Design Patterns for Avionics Control Systems (1994) - <AUTHOR> http://gee.cs.oswego.edu/dl/acs/acs/acs.html

<comment><AUTHOR> _" From a structural perspective, an ACS may be seen as an instance of a Model-View-Controller (MVC) design[7]. An ACS maintains a ``reactive'' model of the world that is controlled via updates in response to new data sources"_

What's old is new again!</comment>


Seriously: what's the "next big thing" in tech? - <AUTHOR>

If you went to a high-tech university during WW2, electronics and radio engineering was huge. If you were born somewhere around 1955, by the time you were in your early 20s you had the chance to start the biggest personal computer or operating system software company in the world. If you were web-savvy in the late 90s and early 00s you could have created online payment systems, web stores, a search engine, or a social network.
It's 2013 and I have no idea what the next big thing(s) might be. Things feel small now, like everyone's picking off the lowest-hanging fruit, e.g. trivial mobile apps, me-too companies, X-for-Y startups, etc.
But in this post, I ask HN: what fields are going to be big, and how can a young engineer/entrepreneur be apart of them early on?
Cheers <comment><USER2> (b0ttler0cket):

What's the next big thing? It may not be all that hard to perceive. You're on Hacker News so you may be biased immediately to think it has something directly to do with programming and computers. Take a step back from that first, and you can immediately think of a couple.

1\. Privacy/advertisements. (how are people going to sell things to us?)

2\. Press/print materials. (print? it's gonna be old news right? save the trees?)

3\. Security (everything's in the open now. how do we adjust? how do we protect information?)

4\. Health (we shouldn't have as many problems as we do)

5\. Transportation (our cities are getting bigger and "rural" is a word that basically means "hard to transport to.")

6\. Environment (our environment is imminently approaching toxic and uninhabitable levels of pollution)

7\. Energy (our resources are rapidly and imminently depleting)

8\. Economics (crypto-what?)

9\. Architecture (these buildings need to get way higher and more sophisticated. we're going to hit 9B ppl soon. rural chinese farmers are swarming to the cities (read that in an article). it's the worldwide trend. the buildings of the future:the buildings of today::the buildings of today:17th century colonial houses)

10\. Engineering (okay, so a transatlantic underwater tunnel would be the single highest costing thing humankind would have ever attempted. even still, what more can we do? is the San-Francisco bridge et al. the best we got?)

11\. Education (this is covered by every politician and so should be self- explanatory. more wide-spread systems of education. online is a start, but I read in an article (I think posted on HN) that the drop out rate is too high.)

12\. Food (more people, more crops. more crops, more transportation, more oil, more livestock, more energy expended. Not to mention, bio-engineered food that produces more vitamins/essential nutrients - depending on who you ask, this is either a blessing or a curse)

I feel like categorization is helpful here. You ask for the next big thing, but that question is so enormous. One person could say one thing, but how could another person argue against it being the next biggest? Is there a metric with which we can compare impact? And impact on what? Society? Businesses? Individual people? Microorganisms? I think if you categorize like this you'll have a much easier time thinking and ranking ideas. Comparing the next ideas in architecture and the next ideas in food development is quintessential apples and oranges. Here we're making it so that we can make better subjective judgments about what's a more important idea.

</comment><comment><USER3> Meta-Materials, BioTech, Quantum Computing & 3D Printing - together these will allow us to create new and diverse physical products.

Meta-Materials - Look to graphene, aerographite, graphene-gel, carbon- nanotubes etc. there are some pretty awesome new materials scientists are coming up with and their potential uses are too diverse to list.

Bio-Tech - There was an article here on HN a few weeks ago about Medi-Gel, a substance that can close severe wounds in no-time. We can read the visual input from a persons eye-balls by scanning the brain. We can (kinda) integrate digital cameras directly into the brain (with limited resolution). We can grow cells (potentially organs) in labs. We can make mechanical hearts. We're about to embark on mapping the human brain. Nanotechnology, etc...

Quantum Computing - I know I may get laughed off HN for this one, but give it time, it may happen. Imagine if that computing power was packed into smaller devices, perhaps even combined with some of the tech discussed here. There's even speculation that the NSA have built a Quantum computer - which is theory could crack ciphers in times orders of magnitudes faster than todays super- computing technology.

3D Printing - This may seem like old-hat news with the recent advent of the hobbyist 3D Printing scene but consider that businesses have been using stereolithography techniques on a much-improved larger scale with better resolution. In theory, we could in the near future 3D print large scale objects in short-spaces of time using a mixture of materials.

I agree with b0ttler0cket, the common-view these days is that most software engineering is less innovation and more iteration. I think most of the premises and ideas behind writing software have largely been the same for the past 30 years and in our most recent years we've seen how combining cutting edge physical technologies has created new marketplaces for never before thought of products. Software just helps integrate and automate that new hardware.

</comment><comment><USER4> We're starting to see a flurry of innovative user interface devices. Touch was just the beginning, we now have finger tracking, muscle flex detection, Kinect, Google Glass etc - some convergence of these technologies could result in an über-interface.

Another big area to consider is how we're going to deal with the avalanche of information that we're slowly all coming under. I use Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, HN, Instagram etc and I want ways to bring all of the relevant news to the surface. Technology that understands my interests and can help me to find not just what has become popular but also to discover interesting things that others haven't yet and share it with them whilst still respecting my privacy.

These are just what I'm personally excited about, but I think what we're really starting to see now is compartmentalisation and niche areas with high- specificity each getting their focus groups, not simply a case of "lowest- hanging fruit" - although there is a lot of that as more and more people get involved in trying to be a part of 'the next big thing'. It's more likely to be YOUR next big thing as opposed to THE next big thing.

So there is no longer that one overarching emergent technology anymore simply because the democratisation of all the previous technologies is enabling more and more people to focus on the finer details, improving their little corner of the sandbox.

To get involved, pick a niche that you're interested in and see if the skills you already have can be adapted in any way to mesh with any new technologies. Or look for problems that may not yet have been found and work to solve them. One of these could become your next big thing.

