch controller gameplay.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> I would much much much rather have a way to get my Xbox controller to talk to my iPhone.

Many games are designed well to take into account the touchscreen, but games that present virtual thumbsticks are usually problematic.

</comment><comment><USER4> Reminds me of my app. I had that idea 4 years ago when I was 16: <http://namsremote.nambrot.com>

Wonderful memories to get started into hacking/dev

</comment><comment><USER5> Nice work guys. I already control my TV via my iPhone, no reason why shouldn't be able to do the same with games. Love it.

<comment><USER6> Agreed - looking forward to getting my hands on it too! Great job guys!</comment></comment>


Yahoo: I have seen the future of search, and it's … a monkey? - <AUTHOR> http://venturebeat.com/2008/05/15/yahoo-i-have-seen-the-future-of-search-and-its-a-monkey/ <comment><USER2> I can't wait to see the mascot/logo for SearchMonkey.

I seriously can't understand why two companies, Yahoo and Microsoft, with such a fetish for pointless pseudo-3D characters couldn't manage to come together as one.

Pics:

<http://www.biancolo.com/jim/search_dog.jpg>

<https://login.yahoo.com/config/mail?.intl=us></comment>


What Every Computer Scientist Should Know About Floating-Point Arithmetic - <AUTHOR> http://web.archive.org/web/20080527204528/http://docs.sun.com/source/806-3568/ncg_goldberg.html <comment><USER2> The thing is that although "big decimal" doesn't prevent you from rounding errors, it does help a lot because the number representation matches the mental model. Whereas, with floating point, the value is not always what is expected (0.1 is not represented as exactly 0.1 in FP).

So although I could use FP for many things, including money, my experience is that the cognitive cost of managing it is too much for many people (and no, I'm not considering myself better than the others)</comment>


Don't Buy a Big Mac Before Conducting a Cyber Attack - <AUTHOR> http://www.securityweek.com/ex-it-administrator-pleads-guilty-destroying-virtual-servers-mcdonalds

<comment><USER2> Ah. Don't shit where you eat. Or eat when you're shitting... something...</comment>


Sync GitHub Gists to Evernote Using Python - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/leemengtaiwan/gist-evernote <comment><AUTHOR> Hello everyone, recently I wrote a python program that sync my gists to Evernote which enable me to search everything I wrote in Evernote, try it and tell me what do you think so I can improve it! :)</comment>


Support The Victims of Japan's Earthquake With Your Loose Change - <AUTHOR> http://blog.swipegood.com/support-the-victims-of-japans-earthquake-with

<comment><USER2> I wonder where all the money will go to, and whether a developed country like Japan really need help to handle the disaster in this situation, given their history with such events.

Its really hard to find where the money will go to, the swipegood site doesn't even link to world vision, I had to get there through google. The world vision site says:

"Your gift will help us rush emergency supplies like life-saving food, clean water, medical supplies, and shelter to survivors."

Your gift will help World Vision respond to this and other disasters around the world including:

A devastating drought and food crisis is threatening more than 7 million lives in the Horn of Africa. Increasing numbers of children are severely malnourished and at risk of disease in Kenya, Ethiopia, and Somalia. Millions of displaced children and families are struggling to survive in Sudan after decades of civil unrest. The recent Referendum has brought hope for peace, but malnutrition, disease, and poverty remain at critical levels. Heavy monsoon rains have caused widespread flooding in Sri Lanka, displacing more than 200,000 people from their homes and impacting 1.2 million. World Vision is continuing to support earthquake survivors in Haiti, rebuilding their communities and meeting essential needs for food, clean water, and healthcare. World Vision urgently needs your support to help children and families suffering from these and other disasters around the world.

So by donating here you're implicitly donating to other disasters too.

<comment><USER3> I know somebody who works with retirement plans for charity organizations. I was shocked after seeing the salaries and pension plans of the people in some of these organizations. They are only required to donate a very small percentage of the money collected.

<comment><USER4> I've been saying this for years.

<comment><USER5> they are required to donate 5% of their equity each year to retain their tax exempt status with IRS. most charities do it this way including the biggest one - bill and melinda gates foundation.

<comment><USER6> bill and melinda aren't asking me for money though

<comment><USER5> the point is that charities are run for the benefit of people who control them.

<comment><USER7> I tend to agree...but would you apply that statement to the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation as well?

