Emacs and Magit - <AUTHOR> https://lwn.net/Articles/727550/ <comment><USER2> If it were to be accepted into Emacs itself that would only be the beginning of the story.

Right now Magit is hosted on Github and anyone can contribute by just sending a pull request.

If it were part of Emacs you'd need to use the FSF's collaboration tools which have a higher barrier of entry, and if you're a first-time contributor with a non-trivial contribution you're going to have to wait days/weeks as your copyright assignment papers make their way over snail-mail.

I've contributed several (trivial) patches to Magit, zero to Emacs itself, and would likely have contributed zero to Magit if it had been an FSF project to begin with.

I think the FSF has gotten their priorities seriously wrong. The package is already licensed under the GPLv3, they're wanting to subject everyone to a more onerous contribution process to guard against the edge case of someone ripping off one specific Emacs package and the FSF not being in a position to have standing in court if they wanted to sue them.

<comment><USER3> _If it were part of Emacs you 'd need to use the FSF's collaboration tools which have a higher barrier of entry, and if you're a first-time contributor with a non-trivial contribution you're going to have to wait days/weeks as your copyright assignment papers make their way over snail-mail._

This is as good a reason as any to try to replace Emacs. Maybe Remacs will succeed.

Though I suppose it'd be best to have proof of this claim. Not that I don't believe you, but this is the type of thing that turns newbies away from Emacs without giving it a shot.

<comment><USER4> Neovim came along but majority who use vim still use vim. They won't change. This is in a situation where neovim is ahead of vim in certain areas (some may not like it and call it bloat but I call them features).

Unless remacs gives a clear advantage over emacs in terms of performance while still retaining compatibility people won't switch easily. Even then the switch should be quick and painless. (Neovim had those and so some people jumped ship).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> > Either all of the significant contributors to Magit must sign papers with > the FSF (with code from the holdouts being replaced), or an entirely new > Emacs interface to Git must be written.

False dichotomy: GNU Emacs can simply not ship with a git porcelain.

Most Emacs users I know typically have dozens of packages installed from MELPA; I don't think most users mind having to install an extra one. If an acceptable agreement regarding copyright assignment cannot be reached, I would really prefer that the status quo be maintained.

<comment><USER6> > False dichotomy: GNU Emacs can simply not ship with a git porcelain.

False dichotomy: The FSF can drop their requirement for onereous copyright assignments and instead trust the GPL to do its job.

<comment><USER7> friendly reminder: the built-in vc-mode can interface with most version control systems, including git.

It's not as great as magit, but it works (and it has you to learn very little).

<comment><USER6> If the FSF wants Magit but can't bundle it because of their own policies (as Stefan Monnier so eloquently points out), that's a problem for the FSF to solve, not Magit.

I think this comment on the Lwn-article really highlights how bizarre this has all turned out:

> GNU began as a project to replace proprietary software with free one, and > now lives on as a project to replace free software with free software.

I think that about sums it up. (And I say that as a passionate Emacs-user)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Magit is still the reason I haven't jumped ship to Atom of VSCode at this point and I would hate to see anything happen to it that would negatively effect its development.

As far as the argument goes, I feel the platform is _better_ by having such a marquee package not be included. The barrier to get it installed it quite simple ( run one command ) and it opens up the user to the package management system which is getting better and allows users to bring in all the features that used to require elisp hacking

</comment><comment><USER9> So, the reason that FSF wants the hold the copyright to the code they distribute is so that they, as the copyright holder, can enforce the license [1]. But why do they need to be the ones enforcing the license on every bit of code they distribute? They could include Magit with Emacs and just declare that they will not be the ones enforcing the license on that part of the code. The main issue I see with such an arrangement is that if Magit was included with Emacs, then conceivably some low-level Magit functions that have more general use could start to find their way into other Emacs code, and other people writing code for Emacs will use those functions in their code. Then the FSF would be in a situation where some of the code that they hold the copyright to depends on code whose copyright they don't hold.

To prevent this, I guess they could establish a "contrib" directory in the emacs source for GPL3+-compatible code that is distributed with Emacs but whose copyright is not owned by the FSF. Any GPL3+ code, or really any free software code with a compatible license, could be added in this directory, without copyright assignment, if the Emacs maintainers feel it's worth including with Emacs. Then, they could require that code outside the contrib directory must not depend on code inside it, and that would be a fairly easy rule to enforce. Then they can include Magit and whatever other GPL3+ Emacs packages they want to with Emacs, but they will still have precise knowledge of which parts of the code they hold the copyright to and can enforce the license on (namely, everything outside the contrib directory).

Are there any downsides to such an arrangement that I'm missing? Is there something that makes this kind of solution unworkable?

Ultimately, I don't see why the FSF doesn't want to distribute any code that they can't enforce the license on. Maintaining copyright on their own code and distributing other people's code aren't mutually exclusive activities.

[1]: [https://www.gnu.org/licenses/why- assign.en.html](https://www.gnu.org/licenses/why-assign.en.html)

</comment><comment><USER10> Emacs does not need to bundle Magit (or most other packages for that matter). What it needs is better package manager - built in!

As of recently, I'm an Emacs user (long time Vim user, just wanted some change) and I still have not completely comprehended how MELPA works. If anything should be more closely built in (and documented and standardised) to Emacs, package manager should. Everything else is better placed into outside packages.

If we look at Python world, here and there we can find discussions to include some library into stdlib and there are good reasons not to do it. Yes, batteries included is cool at first but it's no wonder that pythonistas say that "stdlib is place where packages go to die". We can think the same of Emacs and its package system.

<comment><USER11> > What it needs is better package manager - built in!

Er… it does? package.el has been included in Emacs since Emacs 24[0], and there's an official package repository[1] which is included by default, alongside the older MELPA and Marmalade which you can add to 'package-archives if you want packages from there.

> I still have not completely comprehended how MELPA works.

MELPA is just a repository for package.el.

> If anything should be more closely built in (and documented and > standardised) to Emacs, package manager should.

It is…

[0] [https://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/ELPA](https://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/ELPA)

[1] [http://elpa.gnu.org](http://elpa.gnu.org)

<comment><USER12> Just like other built-in things, the package.el is way too basic, both in terms of features and interface. It's also useless for packages you'd like to closely follow, as it cannot deal with git/bzr/hg/whathaveyou. Inability to pin some package to the given version is also a major pain.

It's kind-of OK for beginners, but for more advanced users it's disappointing. It's better, IMHO, to think about package.el as a low-level library implementing some functions useful for package management - but calling it a package manager, while technically correct, seems like a bit of a stretch.

There are other projects however, like el-get, which work. So it's not like Emacs has no package manager. It's just that the "real" package managers are far away from being built-in.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Why is there a desire to include things like magit in emacs? (Same question regarding e.g. org-mode). Wouldn't it be better to have a lean core, abiding by the strict FSF rules, and a high quality package ecosystem and package manager? It needn't be a barrier to beginners, high quality "distributions" bundling the great packages like magit and org-mode would appear immediately (kind of exist already, like spacemacs).

<comment><USER14> You tend to have the same kinds of problems as early Linux distros did - namely, fragmentation that accidentally heightens the barrier to entry.

Aside from that, much of Emacs's power comes from the ecosystem of Emacs Lisp applications and libraries that come with the base install. I learned Emacs in the first place because of Tramp's appeal, and shortly thereafter discovered in org-mode an amazingly powerful tool I'd never realized I wanted so badly. Absent either of those, I probably would not have kept using Emacs for long.

Finally, there's the question of support. A few years back, when I was much more heavily involved in helping new Emacs users on sites like Stack Overflow, I found over time that the problems people were having tended more often than not to originate not in Emacs _per se_ , but rather in the (mis)behavior of the various collections of packages that came with one or another of the "starter kits" then popular, and beset by the same fragmentation mentioned above. When you start out not with Emacs, but with Emacs plus a large collection of random packages tied together with customizations and init unique to the distribution, it's much harder to find useful information when something goes wrong, because there probably aren't all that many people using the same thing you are - and, being very new, you likely don't yet know how to have a productive conversation with Emacs itself, or even that such conversations are possible.

Conversely, when you have a problem with something that's part of Emacs, you're much more likely to find something or someone that can help you get past it, because ~everyone using Emacs is running the same code you are, and someone has almost certainly figured out how to solve the same problem before. Fragmenting the ecosystem makes this less likely; incorporating popular packages into Emacs, where that can be accomplished, makes it more so.

<comment><USER15> As a not very committed and not very expert Emacs user, I find annoying fragmentation in Emacs configuration not at the level of individual packages, but of fundamental mechanisms with inconsistent alternatives.

\- defining customization groups and variables for one's package vs. not bothering and using semi-documented raw global variables (many actively despise the customization system)

\- properly using the Customization pages vs. just overriding the variables in the init file

-packages that need to be built from a cloned Git (usually Github) repository, packages that want to be "installed" by hand, packages that use the "standard" package manager, alternative package managers, packages offering more than one of the above (or multiple sources with different versions)

\- loading and configuring packages with require statements and setting variables; with use-package in self-contained blocks; implicitly or almost implicitly; in ad hoc ways.