</comment><comment><USER5> The next big thing won't be the next big thing until it is obviously was the next big thing. It may be more productive to focus on a problem and see how far you could make progress on it. If you make enough progress, it becomes the next big thing. For example, I've been dreaming about speeding up software development. There are a lot of pieces of that puzzle across tools, project management, training, etc. I think about it a lot and over time through my career I want to explore all sorts of ways to go faster and faster. Years from now, I'm sure software developers will say how slow things used to be just like we surely can make comparisons to the past of punch card computing and manual memory management.

In terms of watching the future unfold as a spectator, perhaps self-driving cars or 3-D printers are the next big thing.

</comment><comment><USER6> You may be overly pessimistic about what today feels like in comparison to some imagined golden age. Back then felt a lot like today, actually.

I think relevant fields are healthcare, energy and food. All of those are hard to attack by startups or individuals.

Being of the age now where I can spend money on stuff I'd like to see (and build myself):

\- more personalized health care, cheap high resolution MRIs, cheap signal processing for any vital sign that can be measured with cheapl sensors, large anonymous databases that can map my data into what might be wrong with me

\- swarms of drones for fun and profit, especially if we can build the equivalent of a wireless sensor network funded by many individually owned drones. Not sure how this could pay off, though.

</comment><comment><USER7> The next big field is going to be Potatoes, son.

(But in all seriousness, the reason you see low-hanging-fruit being picked is because everyone is still trying to figure out how best to employ the internet - you're seeing microeconomies rising and falling at a rapid pace, innovation both thriving and being stifled - there's a lot of flux at the moment. When everything clicks into place, it's possible that everyone will need to be an entrepreneur in their own way.)

</comment><comment><USER8> > _"If you were web-savvy in the late 90s and early 00s you could have created > online payment systems, web stores, a search engine, or a social network."_

Brin/Page, Bezos (or Graham/Morris), Musk...these weren't just people with web saavy. They all had advanced degrees or for Bezos "just" a Princeton degree and eight years on Wall Street.

 _"The best way to predict the future is to invent it."_ \- Alan Kay, 1971

</comment><comment><USER9> I have a hunch that it's going to be about getting useful and relevant information out of big data. Analyzing 'Big Data' using techniques from machine learning is getting a lot of hype, as it is starting to prove itself as a powerful predictive tool. Companies that will be big in the future will take advantage of these techniques to solve major problems in education, healthcare, robotics, etc.

<comment><USER10> That's the now, not the future.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Certainly realtime stuff for dynamic data.

Instead of trying to predict "what" will come next, you should be asking: what are the commonalities? what will stay the same? what can you envision becoming simplified?

</comment><comment><USER10> \- augmented reality driven by cheap, fast devices

\- super pervasive technology. your phone is your computer...or is your computer your phone...?

\- mesh networks and/or global wireless

</comment><comment><USER12> technical answer: [backbone] models is the new DOM

non-technical: app networks formed by much smaller, more open apps loosely connected into swarming alliances

people: as software eats the world, there will emerge a class of blue collar coders, see <http://dashes.com/anil/2012/10/the-blue-collar-coder.html>

</comment><comment><USER13> the future is always among us. just see around! the correct answer is:

space

</comment><comment><USER14> Robotics or Virtual Reality</comment>


A unified workspace for all your all your files - <AUTHOR> https://desk.ahome-it.com/#!@/mtl <comment><AUTHOR> Let us know what you think. Ideas, critics are very welcome :)</comment>


CamelCase vs underscores: Scientific showdown - ux-app http://whathecode.wordpress.com/2011/02/10/camelcase-vs-underscores-scientific-showdown/

<comment> ux-app I was surprised to see a 50:50 split for camelcase vs underscores, especially with a reasonably sized sample (~1500 votes)

My own preference is for underscores and judging by a lot of the javascript I read I was expecting a landslide in favor of camelcase.

<comment><AUTHOR> I'm with you on preferring underscores.

I noticed that one of the 'benefits' of CamelCase was that it's easier (aka. faster) to type however I'm not convinced that's a benefit. In my mind, each line of code should involve spending some time thinking about its content and structure both as an individual line and within the context of the broader codebase. Underscores force you to slow down and consider your variables and to me that seems beneficial.

Maybe if you're hacking together some fast script that you want to rapidly test and debug then coding speed would be beneficial but I have always approached coding as a slower, more deliberate step-by-step process. This may however stem from my mainly doing code in Matlab, et. al. for computational analysis, where considering how the maths is performed is just as important as laying down variables.

(Disclaimer: Unless I'm doing a night-before homework assignment in uni, at which point my variable names become 'fuck', 'fuckfuck', 'fuckitall', etc.)

</comment></comment><comment><USER2> Given the many views this blog post has gotten, I've decided to finally write up a short summary of some follow up studies which have been done: [http://whathecode.wordpress.com/2013/02/16/camelcase-vs- unde...](http://whathecode.wordpress.com/2013/02/16/camelcase-vs-underscores- revisited/)

</comment><comment><USER3> I'd be okay with _consistently_ using underscores, but a pet peeve of mine is that Python's PEP 8 underscoring rule is subjective; you're allowed to do things like "isinstance" because it's "easy" to read, so when you use some method you really have no idea if it'll be some_method(...) or somemethod(...) :/

</comment><comment><USER4> Speed of reading is not a benefit; I prefer careful comprehension to quick comprehension.</comment>


I was afraid to code – until I learned it could let me build anything - <AUTHOR> https://blog.appacademy.io/afraid-to-code-until_i_learned_it_could_let_me_build_anything/ <comment><USER2> Great story and info</comment>


Older female elk perfect the art of survival - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/15/science/female-elk-hunters.html <comment><USER2> Interesting article. Not really on topic but I find the title of this post rather comical. I think one could safely say that any organism that reaches old age has perfected the art of survival. No?</comment>


Web scraping doesn't violate anti-hacking law, appeals court rules - <AUTHOR> https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2019/09/web-scraping-doesnt-violate-anti-hacking-law-appeals-court-rules/ <comment><USER2> We had a startup scraping travel info, it was considered borderline but the legal issues were the last of the problems. It was an arms-race at building better bot versus better defences. It was fun, but it gets boring real quick.

</comment><comment><USER3> But that it's not hacking doesn't mean it's legal. That depends on the site's terms of service.