<comment><USER5> it's important to say that Bill Gates doesn't give charity his own taxed income... by moving his equity into his foundation, he is essentially avoiding capital gains tax and dividend tax. I'm not saying that taxes are good but we all have to pay them. super-rich have all these smart schemes to pay in taxes as little as possible.

As long as Bill Gates foundation spends 5% of his equity on charity annually, you can't call him philanthropist since 5% rate is exactly what IRS requires charities to do as long as they want to keep their tax exempt status. When Bill Gates starts giving to charity more than he is legally required, then I'll change my opinion.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> For full disclosure, WorldVision is a Christian evangelical organization that only hires Christians for its staff: [http://www.worldvision.org/content.nsf/about/hr- requirements...](http://www.worldvision.org/content.nsf/about/hr- requirements?Open&lpos=lft_txt_Qualifications)

I don't mean to deter anyone from donating. I just thought people might like to know about the charity before they donate.

<comment><USER9> This comment struck me as a bit ugly. Here is why.

First, it includes the word "evangelical", but nothing in the HR requirements says, "You must also spread the Word to those you help." I understand that some sects of evangelical Christians have been getting into the news for the last 10 years in negative ways (and I understand the reaction), but I have not yet seen a relationship between those extremists and this group.

Second, it promotes hate against a group. Why did you think this statement was important or relevant? You pose it, and the question that comes to mind is, "Wait... should we care?"

If you are going to post about a charity's effectiveness, post something relevant, such as documentation about where the money is going, what actions the group has actually taken. What a sad world when it is acceptable -- an upvoted comment! -- to judge a group by their religious preference rather than by their actions.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> There are so many relief organizations. I often wonder which ones are the most effective and most efficient. I also wonder which one's would be most effective in Japan at this time.

I Googled and got a list.

<http://www.people.com/people/article/0,,20473235,00.html>

People like to help but I think we could all do more if we understood the problem better. Often donated money isn't used for the current disaster but is used for another one.

<comment><AUTHOR> I completely get your point & at the same time it's really important not to be paralyzed by the need to make "the perfect choice" and act quickly in a moment of urgency.

There needs to be balance between taking some time to make an informed decision and acting today rather than pushing it away for later!

<comment><USER10> That's right there needs to be balance. There currently isn't any. I'm asking the HN crowd if they have any insight into the most effective ways to donate.

I found this site that seems to be reputable.

<http://charitywatch.org/>

[update]

I found a direct link on the site related to the earthquake in Japan. World Vision is listed along with others.

<http://charitywatch.org/hottopics/JapanTsunami2011.html>

This site does say people should wait to give while the situation is being assessed.

<comment><USER11> Another useful site I've found for helping you figure out where the money goes, etc. is <http://www.charitynavigator.org> \-- IIRC, I first heard of it in the wake of the 2004 tsunami off of Thailand, and it's been a helpful resource ever since.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Using disasters as an opportunity for marketing/promoting doesn't feel right to me (given swipegood is a for profit business)

</comment><comment><USER13> Its hard to understand the magnitude of this situation.

</comment><comment><USER14> Great program! The least we can do!!!</comment>


Degree or equivalent experience - what's the conversion rate? - <AUTHOR>

There seem to be a decent number of programmers on here without college degrees. Most job postings I see for programming positions require a degree or equivalent experience.
What is equivalent experience defined as? Do contracting, Github projects, and personal projects count as equivalent experience? Is there a conversion rate (ie, 1 year formal education = 2 years work experience)? (That rate would seem a bit harsh to me).
Thanks for any responses. <comment><USER2> In a typical four year university program you will probably have spent two years learning how to think about problems to make them easier to attack and three years worth of doing projects. So figure 12 to 15 solid projects that you were a primary input on. Probably four or five of them that you started with a clean sheet of paper and a problem and produced as solution.

I've interviewed a number of people who were programmers but did not have a degree in CS, those who were just caught up in it and lived and breathed it, learned every new language that comes out to see how they are different, implement algorithms in four different languages to see how the compilers compare or design languages, or operating systems, or complex applications from scratch to under stand them better, those people it really doesn't matter. In many ways they are better than people with CS degrees.