Sometimes Emacs itself contributes to the mess; when I thought I exported my faces settings to a theme the "theme" file actually came to contain unrelated settings, preserving obsolete configuration of removed packages and amply overlapping and conflicting with the init file; now, for example, nyan-cat mode only displays a proper wavy trail if I use this magical theme. I'd need to spend hours dismantling the "theme" line by line.

<comment><USER16> I agree that Emacs seriously suffers from "anti-Python syndrome" (or maybe a better term is just "Lisp syndrome") in that there's many ways to do a given thing and no immediately clear "best" option. However, while it may not be immediately clear, I think almost everything you mention here has a "pseudo- consensus" best option. Not something everyone does, but that most people do, and that you're most likely to see recommended as best practice.

\- You should be defining groups and variables to provide better documentation and allow use of the interface. But you shouldn't actually use the interface to do customization (put it in your personal configuration files instead). The interface is both pretty annoying and disallows documentation of why exactly you're setting certain options.

\- You use the standard package manager (package.el) and ELPA, MELPA, and maybe the Org repo. There are a few of these which will require external tools of some sort, in which case fair enough, that's an extra step. But that's still pretty standard in my view (although definitely doing that automatically would be great). I don't think I have any packages that require alternative package managers anymore.

\- Use use-package. No real question at this point.

I do agree that themes are in general a nightmare.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Magit is one of the most powerful pieces of software I use on a daily basis. It's incredibly well designed and I'd be seriously lost without it. That said, I think it's a good thing for MELPA and package.el in general that it's not built-in. It's a killer app, and I can only assume it encourages people to explore more packages.

I also totally agree with the post about contributing. Assignments aren't even the major issue, it's that with magit you can discuss issues, send a PR on GitHub and have a patch included in no-time. As part of Emacs, we'd have to go through mailing-list hell for any discussion and that's before considering the difficulties of actually getting a patch pulled in, at which point most people will have to wait for a new release? As part of MELPA I can update as soon as the PR is merged in.

Strange that people complain about the packaging system — I find it does the job and is super easy to get updates.

</comment><comment><USER18> As one of the small contributors (ranked #225 to be exact) I just became aware of this and emailed the FSF how I can assign them my copyright.

I'm not sure if this is a tedious process but I do believe that it is worth it in the end, when the FSF is able to legally defend this freedom.

<comment><USER19> It's not difficult. The process is described here: [https://www.fsf.org/licensing/assigning.html](https://www.fsf.org/licensing/assigning.html)

I've done this in the past for both Guile and Emacs.

For project maintainers it is a little bit more involved: [https://www.gnu.org/prep/maintain/maintain.html#Legal- Matter...](https://www.gnu.org/prep/maintain/maintain.html#Legal-Matters)

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> Magit is my one of my favorite Emacs packages. It's not entirely intuitive at first but once you get the hang of it, it streamlines the git workflow to a very pleasant interaction.

I highly recommend that anyone using Emacs and git gives Magit a try.

<comment><USER15> I gave Magit a try on Windows, and it failed miserably at finding git automagically. With no configurable option and no documented or at least easily hackable entry point, Magit was my quickest Emacs package removal.

<comment><USER21> Just because you did't make an effort to actually look for these things, that doesn't mean that they don't exist: [https://magit.vc/manual/magit/Git- Executable.html](https://magit.vc/manual/magit/Git-Executable.html).

<comment><USER15> What part of IGNORING THE PATH ENVIRONMENT VARIABLE you didn't understand? Magit is too clever for its own good.

<comment><USER22> From that link:

> This is necessary because Git on that platform comes with several wrapper > scripts for the actual git binary, which are also placed on $PATH, and using > one of these wrappers instead of the binary would degrade performance > horribly.

That sounds like a good reason to be clever.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> If you've already learned to install and use Emacs, one more package aint gonna kill ya.

</comment><comment><USER24> Whilst appearing even handed, in practice the article fails to mention a single reason for Stallman wanting the copyright assignment. I don't know what his reasons are, but he does tend to have thought through these issues carefully.

<comment><USER25> I think the article author assumes that the fact and the reasons for the FSF insisting on copyright assignment for its software are well known. [https://www.gnu.org/licenses/why- assign.en.html](https://www.gnu.org/licenses/why-assign.en.html) has the answer, which basically boils down to "it ensures that there aren't going to be any awkward problems if the FSF ever needs to legally enforce the license."

<comment><USER13> I think you answered a different question from what GP was asking. The question for most people, which is answered in neither the article nor the email threads in emacs-devel, is why this stuff needs to be "in Emacs". What is wrong with it being a third-party package?

For example, these quotes from Stallman:

> We have a problem in Emacs: it doesn't contain a good interface to git. > People often recommend something that is not in Emacs. That's not a good > situation.

> When people ask here what they should do to use git with Emacs, the usual > answer posted is "use Magit". Thus the problem: that the usual way people > recommend to use Emacs with Git is via a package we have been unable to > include in Emacs.

The obvious question is: what is wrong with using a package that is not in core Emacs?

[https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs- devel/2017-07/msg00...](https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs- devel/2017-07/msg00109.html)

[https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs- devel/2017-07/msg00...](https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs- devel/2017-07/msg00105.html)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> I love magit & git but emacs has seen many vcs come and go and I am not sure bundling it by default is crucial. Who knows what vcs we'll be using in 10 years, let alone other specific packages that might follow the same route. I'd rather keep emacs core lean personally.

</comment><comment><USER4> So like org mode and other packages they want to include magit in Emacs. Just got bigger but magit being such a great package I think they should do it. Hope the copyright assignment happens and FSF does it.

<comment><USER11> No, let's not. Magit is a great package, and the ease of contribution and ability to move quickly are great parts of it.

<comment><USER27> Emacs master moves quite fast.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> I saw this on Reddit, lwn and now here and I didn't see anyone comment on license upgrades. when FSF released GPLv3 they migrated a ton of software from one version to another.

although GPL is usually forward compatible with its newer versions I still wonder if that's the concern behind Stallman's opinion.

</comment><comment><USER29> This seems like an interesting idealogical argument to follow, but anybody using Emacs in the real world is going to just go ahead and install Magit. Nobody uses Emacs on the default settings anyways. Part of learning Emacs is sorting out your init file.

</comment><comment><USER30> I tried for a long time to get Magit to work on OSX. Never could; anyone else? The way OSX was setup for emacs to hook into the git process was strange and not smooth for getting them to behave well together.

<comment><USER31> That's odd. I've used Magit on OSX for at least a year now with no troubles, just installed through MELPA.

<comment><USER30> I'll have to give it another try.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> The number of people who use emacs, but also need a friendly front end for git has to be vanishingly tiny.

<comment><USER33> I think the appeal is more how it streamlines workflow, not how newbie- friendly it is. [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14819432](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14819432)

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> the reason im not an emacs kind of person is that it comes with too many goodies. it becomes too complex. i have no need for org-mode and if i need a psychiatrist i can use a real one. including git wont help much. its almost as complex as Eclipse the way it is now. including some fancy git interface will not help matters.

so vim it is. if it does not have functionality i need i download it (or write it myself, easy enough). its a shame emacs is such a hodgepodge as i would definitely like to write new editor functionality using a lisp.

<comment><USER35> I.e. you want to be able to program your editor in a Lisp, but nobody should upstream any such code into a distribution which accompanies the editor.

<comment><USER34> its fine if there are such distributions. i just dont think they should be the main distribution. by this i mean: i think the distro you get when you click the 'download editor' button on the site of the author of the editor or enter apt-get install editor, should eliminate these extras to avoid intimidating people too much and achieve a nice cleaned up aesthetic.

editors like emacs and vim are already have a steep learning curve without any extras and experts who need the extras will find them.

i am a great admirer of what stallman did for free software and i really like the idea of emacs. however i am also aware that its usage is declining. so i do believe taking a more critical look at his decisions is worth it.</comment></comment></comment>


Lsfs – a Perl parser of directory listings and FUSE filesystem daemon - <AUTHOR> http://lsfs.sourceforge.net/ <comment><USER2> Sorry can you explain what it does? I don't get it from the example..

<comment><AUTHOR> Yeah, sorry, I sometimes use HN as a bookmark service that may also benefit someone else.

The idea is to present a hierarchical file system as flat one, using FUSE.

In this particular case, the version of VLC on my old iPad only searches SMB volumes one directory deep.

So I'm trying to mount a flat /mnt/MP3/ disk out of several nested ones:

      /artist1/song1.mp3
      /artist1/song2.mp3
      /artist2/song1.mp3
      /artist2/song2.mp3

becomes

      /artist1_song1.mp3
      /artist1_song2.mp3
      /artist2_song1.mp3
      /artist2_song2.mp3

So yeah, pretty specific. But the takeaway is that FUSE is awesome.</comment></comment>


2008 in Hindsight (from UK indie-dev Introversion) - <AUTHOR> http://forums.introversion.co.uk/introversion/viewtopic.php?t=2012

<comment><USER2> _During our launch party dinner and celebrations that evening, what was truly amazing about this counter was how little it was actually going up. I'm not kidding when I say that we actually checked the connections and the software several times to make sure it was actually working, only to find out it was. Even then that very night we knew it was bad, that our whole future was in doubt._

I've had something like this happen to me before. The managers were convinced there must be something wrong with the statistics and reporting code, which I wrote, but I kept checking and nothing seemed wrong. We knew numbers would be down, but not as down as they were.