And even if it's legal to scrape it may not be legal to use. See also: copyright law.</comment>


San Francisco median one bedroom apartment rent hits a new peak of $3,690 - <AUTHOR> https://www.cnet.com/news/san-franciscos-outrageous-rent-hits-a-new-peak-highest-in-the-us/ <comment><USER2> Note that Zumper is _not_ a reliable source for median rent data. CityObservatory wrote an article about their data problems a few years ago [1]. Zumper's data is, of course, based on apartments that are for rent and doesn't include currently occupied units. That alone skews high, especially when there is a lot of higher-rent new construction hitting the market. Also, it looks like Zumper's data skews towards higher-end neighborhoods.

For a broader look at the rental market, including occupied units and rent- controlled units, you could just consult ACS data. That says that median rent for all occupied 1-bedrooms in San Fransisco was $1912 in 2017 [2].

[1] [http://cityobservatory.org/journalists-should-be-wary-of- med...](http://cityobservatory.org/journalists-should-be-wary-of-median-rent- reports/)

[2] [https://censusreporter.org/data/table/?table=B25031&geo_ids=...](https://censusreporter.org/data/table/?table=B25031&geo_ids=16000US0667000&primary_geo_id=16000US0667000)

<comment><USER3> I guess it depends on what question you're asking. You seem to be pointing out that you think the real question is: "what is the median rent for anyone living in San Francisco?" whereas Zumper seems to be more answering the question: "if someone moved to San Francisco today, and has zero connections, what rent would they pay?" Both are valid questions, but I think it's good to set the context for if you're having a conversation about "general median rent" vs "newcomer median rent."

<comment><USER4> Even then, it's not as clear. First off, median caries the implication that these are all "valid" places, whereas in reality, most apartments that are still up for grabs probably aren't rented for a reason, therefore including them in a median is misleading.

Next up, the data itself needs to be "fresh" for this to work. It could be that cheaper apartments appear on the market frequently, but are rented right away. So as someone new in the city, you could find these cheap places if you looked for a bit, but a single survey will probably not catch these.

A better approach would be to look at the median of all _new_ rented apartments throughout the year. That will give you an idea of what someone who comes to the city will realistically pay.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> On one hand, it's a very high price. On the other hand, no one is entitled to a one bedroom unit in the heart of one of the human epicenters in the world. Many people here have roommates or alternate living arrangements.

There are several reasons why the prices have gotten so high (lack of supply, politics, etc).

But don't expect to move your Texas ranch or Midwestern single-family-house lifestyle to SF with no compromises.

But in return for your compromises, you will get quite a bit in return.

Is it worth it? That's a very personal decision. For many, it's not. For many, it is.

<comment><USER6> > On one hand, it's a very high price. On the other hand, no one is entitled > to a one bedroom in the heart of one of the human epicenters in the world. > Many people here have roommates or alternate living arrangements.

New York is the "human epicenter" in the US. San Francisco is in the same tier as Houston or DC: [https://www.lboro.ac.uk/gawc/world2018t.html](https://www.lboro.ac.uk/gawc/world2018t.html).

Paying New York/London prices to live in a city that is not New York or London is just sad.

<comment><USER7> SF maximizes technological intelligence, Wall Street maximizes financial intelligence. Plenty of overlap, but the top talent stays where the rest of the top talent is.

<comment><USER6> Having technological intelligence doesn't make San Francisco a "human epicenter" (whatever that is). I wouldn't even call San Francisco a technological epicenter. Even within computer technology, much of the most important technological intelligence in the US is outside San Francisco: in Portland (Intel), Seattle (Microsoft), San Diego (Qualcomm), and maybe San Jose (Cisco). Put differently, what cities would be most devastating (in terms of impact on US technological capabilities) to lose early in WWIII? I'd put Boston or Seattle ahead of San Francisco.

<comment><USER8> Agreed, SF has a lot of tech companies, but a lot of them don't do things that ate very valuable for society, many are social networking/advertising.

<comment><USER6> I think consumer tech is valuable in the sense that our peace-time economy is based on consumption, and San Francisco is great at helping us consume. But when I hear the word epicenter I'm thinking "what'd put us back in the Stone Age if we didn't have it?"

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I just visited New York on an extended trip.

Most of NYC is better connected, more vibrant, more concerts, more sports, more universities, more housing, more international people, more business activity.

Yet, NYC is affordable with a "functioning" commute system. People on all spectrum of income can live there.

SF bay area has none of all that and yet is super expensive wasteland of suburbia. SF city is better but not even comparable to major cities of the world.

The only thing SF has going on for it is weather, outdoors (for which you need a car and a parking spot) and tech companies.

For any young padawans considering SF, it has its attractions but you won't know what a bubble it is until you get out. It's not worth spending one single life in the bubble.

<comment><USER10> SF is not the Bay Area, the data often gets confused.

And SF is oddly very, very different from San Jose or Palo Alto - they're literally different climates, like 10 degrees differential on most days!

SF proper is a very small city, less than 1m people!.

<comment><USER9> That is true. That's why I wrote:

>> SF bay area has none of all that and yet is super expensive wasteland of suburbia. SF city is better but not even comparable to major cities of the world.

Most SV jobs are in the bay area. Even concerts, sports, shows in SF are in bay area not in SF proper.

SF proper is smaller than Jersey City or Brooklyn, with lesser walking stores/restaurants, lesser community activities and anyone not in a rent controlled apartment cannot live a life without stress in SF proper.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I think high rent prices are bad for a number of reasons:

Less flexibility in starting a company: You can't choose to bootstrap unless you do it as a side hustle at a megacorp, and it's hard to not compete with a megacorp because it does everything. You have to take VC funding and follow VC rules to some degree, and it may not be a direction you wish to follow. This is a feedback loop.

Oligopsony employment conditions: If you wish to build savings and not spend all your money on rent, you can really only work for the largest and best funded companies, and even then you need to negotiate at a disadvantage, since they have far more information on the employment markets (because they're big) and they each know the other big players (because they're few) and can bound salaries through price leadership. This is also a feedback loop.

I'm concerned we will see fewer "real" companies like Intel/Apple, and more Snapchat clones and e-scooter startups. Less meaningful bets, less drive, and more complacency -- borne out of the desire to cannibalize social trust (e.g. if you work hard, you earn shelter) and the societal fabric (e.g. all people deserve shelter as a basic human right) for privatized financial gain.