Then there are people who got interested in the end effects, fancy web sites, or maybe video games, or breaking into things 'for the lulz' who really don't care about _programming_ so much as it is playing with computers or technology. They read a bunch of blogs maybe, but they don't think deeply about what the underlying systems are doing. For those folks sometimes almost any amount of 'experience' isn't enough if the bit hasn't flipped to understanding as opposed to just doing.

The third category are folks who started programming accidently, they needed to do something and there was no one around to do it so they poked and prodded and got it to work. Over the weeks, months, years they have collected a bunch of 'recipes' for getting stuff done, maybe they know why a hash table differs from a binary tree maybe they don't but if told to they can use either. For them its a lot harder call. 3:1 ? May 4:1 ? Its a matter of being exposed to a lot of different problems so that they can recognize where the solution space is going to be quickly.

Certainly any time you're putting code to compiler and producing product that counts as experience, paid or not, but the quality of the experience matters a lot. No amount of experience localizing pre-existing code will train you to write a compiler.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the reply. It seems like equivalent experience is decently variable.

<comment><USER2> Sure, the big difference is that at a University they go through a bunch of things that come up and they talk about how to avoid them and why. So everyone learns how to do a bubble sort and then you learn why that is so slow, both from an analysis point of view and an algorithmic point of view, and then you move on to quicksort or insertion sorts.

Whereas someone just picking it up as they go along might independently come up with a bubble sort, it works, and then just keep using and reusing it because hey, it works doesn't it? And then when its the bottle neck and they need something better they don't even think to look at the 'working' code they look elsewhere. It is a sort of unintentional blindness.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> I am not a hiring manager, but I am a guy without a college degree who works in IT.

As mentioned elsewhere, it depends on what the equivalent experience is. But also consider this;

Employers [1] look at a college degree as an indicator that one can pick something and stick with it for a few years, see it to it's finish.

If this is valid, then you can't have a strict conversion rate. Enlisting in the military for four years is a valid a measure of 'stick to it-ivness'. So would working at 'a' employer for a dozen years [2]

Which is a roundabout way of saying 'it depends on the individual'.

[1] I was told once by a CIO during an interview. [2] While demonstrating progressive advances in responsibilities.

</comment><comment><USER4> Employers are different. Some prefer formal education. Some only care about your ability to do work.</comment>


Distributed Mass Customization: Is Etsy the Next eBay? - <AUTHOR> http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/etsy_ebay_distributed_mass_customization.php

<comment><USER2> I'v been amazed by the way that Etsy and other sites like Hyenacart have queitly been growing in the background, with not much significant media coverage, but well known and adored within their own circles.

From personal, anecdotal evidence (meaning not good evidence) I'd not expect many people to walk away from corporate jobs for new small businesses facilitated by these websites. However I know of many people turning hobbies into small businesses as a supplemental income. I've seen this trend led by stay-at-home moms.

</comment><comment><USER3> Well, Etsy ( <http://www.etsy.com/> ) is a drop-in replacement and you can search by colour. Factor in media coverage and EBay's lack of goodwill and Etsy could have a winner.</comment>


Tell HN: Why I Don't Supply My GitHub in Job Applications - <AUTHOR>

It pisses me off that everyone just assumes that all applicants have a GitHub account.  While I do, I only use it to supply pull requests to other GitHub users.
Applicants are never requested to supply their SourceForge, their Savannah or - in my case - a link to the source tarballs I supply from my own website.
I'd like to find some way to get the point across that applicants should not be judged on their GitHub.  I'm cool with being judged on my contributions to free software, but not cool with the expectation that I must make those contributions by using one specific for-profit corporation's website. <comment><USER2> I as an employee responsible for recruitment to some degree in our company find it always much more pleasant if an applicant provides his GitHub account unrequested. Showing some contribution or even own projects on GitHub gives me a much broader view of the applicant before even considering an invitation to an interview.

Since GitHub is the de-facto standard for many software projects it makes sense to have at least something on GitHub. I am fine with links to sourceforge, bitbucket, etc. as well.

<comment><AUTHOR> I'm pleased when I'm asked for sample source.

My gripe is that the request is specifically for "GitHub". I have come to believe that most of those who request my GitHub, do not understand the difference between a GitHub and a hubcap.</comment></comment>


Airbnb Is Popular, but Renting Out Your Car Is Another Story - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/02/your-money/airbnb-is-popular-but-renting-out-your-car-thats-another-story.html <comment><USER2> Had two car-owning friends that did RelayRides (now Turo) during the peak sharing economy a few years ago. Both cars were involved minor collisions within months. Turns out renting in the city to people that don't drive much, might be prone to accidents. Making sure cars weren't parked on street- cleaning side and dealing with tickets also seemed like a huge hassle. Cars have a really high administrative burden compared to homes, especially when things go wrong, which they do at a higher rate.