It's interesting to be on the front lines when you know things are about to get really bad.

</comment><comment><USER3> This is a fantastically candid article. I truly appreciated hearing about the horror stories of having too many products on the go and none that could sustain the business.</comment>


10 Programmer Interview Questions I'd like to be asked - <AUTHOR> http://buhrmi.tumblr.com/post/5343463562/10-programmer-interview-questions-id-like-to-be-asked

<comment><USER2> One of the lists of 'worst interview questions' he linked had #10 as:

What interests you about our company?

Which made me realize how antiquated and outdated that list was. If a company DIDN'T ask me that, there's very little chance I'd take the job.</comment>


John Oliver pleads with viewers to revive net neutrality fight - <AUTHOR> https://www.theverge.com/2017/5/8/15577800/john-oliver-net-neutrality-last-week-tonight-ajit-pai-title-ii-verizon <comment> chroem- This is definitely a cause worth fighting for, but something that I've noticed is that nobody cares about these internet issues unless a major corporation's profits are threatened. The media was largely silent about NSA spying and as a result there was no organized movement against it. People said this was due to privacy being too abstract of a concept for people to care, but I fail to see how the issue of ISP's charging internet companies not to throttle them is any less abstract for the average person. There's something else at play here.

<comment><USER2> More people cared about NSA spying than net neutrality. But mass media and major corporations have a strong vested interest in net neutrality. So they amplify the people by covering it with news stories, engaging in "blackouts," etc. For Google, facebook, netflix etc. this isn't a philosophical or moral issue. They don't want Verizon and comcast shaving their profit margin down.

It's a fight between two groups of companies, for the most part.

Practically, there is little chance ISPs actually turn the internet into a walled garden. But they could skim off netflix and google.

Also, you might be in a "tech bubble." Net neutrality is a huge issue for people involved in tech (by business or hobby). Most of my friends outside that bubble don't really understand the issue at all.

<comment><USER3> > But mass media and major corporations have a strong vested interest in net > neutrality.

Major corporations like Comcast, and mass media like the NBCUniversal division of Comcast certainly have a vested interest in the opposite direction.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> We grew up and are now tired, and the next generation was born into walled gardens. We're not in a great place now.

</comment><comment><USER5> How is the tech community responding to this this time? Are there plans for an Internet blackout?

</comment><comment><USER6> The search on the FCC website he asked everyone to go to is broken. I emailed them and they said they are working on it. We'll see if it gets fixed.

</comment><comment><USER7> Leave the title ll I Internet neutrality intact .

</comment><comment><USER8> Everyone who works in an industry that delivers content via the web should be very concerned. This gives the larger established players the ability to crush any upstarts simply by throwing money at the problem.

<comment><USER9> _> Everyone who works in an industry that delivers content via the web should be very concerned._

That's basically every site and service?

<comment><USER8> Every site and service that doesn't have the financial resources to buy preferential treatment and resources. So yes most of them.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Of course, Comcast is spending money to spin this:

[https://twitter.com/comcast/status/857357059196452865](https://twitter.com/comcast/status/857357059196452865)

(Saw this as an ad in the mobile app.)

Does that mean they're actually worried?

<comment><USER9> It means they know they started to lose the obscurity advantage, and since now they are exposed, they resort to misleading the public, to reduce the impact.

Second part of their tactic is to say that Net Neutrality should be protected by the Congress, where they hope to have enough leverage to pass fake NN laws that don't protect anything, while pretending they support NN.

So if that happens, public will have to put a lot of pressure on lawmakers to prevent that outcome.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Oh finally John Oliver has picked up a topic that is actually relevant to my interest. I watched every episode of his show under Obama. But since he turned his show into an endless Trump Hatefest it is just unbearable to stay through all his negativity. Really unfortunate that he turned that great format into one based on one-sided angry know-it-all rants.

<comment><USER12> Not sure why you're getting so many down votes, but I completely agree with you. Some of his shows were incredible a few years back, two that come to mind: Televangelists[1] and Debt Buyers[2].

[1] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7y1xJAVZxXg](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7y1xJAVZxXg) [2] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hxUAntt1z2c](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hxUAntt1z2c)

<comment><USER13> Likely because it's tangential to the primary focus of the submission without really providing relevance, is largely based on personal opinion, and touches on incendiary political topics in a way that doesn't really further the discussion.

It's also slightly ironic that the complaint was that John Oliver makes the issue about Trump too much, and then the commenter introduces trump into this discussion. "It's nice that he's not bashing Trump finally. Now let's take this reprieve and specifically call that out so we can talk more about Trump." While likely not the intention of the GP, that's what it ends up being in practice if it's not curbed.

<comment><USER11> Yes, that was a personal perception/comment. And I am not even arguing that he is this time moving away from blaming it all on Trump. Just that it is this one of the few occasions I agree with the problem premise and that this is a welcome change from the rest of his feeding-the-hate stories.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


In UK universities there is a daily erosion of integrity - <AUTHOR> https://www.theguardian.com/education/2018/apr/24/uk-universities-erosion-integrity-bologna-statement <comment><USER2> As a university student in the UK I find myself reminded of these problems on a very frequent basis. The purpose of universities seems to have shifted from providing academic research and learning to simply being another stage of school, with the sole objective of handing out degrees. One of the metrics that I feel indicates this most strongly is the radical change in hiring at universities in recent years. It's shocking to know that many universities (mine included) now employ more full time non-academic staff than full time academics.

<comment><USER3> _The purpose of universities seems to have shifted from providing academic research and learning to simply being another stage of school_

There's no "seems" about it, 50% of school leavers going to university was an explicit policy goal. There's no way to reconcile an institution of higher learning with one that has to accept anyone that applies

<comment><USER4> That makes no sense. It seems to me it is an elitist view that when you provide a service to the unwashed masses, it must be of lower quality. I believe it is false. Curricula don't have to be easier if you have a large student body, and graduation requirements don't have to be lower. Taking in more students does not inhibit service quality, up to the capacity of the school, which can be easily scaled by hiring more teachers and more teaching space.

Anyhow, the volume of students as a change driver for university quality explanation does not fit with the observations that:

a) Universities employ disproportionately more non-teaching staff than they used to; and

b) Academic staff has a harder time reaching tenure.

The explanation lies elsewhere.

<comment><USER3> _It seems to me it is an elitist view that when you provide a service to the unwashed masses, it must be of lower quality_

But it must be. An institution with AAA A-level students can teach more advanced material at a faster pace than one that admits EEEs. This is surely obvious, no?

It doesn't mean anyone is better or worse in a moral sense, it just means more or less academically able.

<comment><USER5> Not at all.

The ability to learn at university is not correlated with A-level results.

Mastery of the material can help give a good starting point, but I've worked with fantastic E/D/C students and terrible AAA students.

<comment><USER6> _ability to learn at university is not correlated with A-level results_

This is incorrect. They are obviously not 100% correlated (even re-sitting the same exam isn't!) but the correlation is extremely strong.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> This compounds some major long-term problems for education in the UK.

1\. Their school systems are the most elitist/unequal in Europe [0] (from this TED talk [1]). There are many things I love about the UK but I can never go back as the school I send my child to now for free would cost £4000-6000 per year of post-tax income in the UK.

2\. Because of underpaying teachers (In comparison to Belgium the mid-level art teacher I know gets paid €100/hr) and burying teachers in red-tape there is a significant shortage of teachers. This has led to the ridiculous lottery system they now have for picking schools.

3\. The Brexit is going to hit the number of European students hard. Outside of Oxford and Cambridge, most of the top 10 UK Universities are all in London with a huge contingent of European students.

So Universities are going to lose their European influx and the incoming generation of students are going to be poorer.

[0]: [https://imgur.com/a/qqKDgMd](https://imgur.com/a/qqKDgMd)

[1]: [https://www.ted.com/talks/andreas_schleicher_use_data_to_bui...](https://www.ted.com/talks/andreas_schleicher_use_data_to_build_better_schools#t-288035)

<comment><USER8> Honestly that's just kind of cute. Good private schools in the US regularly cost over $40,000 per year.

<comment><USER7> I'm talking about an average school for ages 4-11.

But this is not a competition about who has the most expensive schools.

I'd rather live in a country where education is free.

<comment><USER8> Indeed, I'm only pointing out the absurdity of the US system.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> It's quite appalling how UK universities seem to have changed since tuition fees. Most saddening is the effective destruction of the Open University as they now charge the same fees as everyone else. Few can afford to take an OU course for interest, or mid life career change any more.

The youngest is looking very unlikely to attend university at all thanks to feedback from those already in the system. I rather get the impression that paying £9k per year has turned academic excellence into a simple commercial production line.

<comment><USER10> The OU was actually one of the great British success stories, a "MOOC" before the Internet. It's a tragedy if that's coming to an end.

<comment><USER9> It's not _quite_ as bad as attending, but cost of a degree is about £18k or so - at £3k/year if you do the typical spread over 6 years. The cost has been going up markedly ever since £3k fees first came in.