<comment><USER12> > _all people deserve shelter as a basic human right_

I hear this a lot and it still makes absolutely no sense. Where will they get the shelter from? What if the builder doesn't want to build a house for that person? Is the plan to force the labor out of them? Every positive right that I have ever seen comes along with an implicit demand that somebody else become a slave.

<comment><USER13> What will you do when it happens to you? That you have no place to live?

Because it will.

<comment><USER14> What makes you think that will happen to them? Most people don't end up homeless at some point in their life.

<comment><USER13> More people than you think and it gets more common over time.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Excuse my ignorance. SF doesn't look anywhere like Hong Kong, possibly the most crowed places on earth, and it is not close to Tokyo or Seoul. It has plenty of Spaces, for many coming from Asia, most part of SF is like country side so to speak.

What cant there be more housing development on the edge of SF, or taller building with many smaller apartments etc. Underground packing lot?

Edit: Ok, is it because it is in an Earthquake zone?

<comment><USER16> From what I've heard it's very difficult to develop new housing in San Francisco due to various regulations. Apparently, you even need to apply for permits to change your windows. Having lived in Hong Kong and Shenzhen, San Francisco does feel like country side.

<comment><USER13> > Apparently, you even need to apply for permits to change your windows.

Needing a permit to install windows is a thing everywhere. Because if you want a really good way to ruin a house, installing windows wrong is a great way to do it.

<comment><USER16> Everywhere in the world or everywhere in California? If the former, I find it amazing that house owners ruining their house by replacing windows is a universal problem and that requiring permits solves it.

<comment><USER13> Pretty much every developed part of the world requires permits for such things. Why permits? Because building codes are as old as civilization.

[https://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=5181e80b-f307...](https://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=5181e80b-f307-42e6-a357-c2d081b678ff)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> When headhunters contact me about SF (or even Bay Area) jobs, I just scoff and shut them down. If you're fresh out of school, no family, and willing to live in a hovel for some interesting life experience, sure. But if you're an adult, it's no way to live. And putting kids through it is frankly unethical.

<comment><USER18> Well it depends.

I'll agree with you that if you work at a rando tech startup, the costs of living are going to be quite high, and make it probably not worth it.

 _But_ , the whole equation changes if you are working for a big 5 tech company, or _hot_ unicorn company.

These companies will pay you double what the rando startups pay. Who really cares if you are paying 40k a year on rent, if your total compensation breaks 250K.

And getting 250k+ as an engineer, with a couple years experience, is only really possible in the Bay area.

<comment><USER19> But the cost of living is so high there that the inflated salaries are pretty much required to bring anyone out there. A company wants to have competitive hiring so they offer a little bit more than competition so what was a $200k job is now $220k. Prices increase to what these inflated salaried workers can afford and the cycle continues. It will be incredible to watch when SF finally starts to allow for more high density housing. Housing prices will fall and the salary bubble will pop. A lot of companies will start cutting back on starting salaries and as a result, experienced workers will start either taking paycuts to switch jobs or be first in line for layoffs because they cost the company too much.

<comment><USER20> This gets causality backwards. Employers don't give a shit about whether employees can afford housing - if they did, we wouldn't have such a big homelessness problem, and our teachers/firefighters/policemen wouldn't live over the mountains in Pleasanton. Employers pay enough to prevent employees from going to a competitor. The reason FANG salaries now hit $300-400K is because Facebook refused to play ball with the wage-fixing cartel that Schmidt/Jobs/et al had worked out, then the DoJ cracked down, and so now that's what you need to pay to keep your software engineers from working for someone else. Then you have a lot of tech workers with extremely fat salaries and not enough housing for everyone who wants to live here, so they bid up rents & housing prices until they're unaffordable for all the middle-income folks who used to live here.

If more high-density housing was built, then rents would fall, middle-income people could live here again, and tech workers could pocket their fat salaries as savings (or live extremely lavish lifestyles). They would still be paid a lot, because there'd always be another tech company around the corner willing to bid up wages to their current level. For the salary "bubble" to pop, a lot of these companies would have to go out of business at once. This was exactly what happened in 2001 and 2009, and it had the predicted results: unemployment spiked, wages fell, rents fell, and people moved out of the Bay Area back to wherever they came from.

<comment><USER21> If that would actually be the case you would have these salaries all around the world, but you don't. Because it's mainly a few big highly profitable companies (FAANG) that can afford these salaries and a big VC and stock market funded bubble around them. And even FAANG pays much lower salaries in cheaper regions, because hightech employers have to give a shit about housing. You can't compare it to teachers.

I think it's a dangerous attitude to think the salaries in CA are the actual worth of a software developer's work. It's just what FAANG can afford to pay. For many companies devs at that price point are not economically sustainable.

<comment><USER20> It absolutely is what FAANG (and newer companies like AirBnB/Uber/Lyft/Stripe/DropBox etc) can afford to pay. And what FAANG can afford to pay is not going to change if more housing gets built in the Bay Area. And yes, for many companies devs at that price point are not economically sustainable, but that's why FAANG are sucking all the oxygen out of the startup developers market and maintaining their oligopsony.

(Also, while there's some variance for cost-of-living in FAANG salaries in different regions, it's not _that_ much. Google developers make less in Beijing than they do in Mountain View, but their salary still looks much more like a Google salary than a Beijing salary.)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> It's an existential issue.

"Peter Thiel: The vast majority of the capital I give companies is just going to landlords" [1]

[1] [https://finance.yahoo.com/news/peter-thiel-vast-majority- cap...](https://finance.yahoo.com/news/peter-thiel-vast-majority-capital-give- companies-just-going-landlords-134709786.html)

<comment><USER22> He could try giving capital to companies in other locations. Rent in Berlin in less than a third of what you pay in SF.

<comment><USER23> True, but having lived in Berlin (Prenzlauer Berg) and Bay Area (Palo Alto) I have to tell you the scenes, and intensity, are very very different. SV in particular (Moreno than SF) is _very_ tech oriented while Belin is more e-commerce and food delivery.