I've rented cars myself via Turo a couple times in the past few years. Two of the guys were operating their own small rental businesses (5+ cars, parked around on local streets). At a couple hundred bucks profit per vehicle per month, depending on utilization, having a few cars like that seems the only way to make it worth the while. As a part time job of sorts.

In the East-Bay, AAA is making a massive investment in car-sharing with GiG. I wonder if it will work out financially given state of the world with cheap ride-sharing by Uber/Lyft.

<comment><USER3> _Making sure cars weren 't parked on street-cleaning side and dealing with tickets also seemed like a huge hassle. Cars have a really high administrative burden compared to homes, especially when things go wrong, which they do at a higher rate._

Oh gosh, don't get me started on this. It's theft, plain and simple. Or rather tax. Owning a car in a city is a massive pain in the butt, and it's cost me like $2k per year. Whether it's bullshit tickets, street cleaning gotchas, expired plates (got a ticket _one_ day after it expired just yesterday), being parked in a valid parking spot that is nevertheless a tow zone for mysterious reasons, having to go in front of a judge to point out that it was bullshit for me to be towed because the facility that I had to visit to pay for the ticket was closed due to a holiday, on and on and on. You get the idea.

I've sort of resigned myself to it just being "car stuff," so whenever another crap ticket appears on my window it doesn't bug me much. Just more tax for the city. Whatever.

I know a few of the tickets are my fault, but geez, it seems almost impossible to be a perfectly law-abiding car owner in a major city over the course of five years.

It's actually tempting to rent out my car to someone else just to cover the administrative cost of owning a car in a city.

<comment><USER4> If you're playing $2k/year in tickets, you should be paying closer attention, at that point you have nobody to blame but yourself.

<comment><USER3> It's not just tickets. It's tickets + permits + insurance + plates. I wasn't blaming anyone else, either. I assume you're perfectly vigilant in every aspect of your life? Meh, never mind.

By the way, a friend just tried to park in the spot that I got towed out of. That's how unassuming it looks. That's just a thing you get to learn if you happen to live here, and the only way you learn it is after you get towed. Not a damn thing you can do about it other than pay up.

And how about the $120 ticket the other day for making a left at a light that was green but happened to be labeled no left turn without an arrow? No reason not to be able to turn left, as long as it was green. There wasn't any oncoming traffic. Yeah we missed the sign, and for that we get to pay $120 to follow the silly rule. The tickets add up faster than you think.

<comment><USER5> > _And how about the $120 ticket the other day for making a left at a light > that was green but happened to be labeled no left turn without an arrow?_

Are you complaining that you got a ticket for committing an infraction?

It's one thing to complain about regulations that seem to make no sense to you; it's another for breaking those regulations, and then bitching that you got caught.

<comment><USER6> Often the rules of parking, etc. and the differential enforcement thereof are intentionally designed to boost city revenue.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Different analysis: it's much more likely that a car can be damaged & completely unusable, leaving the owner in an expensive and inconvenient bind. We read about the occasional Airbnb horror story, but I think that scenario is relatively rare for property.

Second, idle cars have a lot of value to owners. The car in my garage right now is giving me optionality and convenience, and that is worth a lot. In fact, I may exercise that optionality after posting this comment!

<comment><USER8> OTOH, one could argue that damage/theft/etc. to a home could involve much larger sums of money and be less easily resolved with a check from the middleman handling the rental--especially if it's not specifically a rental property.

Another issue with car sharing is that a fair bit of the depreciation is going to be mile-based rather than time-based. A "good" renter is going to put fairly minimal wear and tear on a bedroom. A good car renter is still going to put miles on a car.

Once you capture that cost and add it to your profit, it's unclear to me why you'd expect to be competitive with an outfit like Zipcar which is probably a generally better experience for the renter in any case.

<comment><USER9> I disagree and argue that any damage to a home can be repaired in a way that makes things better, while most car repairs have a negative impact to the car's value.

Somebody damaging a wall: the drywall can be replaced and the whole room repainted, the end result is a nicer room.