They still offer bursaries and grants for those on low income, but seem to have been trimmed to be only partial help, with the rest on a student loan. I'm fairly sure you used to be able to apply for 100% help.

So it seems far less appealing for those on low or middle income, and all their traditional successes like those who never did a degree at 18 etc.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> There's also the issue of what has happened now that students have to pay through the nose for courses. They are now customers who _expect_ high grades for their fees. This has certainly changed the dynamic with regard to rigorous marking in some areas

<comment><USER12> I can't help feeling we would be better off if responsibility for grading was taken away from universities as it is for A levels and GCSEs. There are some problems with that but I suspect they would be outweighed by the benefits.

<comment><USER13> I've anecdotes from two university lecturers on different courses. They both want some form of external moderation. its what happens for Postgraduate degrees after all.

What they report is horrifying:

* Essay writing skills are lacking, "its at GCSE level"

* Students contesting any form of criticism - they go via the official channels to argue why they should get a good grade. All schools are tied up in multiple tribunals with existing staff. Often its easier just to pass the student.

* In some cases, students are SUING the university for poor grades

* Plagiarism is commonplace. There is an automated plagiarism detection mechanism for electronic submissions - but they are turned off or ignored as it's so rampant. People literally copying from Wikipedia or copy and pasting from papers to make their own work. Wikipedia copying is especially used for definitions, e.g. "Hacker News is a social news website focusing on computer science and entrepreneurship...."

* Students don't see that their education is also their own responsibility, and see it as a purchase. Give me what I pay for.

* Students who don't turn up to classes and seminars demand the same grades as those who do.

* Hundreds of students email lecturers asking for help with their work (much more numbers and frequency than in the past).

They both despair as they see education standards falling, and theres not much they can do. They don't want to be sued by the students, nor do they want to spend all their time in tribunals, they are educators first. They see their own institution as being of very poor quality.

To me - I would look at a league table of education quality for UK universities. There isn't one, you cant compare. Previously a good chance of good education was the research output of a department, or the references of the teachers. But this, as my associates report don't mean anything anymore.

<comment><USER14> >People literally copying from Wikipedia or copy and pasting from papers to make their own work. //

My lad is just in UK high-school but I'm surprised at how homework is set with no provision of resources and no mention of plagiarism or need to cite sources. The kids are basically expected to find their own sources, which is ridiculous - making them trust whatever Google gives them.

Once they've been inculcated into the notion that education resides in googling and cutting and pasting, without even reading the content, then it's hard to establish a good research ethic.

On top of this the teachers aren't even teaching good use of online search, or providing access to primary source material that gets referenced.

It's really dire.

Textbooks have their problems but ...

<comment> vertex-four In FE college, we had an occasional class (as part of something else, can't remember what) that explained how to use the Internet to research properly, determine trustworthiness, and cite sources, and also how to use the library at a basic level. I'd assume that sixth-form colleges in England and their equivalent elsewhere do the same - but perhaps it's too late by then?

<comment><USER15> I can reassure you that 'research methods' courses are mandatory for all students in the vocational only FE college that I do some teaching in. Taught by LRC staff.

The plagiarism checker is active as well.

Most of the level 3 award tutors set a small assignment within the first few weeks of the course to assess writing level and catch any issues like dyslexia &c.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> It's the infestation of 'market' philosophy that is the grindstone on the academic values. Everything gets beaten into submission of an amoral self- referential quantitative utility framework. This has become so ingrained that many, if not most, don't even see it as a choice but simply accept it as some sort of universal law.

<comment><USER17> >amoral self-referential quantitative utility framework

My goodness, that's quite a phrase. What do you actually mean?

<comment><USER16> Which part is confusing you?

<comment><USER18> What makes a framework self-referential? What does submission of ... mean?

What is this framework? Or which one is this?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> I have lost confidence in the western university system. Too much high exorbitant fees, with no future prospects but debt, so I have taken it myself to learn online via open courses.

<comment><USER20> Not all of West has it this way. US and UK yes, but rest of EU mostly has free college in same or higher quality.

<comment><USER12> Scotland is nowhere near as bad as the rest of the UK although you have to have put up with their dreary weather for three years before attending.

<comment> adam-a EU residents can also study in Scotland for free. It is only England, Wales and NI who have to pay the full fees.

<comment><USER21> No, it is only the English that have to pay the full fees, students from Wales and NI pay a lower rate.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> It would be nice to see some STEM-affirmative universities without any x-studies leaching. Professional complainer is a viable career path these days and it starts at uni.

<comment><USER23> Listening to Jonathan Haidt its pretty scary stuff.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4IBegL_V6AA](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4IBegL_V6AA)

<comment><USER12> _Listening to Jonathan Haidt its pretty scary stuff._

Don't listen to it then.

By the way the, UK isn't the same as the US, our problems aren't necessarily the same as yours.

<comment><USER23> Ignorance is bliss.

<comment><USER12> Don't listen to the media and you are uninformed, listen to the media and you are misinformed. I know which I prefer.

<comment><USER23> Probably the media you listen to with an opinion like that.

<comment><USER12> Didn't you just post a video to some crackpot on YouTube?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> This should probably be seen in the context of the ongoing industrial action in response to a sneaky attempt to convert pensions from defined-benefit to defined-contribution, thereby halving their value. This was based on an extremely questionable financial scenario ("what if all UK universities went bankrupt?")

<comment><USER24> Er is it a questionable scenario? UK universities all have very similar businesses, customer bases, staff unionisation levels and risk profiles. It's quite imaginable that if there was a sudden drop in the number of students attending university they might all get in dire straits simultaneously.

<comment><USER10> They have very different financial reserves, especially the Russell Group ones, and this also presumes that the government would let its entire tertiary education system collapse without intervening.

<comment><USER24> Well, the intervention is to change the pensions, surely. And the goal is to intervene _before_ a collapse occurs rather than afterwards.

If the argument is "we don't need to change the university pension scheme because when they go bankrupt the government will bail them out", I suppose that should be made directly.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> Universities in the UK have turned into administrator-heavy (as in the US) property development companies made to enrich the administrators and top brass, it seems. Here's a story that hints at the issues (UCL and others have been doing this a lot) [https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/jan/25/studen...](https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/jan/25/students- sit-in-university-social-cleaning-london-stop-elephant-castle)

While looking for this, I also found this, (slightly off-topic, but somewhat salient) which makes for sobering reading. [https://www.vice.com/en_uk/article/bnk3vm/vices-most-evil- un...](https://www.vice.com/en_uk/article/bnk3vm/vices-most-evil-university- awards)

</comment><comment><USER26> Despite being a British citizen, I don't understand the university model all that well, but one argument I see being banded about over the creeping levels of control over UK universities is why the more elite-level universities haven't opted to go private.

Sure, there was a legitimate argument a while ago with no/low tuition fees. The government was footing the bill. Now that tuition fees have risen, and seem to want to continue to rise, what benefit is there for the likes of Oxford, Cambridge, UCL, and co to remain public?

Someone I used to work with attended the University of Buckingham, one of the few universities in the UK that is private, and he said that while it was no Oxbridge, the flexibility of graduating in two years made it completely worth it. Ironically, a lot of pressure is put on the ex-polytechnics and middling universities in the UK to justify their high costs, low quality of content, and average employment figures, with the government often pointing towards the need for flexibility (i.e. two year degrees to save money).

If the government want to get their claws in, I'm surprised that those with the freedom to go private haven't decided to, or at least as a way to one-up their competitors.

</comment><comment><USER27> Here in Brazil, in a public university, I saw a policeman (among others) cheating on exams and professors knowingly ignoring it. Just one case, there were many others.

Beware of Brazilians. The de facto rule here is "fuck everybody not in my circle".

</comment><comment><USER15> I finished an undergraduate degree in 1980, when there were around 25000 undergraduates [1] p13/14\. Now there are at least 10 times that many. Inevitably, the system has had to change to reflect that increase in volume within the span of a single career - quite a lot of change.

Not sure where the answer lies, but an increasingly large proportion of my teenager students are opting _not_ to go to university directly at 18, so there could be a 'correction' on the way over the next generation or so.

[1] [http://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/SN042...](http://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/SN04252/SN04252.pdf)

</comment><comment><USER28> Here is an interesting read

[http://www.culturewars.com/2002/potter.html](http://www.culturewars.com/2002/potter.html)

<comment><USER10> What does a 2002 article on faxes and children's books have to do with the present-day UK education sector?

<comment><USER28> If you read it, you'll know.

<comment><USER29> Yeah, I tried, it started with gushing over James Dobson - the man who believes that beating children is a good thing (this is personal; my parents used his books for parenting advice) - and C.S. Lewis.

Eg, it complains about Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone as being a "deeply incoherent work", and praises Lewis. But the Narnia series is _also_ a deeply incoherent work.

It describes the book as a narcissistic fantasy, which is a literary description and an opinion. It then spends paragraphs describing the psychiatric condition known as narcissism. But the connection is still an _opinion_.

The author then gives this horrid homophobic nugget:

> One of the most blatant forms of magic through ingestion is, of course, > homosexuality, and through its connection with narcissism we can get some > inkling of the purpose behind the major cultural offensive in favor of > homosexuality. The homosexual is the consumer culture's version of the ideal > citizen because he takes all of the strains of narcissism to their logical > antiessentialist conclusion.