Thiel in particular is German and has made some particularly scathing comments about the German startup scene (to the German press).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> "The federal Department of Housing and Urban Development said last year that a family of four earning up to $118,400 qualified as "low income" in the city. "

For comparison, in NYC, it's $83,450.

<comment><USER25> Median household income in NYC is 50k, which is an interesting contrast.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> I always wonder how those who are not in the high paying jobs can afford to live there. I'm talking about police, fire, EMS, coffeehouse workers, etc.

<comment><USER27> They don't. For example in nearby Atherton the cops have made makeshift sleeping quarters in the police station because they cannot afford to live in the city they work. Many of the homeless in tents or RVs have jobs in the city, the sole reason they're homeless is because there are no homes affordable on a low-wage job.

<comment><USER28> Why aren't these people out in the streets protesting this? It seems so wrong

<comment><USER29> It takes a while before you relize it's wrong and unsubstainable. And then it's too late becouse you have been a waitress or what ever for 3 years and when you move out there are plenty of people willing to take your place before they realize it and so on. Big city hype.

And there are some real natives with rent control housing.

I lived in Palo Alto for half a year before I even though about how the grocery store clerks could affor living there (which they don't). You also notice the lack of children after a while.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> The data is suspect. Anecdotally, and throw browsing the Craigslist classifieds, the rental market seems to have softened some since the peak a year or two ago.

Specifically looking at the Mission, there was a time that a sub-$3000 one bedroom was very rare. Now you can find plenty in the $2500-$3000 range and even some decent ones below $2500.

There is also more inventory.

</comment><comment><USER31> Where I live in Atlantic Canada you can rent the same for $550 USD, or just buy a brand new modern home for $180k USD. People here work remotely for companies like Google. The government will also help fund your startup's product development through various programs (hundreds of thousands of dollars).

Always wanted to move to San Fran but starting to feel pretty grateful about being here.

<comment><USER32> How large is the remote ecosystem there?

</comment></comment><comment><USER33> I have a 4-bedroom house in the country and the _mortgage_ for it is 5 times smaller.

Absolute madness.

</comment><comment><USER34> And in addition to that because it's San Franscisco you don't really own your own home or apartment. You just have a set of things you are allowed to do on it on the whim of the city (ie, no airbnb).

</comment><comment><USER25> For those who live in SF - what's the cost of a one bedroom rent 1 hour from most jobs in SF? I know in NYC you can reliably get that for around 1500.

<comment><USER35> Walnut Creek is about 40m away from SF on Bart. So door-to-door that'd be about an hour commute. Safe, picturesque, good schools and vibrant downtown. The rent there would be about $1800 for a 1BDR.

EDIT: As noted by the sibling post, the reason it is cheap is because Walnut Creek does not have very many tech jobs. Also, the peculiar thing about the Bay Area is that about 15 years or so the tech industry oscillates its epicenter between San Francisco and the South Bay. From Walnut Creek you can reach San Francisco in an hour, but if you have clients/partners/HQ etc in South Bay it is one bad commute.

<comment><USER36> > Safe, picturesque, good schools and vibrant downtown

It's completely dead and devoid of culture.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> You just have to pay attention. Last year this time people said it was $3400, but I rented for $2300 that May.

<comment><USER38> It makes me mildly annoyed that people are getting cheaper rents than me in SF than I am near Boston.

Are these luxury places?

<comment><USER37> They are not. It's just a standard 1 br. SF is a bit peculiar. There are some things I should call out which are different in most rentals in comparison to luxury rentals:

* No Washer/Dryer in the unit. You'll usually share.

* No parking spot.

* No-one will be around to pick up parcels for you.

* You'll have to put the rubbish bins out for the bin man.

* The stove and fridge and heating won't be using the latest stuff. You're not expecting to have a Nest or a Viking but you won't get a nice stove either, it'll be very basic.

Honestly, it's a downgrade in standard of living for me but not to the point that it annoys me. Those things were just luxuries. Really the washer/dryer being in my unit is the one thing I really miss.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> Barcelona, Amsterdam. Same/better quality of life

</comment><comment><USER23> I do t want to install the app just to find out: hasn't this been true in Palo Alto for some time? My ex pays more than that and her place is hardly de luxe.

<comment><USER38> Palo Alto is particularly expensive because of how luxe the area is (from what I understand).

<comment><USER23> I first moved to Palo Alto in 1984 and can assure you that luxe it is not.</comment></comment></comment>


CSI Effect: How Forensic Science on TV Impacts Our Real Justice System - <AUTHOR> http://www.economist.com/science-technology/displaystory.cfm?story_id=15949089

<comment><USER2> Thanks to CSI and relatives, here is what the public thinks image manipulation can do:

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vxq9yj2pVWk>

The ridiculousness may be lost on you if you need an explanation why a digital image of a crappy security camera can't be used to zoom in on a reflection of an eyeball. Or of why a 2-dimensional image can't be used to construct a 3-dimensional image of the scene, that you can rotate to see objects _out_ of the line of view of the camera.

</comment><comment><USER3> My brother-in-law is a homicide detective and is constantly asked by victims' families why is it taking so long to solve cases when it's over in CSI by the end of the hour.

<comment><USER4> He should tell them they're in a multi-episode story that's not in syndication and being broadcast over several weeks.

<comment><USER5> Or better yet, watch <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_First_48> instead of fiction.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Atlanta's crime lab is so backed up most items aren't even submitted unless they are key pieces of evidence; they just won't be ready in time otherwise.

Of course my wife doesn't find this out until after the jury renderered a verdict (with her as a juror). Other than the medical examinier's testimony, there was almost no physical evidence.

</comment><comment><USER7> This might be of interest:

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CSI_effect></comment>


Show HN: Space Shooter – Retro Game Recreated Using Python - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/prodicus/spaceShooter <comment><USER2> I spent much too much of my childhood playing astrosmash!

<comment><AUTHOR> Too good for it's time :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> This reminds me of space impact on the nokia 3310.