Somebody damaging the side of your car: it's never going to look quite the same as it did before and the resale value is going to be impacted when it shows up on a Carfax report, etc.

<comment><USER8> My concern wouldn't be some minor damage to drywall or similar incidental damage of the sort that happens around a house on a semi-regular basis. It's the big party that leads to possessions being trashed and waiting six months for a contractor to repair major damage.

I agree that a lot of "routine" house damage is probably easier to deal with than similarly routine damage to a car. But the outlier incidents with housing are probably worse. Assuming Turo or whoever honors their obligations, at worst you just buy a new car.

ADDED: I can't imagine renting out either in any case.

<comment><USER10> The thing with a car is that it can easily be badly damaged or totaled by simple driver error. A house can be destroyed by fire maybe but that's far less common than car accidents.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I've used Turo for a 3 week rental and I learned a few things.

I wanted to buy a new Jeep Wrangler Unlimited, but as you may know those are enthusiast vehicles and not without their quirks, so I wanted to live with it awhile and really be sure that was what I wanted. Also I was going elk hunting in Idaho for 2 weeks and I didn't own a car so I thought, how perfect?

The trip and the Jeep were great, but it got me thinking about the economics of the whole thing. I noticed that my "host" I was renting from had about a dozen identical Jeep Wranglers on Turo, not multiply listed but completely different vehicles. I realized that the "Uber landlord" model was already taking hold here. I did the math - Wranglers are some of the lowest depreciating vehicles right now even with heavy mileage, and even with 2-3 days of rental a month the owner would likely break even at the end of the loan. Interesting business.

<comment><USER8> In the right area of the country I could see a decent market for renting Jeep Wranglers and Rubicons as the rental options for that type of car tend to be fairly limited.

That said, off-road vehicles will tend to be taken off-road and beat up a bit. It's unclear whether the insurance covered by Turo covers the vehicle being used off-road etc. Of course, if someone is running this as a business, they can presumably get their own commercial insurance.

<comment><USER12> Insurance doesn't really change the economics if you have a fleet, right?

<comment><USER8> I imagine that if you have a fleet it's more practical to negotiate a business insurance policy than for one-off rentals a few times a month.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I do really like the idea of a 'shared fleet' to get cars off the road and encourage alternative transport (walking, biking, public transport, ride sharing) and reduce our 'car culture'. Because these alternatives don't cover all use-cases, I need a car _sometimes_ so I'm mostly forced to bear the rather large expensive of having a car all the time. I'd totally consider ditching my car entirely if I could press a button and reliably get a nice-ish car valet'd to my door in a reasonable amount of time for a reasonable cost. It's unclear if this is where we're at with these companies (and I already have a car sitting in my driveway so i'm already pot committed for awhile)

<comment><USER14> I'm in a similar situation. I rarely used my car, and was considering getting rid of it for a while. About a year ago I got rear-ended in a hit and run that totaled the car, so I decided to just try using Uber / Lyft, and decide if I wanted to buy a car.

It's been about a year, and I'm pretty seriously considering buying a used car. There are some use cases that Uber and Lyft don't cover, and my only option is to go rent a car, which requires some lead time, etc. Being able to get a car valet'd to my door would be nice, but what I'd really like is to find a neighbor that has 2 cars that they use to drive to work, but would be willing to let me use an extra car of their's on the weekend (for a fee of course). Our city has car2go, but the cars a really tiny, and you can only park them in a small part of the city.

<comment><USER15> Have you considered an electric bike?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> I put my car on Getaround for a few months in Oakland, got tired of it smelling like weed and McDonalds eventually. Damn device also ended up draining my battery.

<comment><USER17> That's seriously impressive to drain a _car_ battery. Makes you wonder what in the hell that thing was doing. A phone-sized battery should probably be sufficient for their use case.

<comment><USER18> There is no battery in the 'connect' device; it uses the car's battery for power. Major mistake not including a battery as it is the reason I and many others have taken our cars off the service.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> One has to put in a lot of effort to render a residence unusable (not talking about having to replace carpet, I mean irreparably ruined).

One only has to not pay attention for 30 seconds at the wrong time to do the same to an auto.

<comment><USER10> Hell, inattention for less than 3 seconds at the wrong time can cause a huge accident. Then there's the issue of willfully bad driving when it comes to sports cars, bad weather, and drunk driving.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> Curious about people's experience w/Turo. Seems like a good way to enhance a new car-buying experience.