Yeah, I stopped there.

<comment><USER28> You're not going to make it.

<comment><USER29> I'm not going to make what? Make it through a homophobic essay with poorly constructed arguments? You're right.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> Ugh, boo hoo. "Autonomous" Universities have become political and a source of left propaganda. Only time they complain about it is when the politics are on the "wrong" side.

</comment><comment><USER31> Some significant issues in western democracy can be traced back to the 1980's and before the fall of communism. Untill then it was important at least for appearances to show western capitalism and democracy as the best and fairest political systems for all round prosperity.

Reaganism, Thatcherism and neoliberlism of the Friedman kind unleashed a toxic ideology that legitimizes and surrenders all decision making and thinking to markets. It's like a religion and magical thinking. This disproportionately benefits those with economic power as it is intended to, but under the Orwellian use of words like 'freedom' and 'efficiency'.

This concentrated economic power is then used to co-opt dissent by economic means or disarm it to make it meaningless.

Academics along with a free press were a bulwark against unchecked power and provided dissent. Now they are too tied up with administration and securing grants to perform that role, and this is not an accident. The free press similarly have become too intertwined with entrenched interests and government and have been reduced to a mouth piece for propaganda and special interests.

</comment><comment><USER32> You argument is not in favor of the poor. Given the way taxation works, free healthcare and education provide opportunities for lower incomes that aren't available for private services. When education is free (popular phrasing for government paid), a poor person with no income can get a free education and usually financial support and actually get a degree. If healthcare is free, the burden of the individual is carried by the society. As for 'standard libertarian arguments', you might as well say 'myopic perspective'.

</comment><comment><USER33> I agree with the article but I can only note, once more, that it is from The Guardian, who did run multiple articles in support of no-platforming in universities.

But look who comes crying about freedom of inquiry now, once said "erosion of integrity" is done by right-wing bureaucrats. But the no-platforming happens mostly in the US, while government interferences is happening in the UK, so they will probably get away with their double standard one more time.

<comment><USER34> Whenever the theme turns a little bit orange on the Guardian, you're reading an opinion, there are lots of opinion columnists at the Guardian and many of them have differing views. If you want a more consistent view from the Guardian, then stay in the news sections (the theme is red for that), this case, the opinion is by a professor at the University of Cambridge, it's not an unbiased report from a journalist.

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> And is the UK government behind the erosion of free speech identified at a large number of institutions who have banned and actively censored ideas on campus? Shall we assume they are helpless in the face of demands from Whitehall?

[http://www.spiked-online.com/free-speech-university- rankings](http://www.spiked-online.com/free-speech-university-rankings)

<comment><USER36> I have a few issues with that link.

Namely that a traffic light system is a huge, _huge_ , _HUGE_ oversimplification of complex issues. While the analysis seems fairly transparent, I don't think many people will actually look into it past the traffic light.

I checked out the uni I went to: apparently the students union got an amber light because of "no tolerance to sexual harassment". How exactly does that violate free speech? The right to free speech unequivocally does not give you the right to harass people in any way. Similarly "Rules and Regulations for the Use of Information and Communications Technology" is an amber for institutions: does that mean all AUPs are in violation of freedom of speech? Most of them come down to "please don't hack our infrastructure or download anything that will make the police come round".

Also when things like "bans on specific ideologies" are very likely to get misconstrued. Banning groups which verbally harass others is likely going to be seen as a ban on free speech, despite the fact that such bans may be warranted.

The whole analysis and ranking system seems biased, and completely garbage to me.

Edit: since I'm an idiot and didn't realise that you could expand the amber/red points on the site, my uni SU's "no tolerance to sexual harassment" was due to them adopting the NUS (National Union of Students) guideline that sexual harassment is defined as 'any unwanted comments which makes someone uncomfortable', and the ICT rule was 'Users must ensure that the content and tone of their email messages cannot be considered offensive.'

Both of these appear reasonable to me. There's some genuine debate to be had over the issue of no-platforming but all this site is doing is furthering their own agenda, which seems to be that they should have the right to insult and harass people however they want. As always, this is relevant here: [https://xkcd.com/1357/](https://xkcd.com/1357/)

<comment><USER37> That particular xkcd gets linked a lot in this debate. I really wonder what happened between when the author drew that comic and when he drew this one: [https://www.xkcd.com/137/](https://www.xkcd.com/137/)

<comment><USER38> I don't see any incompatibility there?

Seems like in 137 he's saying that he doesn't want to sacrifice individuality and creativity for the sake of maintaining a banal existence that doesn't deviate from the norm out of fear. He's accepting the risks that come with making his opinions public, and challenging assumptions that he should just shut up, in part because he has confidence in the validity of his beliefs and a willingness to defend them.

The more recent one is about people who publicize poorly constructed opinions with no consideration to the potential consequences it will create for their interpersonal and community relationships. Those folks are welcome to say "fuck that shit" like the character in 137 and go build their own forums or whatever to spread and defend those ideas. But most of these types would prefer to whine and call themselves victims.

<comment><USER39> > he doesn't want to sacrifice individuality and creativity for the sake of > maintaining a banal existence that doesn't deviate from the norm out of fear

Exactly. Just apply that to the fear of running afoul of draconian speech codes designed to reduce the amount of "offence" people experience.

<comment><USER38> "Don't be a jerk" doesn't seem draconian to me. The people I see whining about their speech having consequences (ie, Milo) are usually aiming to offend. They aren't running into obscure codes, they're being jerks for fun and profit.

<comment><USER40> > "Don't be a jerk" doesn't seem draconian to me.

And who gets to decide what is acceptable?

My college had an atheist club that hung up a banner saying "Religion is for the feeble minded" \- that's offensive to billions of people.

Can we shut them down and boot them off campus?

My college also had communist clubs with communist slogans - many of my extended family were killed by communists so that's obviously offensive.

Can we shut them down and boot them off campus?

> The people I see whining about their speech having consequences (ie, Milo) > are usually aiming to offend.

By the time people like Milo come along hundreds of legitimate speakers have already been silenced - that's how people like Milo realize it's an easy and lucrative market to take advantage of.

<comment><USER38> That's a bad comparison. Clubs like those, especially at a public college actually ARE protected by the 1st amendment. You can choose not to join, but cannot prevent them from meeting. The only thing the school can do is limit the non-student guests a club brings, and even that power is typically limited to in cases of security concerns, which can often be remedied if the club helps foot the costs for increased security (see: UW Milo visit where counter protestor was shot)

Twitter and Reddit and the like are public platforms that belong to a private entity. So it's private property and the people who own it can curate or be selective if they choose.

All that said, I'm no fan of "no-platforming", but it's not as prominent as you might think, at least on the public college level. I went to a college where random fire and brimstone preachers would stand in front of the library, bang on buckets and call women "whores" as they passed by. Nobody invited them, they just wanted an audience. And though I hated those guys, I understand their right to do that (with a permit) and to say whatever. Likewise, it was my right to laugh in his face, call him an asshole. Because he was being a jerk.

<comment><USER39> > Clubs like those, especially at a public college actually ARE protected by > the 1st amendment.

In UK universities they have no such protection, and similar clubs have been shut down.

My alma mater, University College London, banned the Nietzsche Society: [https://thetab.com/2014/06/03/thus-spake-the- su-14611](https://thetab.com/2014/06/03/thus-spake-the-su-14611)</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Make Me SuperHuman - the Top Enhancements I Crave - <AUTHOR> http://ieet.org/index.php/IEET/more/nicholas20120701

<comment><AUTHOR> I agree with #1 - life extension - that I way I can live long enough to benefit the others.</comment>


Snikket - <AUTHOR> https://blog.prosody.im/introducing-snikket/ <comment><USER2> This looks very promising! Especially curious about their ideas for iOS because afaik the xmpp client situation's still looking pretty bleak compared to Android.</comment>


Ask HN: Contracts for doing software consulting? - <AUTHOR> Does anyone here have any experience or know of any good resources for making software development/consulting contracts, when doing software consulting?
I might potentially be hired to do some contracting (both development and administration) on a software system. Knowing my client very well, I am a bit worried that I might end up without any clear goals for when my job is finished.
Should the contract specify specific features that need to be implemented? I dont think there will be any design documents written other than "back of napkin" style task descriptions. How about bug fixing? Would there be a specific amount of time after feature completion that the client would have to report any bugs that I would then fix?
I am new to freelance contracting, so if anyone has any experience doing something like this, I would love to get some input. <comment><USER3> The keyword to search on is statement of work, or SOW.

Here's a nice start: [http://programmers.blogoverflow.com/2012/08/fix-price- vs-tim...](http://programmers.blogoverflow.com/2012/08/fix-price-vs-time-and- material-contracts)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks! That was a good start. The comments in the that post also provided a bit of insight into how to approach this.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> The Contract Killer by Andy Clarke gets some good feedback:

[https://gist.github.com/malarkey/4031110](https://gist.github.com/malarkey/4031110)

<comment><USER5> I wish I could easily star gists from mobile, I always see these kind of things when reading hn on rest break with just phone.