<comment><AUTHOR> Good old days :)</comment></comment>


Jenkins the Cow – How to Deploy Jenkins Completely Pre-Configured - <AUTHOR> https://blog.nimbleci.com/2016/10/11/how-to-deploy-jenkins-completely-pre-configured/ <comment><USER3> _Luckily, there is an alternative: we can move all of the configuration of Jenkins into source control. This means that when we deploy Jenkins it is deployed fully configured, so we can treat the instances as cattle instead of pets._

I would take that two steps further:

1\. make an OS package of the configuration, and keep the OS package files plus the configuration under revision control (Bitkeeper, git, Mercurial, ...);

2\. ditch Docker, because at that point, it's superfluous (the OS' software management subsystem worries about the payload and deployments at that point, for example with Kickstart in RHEL / CentOS, or AutoYAST in SLES, or...) - <USER2> code required for installation.

 _We might lose the job build histories when we redeploy (only if we wipe the old Jenkins and redeploy a fresh, but treating Jenkins as cattle implies that this can happen at any time). If keeping the build histories intact is very important to you then you'll have to solve this yourself or keep treating Jenkins as a pet._

That's easy to solve (I already solved it): if Jenkins the application, and Jenkins' configuration is packaged, then the same applies for backup software (Bacula), and backup software's client configuration.

Using the AT&T / SVR4 filesystem hierarchy standard specification, Jenkins can be _engineered_ to deliver:

\- payload in /opt/;

\- configuration in /etc/opt/;

\- _data_ in /var/opt/jenkins/.

Since the client will be automatically configured via the OS package to backup only /var/opt (no point in backing up packaged application and configuration, since they're under revision control and can be reinstalled at will to replay the machine state), only _data_ can be restored and the instance can continue where it left off, _without any loss of state_.

I already do this at scale. No Docker needed at all, and servers, be they virtual or physical, are completely disposable.

<comment><AUTHOR> Excellent! Thanks for the detailed description!

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Great post. I've seen first hand the problems that occur with all the uncontrolled 'state' in Jenkins installations when something goes wrong... lots of manual work!

It's like moving Jenkins towards a static website model where you can always get back to a known state quickly and easily.

At hyper.sh we've been working to take this a step further by providing fast starting (couple of seconds), secure and highly-parallelized on-demand CI worker nodes.

We started with Buildbot (released yesterday: [https://blog.hyper.sh/serverless-ci-hyper-docker- integration...](https://blog.hyper.sh/serverless-ci-hyper-docker-integration- for-buildbot.html)) and the Jenkins plugin is coming up next.

That makes a dream situation whereby you have a Jenkins master that can be easily restored from version control and all workers are created on-demand and billed per second meaning that there is no worker node maintenance at all and you only pay when you're building.

We're calling it 'Serverless CI'. Would love to talk to you about this further. You can find contact details on the website if interested!</comment>


Building an Open Core Company: Interview with GitLab's CEO - <AUTHOR> https://about.gitlab.com/2016/07/14/building-an-open-source-company-interview-with-gitlabs-ceo/ <comment><USER3> Hands down the best open source community with a commercial offering I've ever dealt with. The company really clearly gives a $&@"! about what people feel is right and wrong with the product components and has always heard me out - <USER2> if people disagreed with me (god forbid I might be wrong about something!).

I truly have grown to love GitLab and the team that develops and supports it, it's probably the fastest moving OSS project I've _ever_ seen, and every release is clearly getting better (although there are some UI changes recently that bug me, but that might just be me).

Thank you yet again everyone involved with gitlab and it's varying components (especially gitlab-CI) both internally within the company and those contributing either code or conversations from around the world.

Gitlab has enabled us @infoxchange to move faster than ever before, with a low TCO and a responsive support team.

I salute you!

<comment><USER4> Thanks, I return your salute.

It is great to know that GitLab is contributing to your not-for-profit with its 'technology for social justice' mission.

We also heard from other people that the navigation redesign is not ideal. I think the big picture change is welcome but some things are taking too many clicks. But we would love more feedback with examples. The thinking behind our navigation redesign is detailed in [https://about.gitlab.com/2016/06/06/navigation- redesign/](https://about.gitlab.com/2016/06/06/navigation-redesign/) Please comment on that blog post (or create an issue) with what we can improve.

Thanks for your kind words, we'll keep shipping!

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Gitlab is great stuff, but as a business model for open source, I always considered open core as somewhat toxic. When your community is trying to add features in your commercial implementation, you're "competing with yourself", which in this context, is actually a bad thing. I saw it wreck havoc in the ZenOSS community years ago.

David Neary does a most excellent post on why: [https://blogs.gnome.org/bolsh/2010/07/19/rotten-to-the- open-...](https://blogs.gnome.org/bolsh/2010/07/19/rotten-to-the-open-core/)

<comment><USER4> Yes, we recognize we have to walk a fine line. In [https://about.gitlab.com/about/#stewardship](https://about.gitlab.com/about/#stewardship) we detail our policy regarding this. It starts with "When someone contributes a feature to CE that is already in EE we have a hard decision to make. We hope that people focus on contributing features that are neither in CE nor EE. This way both edits benefit from a new feature and GitLab Inc. don't have to make a hard decision."

<comment><USER6> Can you explain the "hard decision"?

Is it that you have to choose between two implementations for the same or overlapping features, meaning someone's work gets thrown out?

Or do you mean that you have to decide whether to reject the freely offered CE pull request because it undermines the value-add of EE?

<comment><USER4> Both are options and we will make that trade-off according to the criteria mentioned. So far all our decisions were easy (low quality contribution or code copied from EE) but someday we'll have to make a hard decision.

<comment><USER6> To me the second reason is a serious conflict of interest issue and severely undermines the open source community spirit of your open core. GitLab's Inc would no longer be benevolent dictator for life, just plain old dictator.

<comment><USER4> I meant that rejecting an MR is always an option. We will never do that only because it undermines the value-add of EE.

As stated on [https://about.gitlab.com/about/#stewardship](https://about.gitlab.com/about/#stewardship) we will consider multiple factors.

I just updated these factors to make sure everything that comes to mind is listed there in [https://gitlab.com/gitlab-com/www-gitlab- com/commit/8e22bb93...](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-com/www-gitlab- com/commit/8e22bb935da1bca44e220862e93c2da7aa72b606)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I've been impressed with the GitLab founder in every interaction I've had with him. He treats people well and makes an effort to connect with every dev/person interested in his product. He's building a great culture.