Other than that, it seems weird from the car owner's perspective.

<comment><USER21> I had great experience. Rented BMW Z7 and Porsche Boxster on two occasions. Picked cars in SF and dropped them in LA for an extra ~$300 fee. The owner then would fly over and drive them back. Total price was significantly cheaper than any rental company could offer. The biggest advantage to me is that you get the exact car you see in the pictures.

It also allows you to test the car you always wanted. After a week spent driving a powerful convertible I have decided that I don't want one.

<comment><USER22> somewhat tangential, but why didn't you like the convertible idea?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> The problem here is that accidents happen. We are humans and especially during travel we might not be at our sharpest.

If your attention slips in an airbnb and drop a mug and the handle breaks off, well, that's a few dollars and an apology to the owner.

If your attention slips in a car and get in a fender bender and even if no one is injured that's a mess with insurance and at least several hundred dollars of repair.

</comment><comment><USER24> There were a couple of German car-via-internet-sharing startups (tamyca was one of them, seems they're still in business) and I tried them once. My impression was at the end that I payed not much less than when I would've rented from a commercial car rental company, but with much more overhead.

So that was the experience for me as a customer. With airbnb it's completely different. I feel I often get more from the things I want (e.g. kitchen access is very common in airbnb's, no Airbnb ever tried to charge me for wifi) and the prices are often massively cheaper than hotels.

<comment><USER25> I am using drivy.de in germany and it's cheap with a lot less hassle than a regular rental

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> I rent regularly from Turo.

They have been a much easier option than a traditional rental car company.

They meet you at the airport.

You can rent hybrids.

You deal with a consumer who owns the car not a customer service rep who could care less about their job.

My complaints are that the app and website have terrible user experiences. Terrible is an understatement.

They were cavalier with my drivers license data going so far as to email it around to vehicle owners as an image. Though I emailed their CEO and he stopped that years ago.

Still, I'm a big fan of Turo.

GetAround is my second choice. They have much more restrictive mileage limits so I stay away.

</comment><comment><USER27> I don't see the point (if any?) that the article makes.

<comment><USER28> All articles push a narrative some way or another, true or not.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> Marketplaces are hard since the main thing you can sell is liquidity. If I were these car companies I'd focus in a benefit that helps users without requiring liquidity (single player mode) to bootstrap the marketplace.

<comment><USER6> That's what ZipCar did.

FlightCar shut down because it offered monthly parking at the SFO airport for free, on the condition that you rent your car out for them. I did this because I wanted to keep my car, but I did not want to pay $400/month for a parking spot in SoMa, and my car hardly got rented out.

They eventually started doing some shady things like moving some of the cars to Oakland behind owners' backs. I ripped them a new one when I found out they did this to mine, but still stayed with the service because it was such a sweet deal.

When FlightCar finally kicked the dust, I went to pick up my car and saw a lot full of barely-used other cars from other people presumably exploiting the monthly parking in a similar way that I did.

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> I can keep an eye on what's going on in my spare room. Can't keep an eye on the rented car as easily

</comment><comment><USER31> There are also more specialty car rentals like Vinty and RetroMotion.

Does anyone know how successful these companies are? What kind of volume do businesses like Turo see?</comment>


This Week in DevOps - <AUTHOR> https://thisweekindevops.com/2020/04/17/weekly-roundup-april-17th-2020/ <comment><USER2> I think this kind of sites are valuable as it is quite hard to keep track of the ever changing IT world.

In the beginning of this year we started [https://nativecloud.dev/](https://nativecloud.dev/) which is a weekly curated list of noteworthy articles and tools of the cloud native world. We aim to publish every sunday.

I also recommend [https://devopsish.com/](https://devopsish.com/) which is always on point.

<comment><AUTHOR> DevOpsIsh is great, I am a subscriber there also. I started ThisWeekInDevops to serve a slightly different need for a similar audience. I wanted to keep up with just new announcements in the Cloud/DevOps space but without filtering all the content marketing that passes for announcements these days.

There was nothing out there quite like what I wanted so I started it myself. I focus on really only covering actual NEW stuff and filtering out the existing stuff.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> I like this. I once heard an anecdote from an AWS solution architect that they're launching products so fast, _they_ have real problems keeping up with it and keeping their staff trained.