<comment><USER6> I've been using the share button in the browser, then choosing save to inbox. That is of course if you are using google inbox.

<comment><USER5> I would typically use pocket for this, but then half of the gists I need to remember are in one place, and half (the ones I've starred on desktop) are in another, so it's not a good solution. The alternative is to completely use pocket, and not use github stars, but in any case, since I like github as a service, the comment was more of a hint to any random githubber who may read browse hn and want to do an easy modification.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Bonsai seems to be a good choice for you. They provide a decent contract template.

[https://www.hellobonsai.com/](https://www.hellobonsai.com/)

</comment><comment><USER8> Yes, you will need an SOW, (statement of work) that articulates very clearly what you aim to accomplish. Near the latter part you should have another section ( there is more than one way to accomplish this however ) that clearly states what the "acceptance criteria" is for meeting the goals - ie - <USER2> out usually in bullet points reachable goals for the project that when met everyone agrees your end of the deal is met.

Along with this it should also cover your rates, payment schedule, terms, and what things cost if they fall out of scope.

Finally I find it useful to add a "prerequisites", and "disclaimers" section that say that work can't begin until you have things like write access to their git repo or access to their aws account ( or whatever ) and that the current SOW doesn't cover getting it into the App Store or bugs that come after the acceptance criteria are met.

Put places on this document for your company or self, and the other party and make sure you properly distribute and record the signed docs.

IANAL but have one, and the more you get into consulting and bigger contracts it's good to run things by a lawyer if it's something that's high value, with a lot of effort, or even remotely puts you at risk.

Be even more careful signing documents clients give you;)

Have fun

</comment><comment><USER9> If the scope is not clear enough for putting together a statement of work of acceptance criteria as described in other comments, one thing that you could do is to start with a time-boxed contract, ranging from a couple weeks to a couple months, depending on the complexity of the project, to do requirements analysis. The deliverable of this contract would be a list of functional and non-functional requirements, at a reasonable level of detail.

The issue is that, for bigger projects, you start running into the problems related to a "waterfall" approach. As an alternative, you could look into how "agile" organizations approach their contracts -- basically by selling the ability to work on "stories" for as long as the customer wants them to -- and the deliverables for each story are very fine-grained.

Either way, without active involvement of the customer to either elicit requirements up front or validate your stories as you go, you'll be in for a rough time. It's probably better to have an honest discussion with them about this, because it's in their best interest after all.

</comment><comment><USER10> > I might potentially be hired to do some contracting (both development and > administration) on a software system. Knowing my client very well, I am a > bit worried that I might end up without any clear goals for when my job is > finished.

If the requirements are vague then don't agree to a fixed price and charge by the day or hour instead. Ask for a small task that needs to be done, provide an estimate, perform the work while keeping the client up to date if the estimate is still accurate so they can decide what to do next and go from there for each task. Hopefully trust will build up both ways as you work through tasks.

You could both burn a lot of time writing up contracts for every small task instead of just getting on with it.

</comment><comment><USER11> I can recommend grabbing a copy of this book: [https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/14617573-a-guide-to- it-c...](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/14617573-a-guide-to-it- contracting)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks, I will get it.

<comment><USER11> Glad I could help.</comment></comment></comment>


Loan Monitor Is Accused of Ruthless Tactics on Student Debt - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/02/us/loan-monitor-is-accused-of-ruthless-tactics-on-student-debt.html?hp <comment><USER2> Now that undergraduate loans are exclusively financed by the Federal government, they've become a powerful policy lever: Want to greatly reduce your liability of $50,000 after four years of undergraduate education? Work in "public service" for ten years, making repayments at income-based levels and the rest of your debt is assumed by the taxpayer.[1]

It's not hard to imagine a whole bunch of "desirable" activities that could be incentivized in this way. I am somewhat uncomfortable with that.

[1] [http://studentaid.ed.gov/repay-loans/forgiveness- cancellatio...](http://studentaid.ed.gov/repay-loans/forgiveness- cancellation/charts/public-service)

<comment><USER3> Last year, the student loan system was $50 billion in the black.[1] So it's a cross-subsidy rather than a taxpayer subsidy. And that seems perfectly fine to me. My wife and I took loans for graduate school, and both came out with high- paying jobs for our trouble. I think it's totally fair for people like us to subsidize the people who pursue public service. The system helped us out, and now we're happy to help out the system.

[1] This number is likely to decrease as time goes on and more people take advantage of the loan forgiveness, but there's quite a cushion at the moment.

<comment><USER4> That the system is in the black doesn't necessitate that program is not in fact a subsidy. If the market interest rate is 5% and the gov loans at 2%, assuming no defaults, the program will appear to be in the black while still subsidising borrowers at the expense of taxpayers. Moreover, when you say "fair for people like us to subsidize the people who pursue public service" you seem to imply that the tax is progressive when in fact is not since most people going to college are middle and upper middle class. Finally, this doesn't address the question of who is providing a public service. Are private for profit orgs not providing a public service?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> > The agency charged with monitoring such bankruptcy declarations, a nonprofit > with an exclusive government agreement

I used to associate nonprofits with humanitarian works, almost like charities, but it's pretty obvious lately that in many cases they're just for-profit systems that have found loopholes to exploit.

A prime example of this: the NFL is a nonprofit.

<comment><USER6> While I agree that the NFL is certainly not a charity, I'm not sure that the NFL's nonprofit status is necessarily indicative of the league exploiting loopholes. I have always been led to believe that all league profits are shared among the league's for-profit teams who pay the appropriate taxes.

Can you explain how the NFL is a prime example of a nonprofit exploiting loopholes?

<comment><AUTHOR> _The 1961 Sports Broadcasting Act was the first piece of gift-wrapped legislation, granting the leagues legal permission to conduct television- broadcast negotiations in a way that otherwise would have been price collusion. Then, in 1966, Congress enacted Public Law 89‑800, which broadened the limited antitrust exemptions of the 1961 law._

But in general, the teams make tons of money and have close zero profits. They use variations of "hollywood" accounting. Which might help explain the cognitive dissonance of profitless monopolies =D.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sports_Broadcasting_Act_of_196...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sports_Broadcasting_Act_of_1961)

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

<comment><USER6> I would consider the Sports Broadcasting Act and the following legislation that expressly permitted the AFL/NFL merger to be, as you imply, well-known gifts from Congress to American professional sports leagues and the NFL in particular.

Those are hardly loopholes, however, since the legislation worked exactly as Congress intended as far as I can tell.

Your allegations of "Hollywood" accounting seem more consistent with loophole exploitation, but I would like more concrete evidence other than the alleged dearth of team profits.

<comment><AUTHOR> Anyone with firsthand access to NFL, MLB, Premier League Soccer(and other pro sports) financial info will attest to the lack of book earnings. see for eg

[http://www.wallstreetoasis.com/blog/the-money-leagues- part-2...](http://www.wallstreetoasis.com/blog/the-money-leagues- part-2-accounting-for-sports)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> "Professor Cole added that if it were easy to discharge student loans in bankruptcy, lenders would simply not lend money to students without clear assets or prospects. 'We need a standard like that to be able to allow students who can't afford an education to be able to borrow,' he said."

Cole is right, and 'undue hardship' is highly subjective. However, as it stands only "hundreds try" to discharge their student loan debt through bankruptcy, and unknown how many succeed.

Undue hardship sounds like something we should be managing towards an overall level of 0.1% not 0.0% as they are now. I think the problem is that you can't achieve that on a case-by-case basis. Anything but impossible standards would blow past 0.1% in a heartbeat. I think you would need some sort of quota / ranking system and current law doesn't allow that.

What the story didn't talk [enough] about is how the income-based plans actually work. It sounds like there's an incredible amount of work that goes into calculating those plans (counting number of meals at McDonalds?). I don't know why that would be necessary. I assume you would just target a percentage of adjusted gross income. The whole point of the loan is to increase AGI so if AGI is _systemically_ too low to repay the loans, the problem is with the economy or the educational system, not the individual.

<comment><USER8> > It sounds like there's an incredible amount of work that goes into > calculating those plans

It is a simple calculation. 15% of Discretionary Income. DI is calculated as AGI minus 150% of the federal poverty line. For instance, if someone is single and makes $35k per year, their monthly payment is capped at: (35-11.5×1.5)×.15/12 -> $222 per month.

What is complicated is when people say they can't make the income based repayments because of a hardship. That is when all the counting meals and extra bedrooms happens.

</comment></comment><comment> at-fates-hands >>> When Ms. Hann took the issue to a New Hampshire court, the judge sanctioned Educational Credit, citing the lawyers' "violation of the Bankruptcy Code's discharge injunction."

I'm wondering what the penalty was from getting sanctioned by the Judge. In some states, you can your license revoked by the state bar association. I thought it was odd they didn't mention what penalty the attorneys received as a result of the sanction

</comment><comment><USER9> It should be noted that Professor Cole is a direct beneficiary of the aggressive student loan collection practices. This story reads like something out of a "Tale of Two Cities". I wonder if the ending will be similar.