<comment><USER4> Thanks, I'm humbled by your comment. I hope to make it more clear that this is a team effort and I'm a spokesperson.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> In the article Sid mentions that "according to research, by 2019 80 cents of every dollar spent on software will go to on premises or single tenant software."

Does anyone know which research he's quoting?

<comment><USER9> I'd love to know the source too.

But this matches what I am seeing right now as well as predicting for the future.

SaaS is a powerful distribution model but IaaS has gotten so good that it's in many ways easier to run many small things than one big thing. And when you run many small things huge benefits arise:

* security and isolation. Single tenant by default.

* control. Upgrade when it's convenient for your company, not your provider.

* Cost efficiency. Freemium SaaS requires burning VC cash. Open source + self serve demo doesn't

* customization. Set your own feature flags or add your own patches to fit the software to your business

Everything is cyclical. I think "install this software on your [cloud] computer" is going to be a big trend again.

<comment><USER10> Yup, this is why at work we have our multi-tenant SaaS using a different database for each tenant. That way if they want to split to self/dedicated- cloud hosting later down the road we can move them without any hassle.

Edit: I describe our thought process here if it's useful to anyone else: [https://tomschlick.com/2015/11/29/lessons-from-building- mult...](https://tomschlick.com/2015/11/29/lessons-from-building-multi-tenant- apps-part-1-databases)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> The interviewer asks if the community edition is a good funnel into the enterprise edition, but doesn't ask what I see as the converse; which I'd hoped for:

"Does making the source available restrict pricing options, or completely lose would-be users - or would self-hosters never be customers anyway?"

This has been bugging me and holding me off a project that I'd like to be open-source; I just can't help wondering what stops someone from thinking "well I'm just going to host your source code, and undercut you". I'm all for a competitive market - but not if I do all the work and we only compete on how to price it!

<comment><USER12> Stupid question but couldn't you release it under a license that prohibits selling a hosted version of your software? It wouldn't pass the OSI test but would achieve some goals. Users could self-host if they don't want to pay you but no one can undercut you.

<comment><USER11> That's not a stupid question, it's a good answer :)

I suppose I wouldn't expect to be able to (afford to) defend it, but I imagine being in breach of a licence would be deterrent enough for anyone looking to operate at anything but trivial (that is ignorable; not a threat) scale.

Thanks.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> > Open source is wind in your back.

So true. Open source lets small engineering teams punch above their weight. Thousands of extra eye balls on the code for QA make it so much better. And the project-user feedback loop is fast.

<comment><USER4> For sure we think we're punching above our weight. We're less than 100 people and are competing with multi-billion dollar companies likes GitHub.

Some other benefits of our open core model:

1\. Remote only is the default way of working, allowing us to hire great people around the world.

2\. Our open core model attracts great people, it is rare to have no recruiting problem for engineering.

3\. Our technical interview is adding a feature to GitLab, ensuring we test exactly the skills we need when you join.

<comment><USER14> (vonnik's cofounder here)

We don't have a careers page on purpose. Right now the best hires either come from very strong referrals or fall in to our lap via the oss community. People who ask us about hiring: we just tell them to join the oss community.

It saves us a lot of time.

<comment><USER15> This seems like it would preclude people who love what you are doing, but also love to do things after work that aren't around programming.

<comment><USER14> We get referrals for other roles. But yeah: that's more or less on purpose.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> > [Without telemetry] Do you have to rely on users asking for features then?

How does telemetry affect that? I can see that you would maybe prioritize work on improving different features depending on what gets used most or what crashes most, but how should telemetry help you decide what features to include?

<comment><USER4> Two examples:

1\. You might find that some parts are more heavily used than you thought (for example the wiki) and you prioritize making them better.

2\. You find that many people use CI and not many use CD so you add features to make the transition easier.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> The true core of GitHub (and GitLab) is Git itself. So both are open core where it really matters. Because both GitHub's and GitLab's essential operations are all done over the Git core, neither code and code history hosted on either system are locked in.

Where GitHub has slightly more lock-in and is less open than GitLab is its Issues system; One can only extract the data (via API) for import into an alternative system, whereas with GitLab you could run your own copy of the open source code (but you'd still have to do the data export-import as far as I can tell).

(copied my comment from a duplicate thread)

</comment><comment><USER17> Great interview with a lot of good advice for anyone starting their own OSS- based business.

Making EE "open source" (not "Open Source") is a brave move but I think anyone who's done this work before knows that having the source available for viewing doesn't really matter much to actual customers with money - a packaged solution with long-term support and legal compliance are their main concerns.

<comment><USER4> Thanks for the kind words Mike and thanks for Sidekiq, we use it extensively in GitLab.

We decided to package GitLab Community Edition to make it very quick to install. So our open source users get the same easy installation and the same security updates and our Enterprise Edition customers.

We find that large enterprises are interested in some of the features [https://about.gitlab.com/features/#compare](https://about.gitlab.com/features/#compare) and not in any of the other things. Maybe the best example is a user if China with more than 6000 developers that decided to copy the code of some features over to the Community Edition. This is illegal if you don't have a subscription but I think it shows that the features do matter. Our policy is to put features that are more useful if you have more than 100 users in the Enterprise Edition [https://about.gitlab.com/about/#stewardship](https://about.gitlab.com/about/#stewardship)

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> I was excited to read how open source philosophy is ingrained into Gitlab and how it helps them grow but the article rather skims over it.

<comment><USER4> This blog post was a writeup of Jason asking me questions because of personal interest. I would be happy to do a 1 hour skype call with you if you promise to write it up afterwards. Please email marketing at our company domain if you're interested. Please link to this comment in your email.

<comment><USER18> That's great. Thank you. But I am not much of a writer. I was just curious. Maybe somebody else can use this opportunity to write about it.

<comment><USER4> Yep, everyone can contribute and is free to take me up on that offer.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> I was going to try it out after many months... and it is down :( [https://twitter.com/gitlabstatus/status/755878196634087424](https://twitter.com/gitlabstatus/status/755878196634087424)

<comment><USER20> Is gitlab.com just a demo? I have always found it horrible slow and unstable.

<comment><USER4> I agree it is too slow. We're working on improving it in [https://gitlab.com/gitlab- com/operations/issues/42](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-com/operations/issues/42) (now down)

This release contains improvements that made very long issues load in 2 seconds instead of 6.