The situation for us, however, is even worse: we're expected to keep up to date with all these products, ideally across all cloud platforms. I find it simply impossible to keep up, and I appreciate this.

<comment><USER4> >I find it simply impossible to keep up

How so? There are so many blogs, podcasts, news feeds, and youtube channels about clouds.

[https://aws.amazon.com/blogs](https://aws.amazon.com/blogs) even have a RSS feed for lazy persons

<comment><USER5> I would say you have probably answered your own question: There are so many blogs, podcasts, news feeds, and youtube channels that it often feels hard to stay on top of exactly what is relevant.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> > The announcement does not specify whether this will also work with EKS > (Kubernetes) Fargate but the mounts appear to be on the container level. > Given this it seems likely that this will work for EKS also. If you have > definitive information about this please let me know and I will send an > update next week.

If I remember correctly, EFS is distributed NFS. If they support automatically provisioning AWS EBS blocks, mounting them into a fargate instance, and specifying IOPS/transfer speed/replication they'd surpass most of the offerings from other clouds platforms. Provisioning local/distributed storage (fs & block) is a massive pain in most clouds. AWS is one of the few clouds that I've used that let you provision IOPS and bandwidth. If you can provision block, file system, distributed, local, and specify performance requirements you'd be able to make some really efficient systems with no external DBs.

edited: typo NTFS->NFS

<comment><USER7> > EFS is distributed NTFS

I'm 99.999% sure this is a straightforward typo, but it's NFS (Network File System) not NTFS (the Windows NT File System).

<comment><USER6> Yep, too early and too little coffee. s/ntfs/nfs/g</comment></comment></comment>


Why am I funding my employer using expense reports? - <AUTHOR> https://email@example.com/why-am-i-funding-my-employer-using-expense-reports-3a0f84f1fd9a <comment><USER2> Pretty interesting offering! I travel quite a bit and certainly see the value.</comment>


Bill Gates Breaks Down 6 Moments from His Life - <AUTHOR> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GzUUghxDhYM <comment><USER2> It's interesting (and good) to see how Gates has mellowed as he ages. He now comes off as this affable, well-read, and geeky senior citizen.

I find it hard to reconcile that image with stories of him in the early days of Microsoft, where others described him as hyper-competitive, intense, and a bully. I wonder if he regrets how he behaved during his earlier periods.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> I would love to see a Twitch stream of Bill Gates programming. In this video he says he still does some programming, I think there a still some things we might learn.</comment>


Chocolate chip cookie Baking simulation - <AUTHOR> https://youtu.be/SIGQSgifs6s <comment><USER2> The paper being discussed [0].

This seems like an exciting exploration, with more to be looked at.

> Lastly, due to the high-complexity of our coupled porous therm-mechanical > model, we did not investigate fully implicit treatment of water diffusion > and material stiffness.

This section from the limitations suggests a funding problem to me. These models are probably something that burns a ton of compute hours, but I'd love to see it fleshed out.

[0] [https://www.math.ucla.edu/~myding/papers/baking_paper_final....](https://www.math.ucla.edu/~myding/papers/baking_paper_final.pdf)</comment>


Combating Fraud and Abuse in the H-1B Visa Program - <AUTHOR> https://www.uscis.gov/working-united-states/temporary-workers/h-1b-specialty-occupations-and-fashion-models/combating-fraud-and-abuse-h-1b-visa-program <comment><AUTHOR> USCIS seem to provide two provisions with this:

1) An avenue for members of the workforce to report H-1B abuse. People on H-1B are offered some protection against retaliation.

2) Targeted onsite visits at worksites of employers who have larger fraction of their employees on H-1Bs, and those who sent employees to other locations.

Together, this seems to be aimed at curbing H-1B abuse by staffing companies. Some Silicon Valley employers - like Apple, Cisco etc - who use these staffing companies extensively might also be affected. But overall, this should be good news for both H-1B employees and citizens/permanent residents.

<comment><USER2> It would be useful if workers in such companies would take "before" pictures now of places where openings are supposed to be posted (e.g. lunchrooms, other common areas) and see how much change there is over the next few weeks.

"Why are there a couple of dozen job postings put up in the lunchroom all of a sudden? They've never been there before."

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Excellent. I was looking for this, as no articles seemed to provide a link although they mentioned it. I'm reporting a company today.</comment>