<comment><USER10> For what it's worth, you're right but not for the reason you expect. Marcus Cole is well known for having grown up in a Pittsburgh housing project (Terrace Village) and having absolutely zero parental support for his college education. He is the type of person who would be the first to be denied a loan if it were possible to do so.

He's also fond of pointing out that medical students started this problem when a number of them declared bankruptcy right as they graduated med school and just before entering lucrative fields.

Source (among others) last page of: [http://www.judiciary.senate.gov/pdf/12-3-20ColeTestimony.pdf](http://www.judiciary.senate.gov/pdf/12-3-20ColeTestimony.pdf)

<comment><USER9> He's currently paid a salary from his university, so yes he and his employer are very benefiting from the federal student loan programs and subsidies.

I don't see how the fact he grew up Pittsburgh and received forms of government assistance is relevant. Good for him but the income of his employer is heavily subsidized by student loans.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I have a lot of sympathy for the individuals involved. One question... Does an insurance market exist for student loan paybacks? If not, perhaps it's time.

If the market doesn't exist (or can't exist) and we have sympathy for people who can't pay their loans back then we have to accept higher interest rates in returns. By having such strict laws on paying loans back, people with poor credit ratings through no fault of their own can get student loans.

Of course it would be great if people didn't need to go so far in debt to pay for school, but that's another story.

<comment><USER12> I read about an even more radical proposal: make the schools themselves back the loans. If Univeristy X graduates can't get jobs that allow them to pay back their loans, University X is on the hook.

<comment><USER2> Harvard can afford to let disadvantaged students in for free, but many middle and lower tier schools would become averse to admitting/financing poor or otherwise "risky" students under such a scheme.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Notice the common theme: people's financial lives get derailed by medical expenses. Yet another argument for healthcare reform.

In New Zealand (as in many other countries) we have a very reasonable system whereby you repay student loans as a small percentage of your income after graduation, taken out of your paychecks until they are fully repaid. If you're unemployed, you don't have to be making repayments. This means no one is under undue strain month to month and seems like a much more humane approach.

</comment><comment><USER14> Typical tug-the-heartstrings piece, find a couple of cases where people who seem to legitimately deserve a "hardship" exception had trouble getting it, and make it sound like that's the norm.

I suspect that the norm is that most people who are delinquent on their student loans are just simply not paying them.

 _Professor Cole added that if it were easy to discharge student loans in bankruptcy, lenders would simply not lend money to students without clear assets or prospects._

Now there's an idea! </sarcasm></comment>


Show HN: Krrnt.com - A live playlist discovery service powered by node.js - <AUTHOR> http://www.krrnt.com

<comment><AUTHOR> Hi, I just released <http://www.krrnt.com> into the wild. It is very much in beta, so please be gentle. For instance, IE8 does not work that well ATM.

The idea is to provide a granular live feed of playlists shared on Twitter. Initially, Spotify playlists are supported. Playlist URI:s are examined and indexed, making each and every playlist searchable. Technically, node.js and socket.io is working together to provide the dynamics of the UI and the live feed.

Any comments are highly appreciated!</comment>


What Are some successful Startups which were created outside of the USA? - <AUTHOR> https://www.quora.com/What-Are-some-successful-Startups-which-were-created-outside-of-the-USA?share=1

<comment><USER2> Skype was built by a team of Europeans in several countries. Don't remember which country it was originally headquartered in but it was not American.

Reaching further back, ICQ (one of the first big IM companies) was Israeli.

Hetzner and OVH are extremely successful hosting and cloud businesses, but I'm not sure if they qualify as startups or not. Hetzner is German and OVH is French.

I'm sure there are more but those are the ones that come to mind.</comment>


How to delete and purge my HN account? - <AUTHOR> can you support this feature? it's really a normal request, is it too hard to implement, or there are other reasons you can't do that? <comment><USER2> Just stop coming here. Deleting your account doesn't stick it to "the man" anymore than not coming here.

"how did the downvote-jury chosen? why are they superior? what's the rule for them to downvote? for me I just feel they are a group of jerks lurking, if you call this democratic, fuck it."

I thought this was pretty well documented. You have to have a certain number of points to get the downvote functionality. This is to prevent the exact kind of shit that you're complaining about. The people that are here for 3 months and then angst for "the gold old days", then downvote everything. I've not even been around here for that long, but I've been a member of the internet for long enough to know that communities are fluid.

</comment><comment><USER3> I do not know HN's policy in particular, but some online community sites either prohibit this altogether, or do it only in select situations, as deleting and purging an account can render old archived conversations less useful.

You might try sending an email to: firstname.lastname@example.com if you're wanting your account deleted.

</comment><comment><USER4> Allowing deletion of comments (especially en masse) can completely ruin a thread by rendering it incomprehensible. The combined value everyone else gets from posts not being deleted is probably greater than the benefit you would get if it was allowed.

</comment><comment><USER5> What would happen to your posts and threads? What if you are successful and I want to delete my account in 2 years. Will I be able to search and find out if its possible, or will I need to start a discussion like this one?

</comment><comment><USER6> Send a polite message to the mods, with a good reason.

To just lock yourself out, set your password to a long random string.

</comment><comment><USER7> It's better to use the feature request link at the bottom of the page to make feature requests.</comment>


Ask HN: Sleeping Hacks - <AUTHOR> I have a major sleeping problem - I'm so excited about the ideas I'm working on throughout the day that I can't actually fall asleep without working myself to exhaustion, and the issue is that it's nearly impossible for me to get out of bed in the morning the following day. I'd like to break the habit of staying up late and sleeping in.<p>What are some hacks that other entrepreneurs and engineers use to maintain some sanity in their work routines? <comment><USER2> Simple discipline.

Turn lights low. Get into bed at 10 PM. Read a boring book until 10:30. Turn off the lights. Get up at 6:30 AM.

There's no magic. You simply have to stop doing stuff.

<comment><USER3> When I went overseas for two months for an internship, I figured this out the hard way.

But then that got boring, and alcohol was cheap... and fun :-P

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Sleep requires one to be both physically and mentally tired. Playing computer games can be a relatively lazy way to wear out your mind when you are physically too tired to get much done but can't yet sleep. Getting adequate physical activity can help with the other end of the equation. For bright individuals, sleep sometimes doesn't come because of their mental gears continuing to whir, which is what you describe. You need to find a means to get enough of a mental workout. It sounds to me like you really aren't getting that.

Good luck with this.

</comment><comment><USER5> I hear you. I do not have any answers, just sharing my experiences. What I end up doing is following a cycle thats larger than the 24 hour cycle.

What happens with me is that I cannot get my mind to switch off. It races from one thought to another, and the conversation, if you can call it that, keeps going on. I am tired and have my eyes closed, but my mind is awake. In this mode, I can blank it out for a minute or so. But some stray thought will break in, and that's that.

But what I find surprising is that, I can feel a sudden and clearly demarcated change of state when all that 'talk' stops. Like some sudden exponential decay. Once that happens I know I will fall asleep in some ~10 more mins. It is this sudden and clearly perceptible change that intrigues me. If I can somehow hit that state then I know I will do fine. I dont know if anyone else have had this. However if some distraction/noise kicks me off that 'quiet' state, then the entire process has to start all over again. But this is very different from the case where a thought breaks into my difficultly enforced one minute lull that i spoke about earlier.

I can clearly identify which of the two states I am in. I have always wanted to study my EEG pattern to see if that is also reflected there.

<comment><USER6> I loved my >24hr cycle. Dating, marrying, and having a kid totally killed it. But while I was single my bedtime would make a full circuit of the clock every week or so, sliding back a little each day. I never had such good sleep in all my life. The waking was good, too. The only time I'd set an alarm was when I had a flight.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Make sure no matter what you get up at the same time every day, even if you went to bed really late the night before (or earlier that morning), and go to bed at night when you start feeling drowsy. If you need a kickstart in the beginning of the (re)transition period, drink a cup of coffee when you wake up or sit in front of a light therapy device ([http://www.amazon.com/Philips- goLITE-BLU-Therapy-Device/dp/B...](http://www.amazon.com/Philips-goLITE-BLU- Therapy-Device/dp/B001I45XL8/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=hpc&qid=1294474203&sr=1-1)) for 15-30 mins. After a few days, your sleep schedule should normalize. If you still have trouble getting drowsy at night, try to get into a pre-sleep ritual (book, warm milk, dim the lights, whatever) 30-60 mins before you want to go to bed. Definitely stop all work 30-60 mins before bedtime. In general, no backlit screens in the 60mins before bedtime, and no caffeine after 3pm.

</comment><comment><USER8> I would suggest measuring the work hours you have in a day, and understand at 9 pm you have to start thinking about going to sleep, and getting tired. It's hard to jump from active to sleep, you'll fail. So learn to push yourself to stop at take it easier gradually. By 10 PM, maybe you start actually winding down more. With practice you can probably get to bed quickly, and take advantage of your work hours during the day. Try practicing this regimen for a while and you'll get into the habit of ending your day, not working til exhaustion. In fact you probably functioned that way before you worked too hard =)

</comment><comment><USER6> Do something completely unrelated to hacking. You might call it a hobby. Try oil painting, baking, sculpture, music, whatever. Anything that doesn't involve a computer. Preferably something aesthetic.

<comment><USER9> I agree with this.

In a gross oversimplification: Aesthetic = right brain = non-thinking = goodbye monkey mind.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> If you have feel a pull to stay up later every day, besides just being young, you might also have some form of Delayed Sleep Phase Syndrome; I found that Rozerem (or some form of melatonin) helped greatly to remind my brain it was night. For some reason, other gimmicks to reduce my eyes exposure to light didn't work.

You may also try to make lifestyle choices that are compatible with you not being coherent before noon.

</comment><comment><USER11> Do something completly different which empties out your mind. For me that is going for a run, others play the guitar, just try and get away from the computer for a good while before trying to sleep.

And I second the note about discipline. Define your working hours and stick to them. If you can't do it, get yourself a faimily: they'll do it for you :)

</comment><comment><USER12> I have a similar problem. I use non-prescription sleeping pills occasionally to maintain my regime and it works pretty well.

(the active compound for the medication I use is diphenhydramine) <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diphenhydramine>

</comment><comment><USER13> I take cold showers immediately before going to bed. Hasn't failed me yet! Now if only I could get my neighbors to be quiet so I could stay asleep...

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2031470>

</comment><comment><USER14> Progressive relaxation and/or self-hypnosis tapes work for me, if only to anchor the state that "it's time to sleep now".</comment>


Ask HN: I quit my job at a startup, what happens now? - <AUTHOR>

My stressful career as an early employee at a tech startup in SF has come to an end. Officially not an employee after over two years, and it feels overwhelming even though I put myself in this position.
The reason I left was because I wasn't learning or advancing and grew fed up with covering for mediocre performance by my peers. What I wish for at this point in my life (mid 20's) is to absorb as much knowledge and experience as possible and I feel that the best way to do that, for me, is to learn from the best. So I want to work at a place with > 10 employees that has a strong company culture of teamwork and creating top-tier products and services.
I have some questions as to what happens to my equity, insurance, etc...
1) I have ~50k vested shares of stock (options?) but don't have any paperwork other than our original contract which says something about the next board meeting, it's all rather confusing.
2) Would it be wise to take advantage of a government run program like COBRA for insurance? I never used my insurance anyways, is it worth it to apply, and how are the chances that I will be accepted?
3) My savings will not last long with rent prices and all, I'm thinking about moving back home and staying with family or friends, but I'm also trying to find a new role here in SF, how much will being (very recently) remote affect job hunting? I got hired from out of town but I'm not sure if hat's unusual.
That's basically it but I would appreciate any other general advice for what happens now, what I should be doing, or if you have a job opening for a hacker who writes code, is into devops, and has an eye for product! <comment><USER2> I was in a similar position about 6 months ago.

With regard to stock etc, I've no advice. The startup I worked for took good care of me even though I was leaving and the entire process was actually smooth and painless. However, regarding the afterward:

I immediately contacted anyone in my network I thought may have some sort of consulting or contract work I could take up while I looked into what my next venture may be. With this, I actually ended up choosing to work mostly on open source projects and contracting work (contracting part time). I was in Ohio, so cost of living is next to nothing compared to SF (my share of a 3br house is $400/mo 10 minutes from downtown Columbus).

From here, once I had the desire to get back into the grind and onto a team I started selectively applying to new firms I was interested in and truly trying to make a connection, rather than blindly sending out resumes.

It took about 6 months to get to the point I wanted to dive back in again, but I have worked on wonderful and incredibly interesting projects ranging from designing packages for the Atom editor to enable better accessibility for the blind to working with medical and legal startups adding features. It's really been a great experience.

Feel free to email me, contact info is in my profile desc.

</comment><comment><USER3> 1) Regarding stock (options?), consider talking to a lawyer ASAP to understand your rights. A consultation will likely be free. Note that you may actually have nothing. Note that you may actually have to buy the shares. Note that you may not want to put much money or effort chasing down stock in a company that you aren't willing to work for. Personally, I would just consider it worth $0 unless there was a clear right to free or cheap stock -- that is, unless it's essentially a free roll. Finally, note that there is probably a time limit on you converting your options to stock (if you in fact have options and not grants).

2) I would make sure you have insurance. Health insurance seems worthless when nothing is going wrong, but it's there for precisely when things do go wrong.

3) You should be able to find a new job in SF by... Monday? Meh, maybe people will be busy over the weekend. Next Friday seems to be a safe bet. That said, if you need to recharge, consider taking a little time off and go visit friends and family back home.

Other:

\- Note that the tech world in the Bay Area is bizarre both in good ways and bad. Don't believe most of the BS hype that you hear -- it's BS.

\- I don't know what your circle of friends is like, but it might be a good idea to find a good group of people like you (i.e., young, competent, ambitious programmers). It seems like you have no one to talk to about this, so this would probably help.

\- Random suggestion... check out Twilio (no affiliation). If they don't have a spot for someone with your skills, they probably know someone who does.

\- Honestly, you will probably get job/consulting offers from this post.

Best of luck. I think you made the right decision.

[Edited for spelling and content on time limit for options.]

</comment><comment><USER4> >1) I have ~50k vested shares of stock (options?) but don't have any paperwork other than our original contract which says something about the next board meeting, it's all rather confusing.

Nope, you have nothing. Zero. You got conned.

Your offer letter probably says something like "This option grant is conditional on being approved at our next board meeting." If you never got a letter saying that the board approved your grant, you have nothing.

Sucks to be you. Now you learned for next time.

Did you ask your now-ex employer about exercising your options? What did they say?

You can, if you want, talk to a lawyer, but he'll probably say the same thing I just said. Given that you are broke, you don't have the money to hire a lawyer and press this issue.

Besides, there are two possibilities, both bad:

1\. The startup is going to fail anyway. No point exercising your options.

2\. The shares are worth more than the strike price. Now you have to come up with the money to exercise AND pay a huge tax bill. Plus, the shares probably aren't liquid. Plus, the startup can raise money at their next financing with a liquidation preference, and you can wind up with nothing even if the startup eventually sells for a decent amount.

>2) Would it be wise to take advantage of a government run program like COBRA for insurance? I never used my insurance anyways, is it worth it to apply, and how are the chances that I will be accepted?

Yes, this is worth it, because you might get sick. However, with health insurance exchanges, you might be able to get a cheaper bronze/silver plan.

>3) My savings will not last long

That's why you keep an emergency fund of 6-12 months' living expenses. Also, try to find a new job before quitting your last one.

</comment><comment><USER5> It's way more difficult to find a job when you don't currently have one.

1) Reread your contract and try to make sense of it. Pay a lawyer to review your contract regardless of whether you can make sense of it.

2) Yes, the government will now fine you through your taxes if you have gaps in insurance coverage.

3) If you're as good and confident as you seem to think you are, you'll find a job quickly, but not as quickly as if you'd been able to say you're currently employed.

If _I_ were a potential employer, I'd think you make important decisions impetuously, and discount your value because of the apparent greater risk in hiring someone who makes bad decisions.

</comment><comment><USER6> 1) You probably have a deadline to exercise those vested options coming up very quickly. Should you do that? There's lots of past discussion on HN about that. Don't forget about 83(b) elections.

2) COBRA is a continuation of your employer's group health coverage. You can probably get significantly cheaper high-deductable coverage under an Obamacare exchange (coveredca.com, in your case). That's probably the better option. You should not go without health coverage, because then you'll be subject to tax penalties, but also for other obvious reasons.

3) Being remote will affect your job hunting by a factor of 2pi/sqrt(e).

<comment><USER7> _" COBRA is a continuation of your employer's group health coverage. You can probably get significantly cheaper high-deductable coverage under an Obamacare exchange (coveredca.com, in your case)."_

On the other hand, if he expects to be working for another company soon where he'll be covered again by group health insurance, it may not be worth the effort of researching and signing up for Obamacare insurance. COBRA may be more expensive, but it's much quicker to get it set up. (Also, I'm not sure if any insurance company will sell you individual health insurance for a very short period, like the time between jobs. That's what COBRA was really designed for.)

<comment><USER6> Alternate health insurance is quick enough to set up, at least in California, that it's easily worth the time invested (which is minimal, it's very convenient, and the savings can be quite significant). You can indeed buy health insurance for a very short period, like the time in between jobs. Leaving your job is a "qualifying life event" and you can choose between COBRA or signing up for a different health plan (on an Obamacare exchange, I guess) in a "special enrollment period."

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> >>> grew fed up with covering for mediocre performance by my peers

Would love to hear your peer's thoughts about this.

</comment><comment><USER9> Sounds like you need to move back home, take a break for awhile, then start making your own startup, if you want a real adventure your own thing is the path to go. What kinda skills do you have?

</comment><comment><USER10> What's your stack? We're hiring at eShares. Send me an email: jared at esharesinc dot com</comment>


Ask HN : Is there a free API or database for academic publications? - <AUTHOR> I am wondering if there is any free API or database from which one can obtain (say) a list of all academic publications in 2016? I looked around a bit and couldn't find anything promising so far. Any information is appreciated. <comment><USER2> This API is free, though somewhat incomplete:

      int publish(const char *document, size_t doc_size, const char *type);
      int obtain(char **document, size_t *doc_size, const char *doc_id);

HTH.</comment>