<comment><USER20> Maybe this is a case where ruby is just not the right tool, how does github does it?

honest questions:

Is performance not that important for gitlab cause your revenue comes from self-hosted, where performance might be less of an issue because of lower load? Isn't gitlab highly concerned with a new company starting a similar product in a more efficient language implementation and eating your lunch?

apologize if these questions sound a bit harsh, gitlab is doing great work and lots of users enjoy your product, I guess these is one of the perks for exposing yourself too much to the community ;)

<comment><USER4> This is not due to Ruby, both we and GitHub use that. We do offload some tasks to Go processes with GitLab workhorse to take advantage of multithreading. But therr are a few reasons GitLab.com is slow:

1\. I didn't prioritize growing our infrastructure team after raising our A round, for a long time it was one person running GitLab.com. In the last couple of months I realized my error and now we're about 8 people and hiring.

2\. We're shipping a lot of new features every month and we where not monitoring for performance regressions. We have better monitoring in place now.

3\. GitLab.com runs on one file server. This release adds the capability to add multiple ones. We are also testing Ceph to make it completely distributed.

4\. Some problems only occur at scale. GitLab.com is running GitLab Enterprise Edition with more than 500k accounts created. This causes problems that don't occur at 10k users.

5\. Our monitoring infrastructure has been coarse. We're now using Prometheus to improve this.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Lots of companies use Jira for issues and Github/Gitlab for code. It's a painful divide. Do Gitlab and/or Github have plans to rescue such companies from that situation?

<comment><USER22> Take a look at GitLab's plan for Issue Boards ([https://gitlab.com/gitlab- org/gitlab-ce/issues/17907](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab- ce/issues/17907)). It's not quite Jira, more like Trello, but a great step in solving modern issue management and planning.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Any chance GitLab will add Mercurial support?

<comment><USER4> Almost no chance, if anything we would add SVN support but I think that is already too much technical complexity.

Consider using [https://rhodecode.com/](https://rhodecode.com/)

<comment><AUTHOR> Why SVN over Mercurial?

<comment><USER4> There are more people using SVN than Mercurial.

<comment><AUTHOR> I saw somewhere else that you used Google trends to show how git was more popular than Mercurial. However you didn't consider "hg". Here is the trend for Mercurial vs SNV

[https://www.google.ca/trends/explore#q=svn%2C%20hg%2C%20Merc...](https://www.google.ca/trends/explore#q=svn%2C%20hg%2C%20Mercurial%2C%20subversion&cmpt=q&tz=Etc%2FGMT%2B4)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Here's the open source definition:

[https://opensource.org/osd-annotated](https://opensource.org/osd-annotated)

Gitlab EE, which is how Gitlab makes its money, comes nowhere close to meeting that. It's pretty much straight up corporate dishonesty to pretend to be an open source company when you're following a proprietary software model to make money.

You're no more an "Open Source Company" than Apple or Microsoft, who also have some open source projects separate from their main revenue streams.

<comment><USER24> I'll point out that merely being the first to claim "opensource.org" does not allow one to define what the word means for the community at large.

<comment><USER25> I'm not expressing any opinion on the question of whether GitLab is or is not an open source company, but:

Opensource.org isn't just some random website by a random dude. It was setup by (among others) the very same guy that invented the phrase "open source". It should rightfully be considered the canonical definition of open source.

In my experience there is also a group of people that simply don't care about exact definitions or legal implications. They have this overly simplistic view that having access to the source code is all there is to it to be "open source". That's probably the group of people you refer to when you say "the community at large". I have no idea how big group is, or whether it is big at all. But I do think they are wrong.

<comment><USER26> _In my experience there is also a group of people that simply don 't care about exact definitions or legal implications. They have this overly simplistic view that having access to the source code is all there is to it to be "open source". That's probably the group of people you refer to when you say "the community at large". I have no idea how big group is, or whether it is big at all. But I do think they are wrong._

I've noticed that some (not all) of the people in this group use the term "open source" for marketing purposes. Sadly, it is a term that attracts uninformed eyeballs.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> Lot's of griping in here about whether or not GitLab is really 'open source'. Typical HN vitriol. I think GitLab is doing fantastic work pushing forward open source philosophies with real world execution. They're putting a lot of their money where their mouth is. Hell, you can clone their ENTIRE corporate website. On top of that, the product they offer (yes, their free, Open Source community edition) is _fantastic_ and continues to improve with each release. I am constantly impressed with how this company operates, and am always trying to roll in more of that to my own company (their Handbook for example is fantastic.)

<comment><USER28> Why is it that the top comment of every debate on HN is without fail something along the lines of "I'm shocked at the negativity here..."?

This cliche is beginning to get a little worn.

<comment><USER29> I agree, but it's also _especially_ shocking anyone would be negative about Gitlab.

Take it from an adamant free software user, contributor and advocate: "Free software purism" is counter-productive and it's honestly disgusting anyone would wag their finger at Gitlab, possibly _the_ most open source example of a real world company out there (yeah, I'd even put them above Red Hat). They have been a model to follow, an extremely inspiring one at that.

Maybe I'm wrong and it's exclusively HN's top paragons of virtue raising their eyebrows? Those that have evolved beyond mortal needs such as money to spend on food and rent, and would be ready to pledge their own possessions to Gitlab Inc (or at the very least, donate to the EFF: [https://supporters.eff.org/donate/](https://supporters.eff.org/donate/)).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> In the interest of objectivity, I'd change the title to read "Open Core" instead of "Open Source"

<comment><USER4> Interesting, I never considered called us an open core business, but I agree it is more accurate and edited the blog post in [https://gitlab.com/gitlab- com/www-gitlab-com/commit/e333cc93...](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-com/www- gitlab-com/commit/e333cc93b17df60ce8f7948896ddf3b714d8ec1d)

<comment><USER4> I'm considering this blog post [https://gitlab.com/gitlab-com/blog- posts/issues/226](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-com/blog-posts/issues/226) to set the record straight, what do you think?

<comment><USER4> I just published it [https://about.gitlab.com/2016/07/20/gitlab-is-open-core- gith...](https://about.gitlab.com/2016/07/20/gitlab-is-open-core-github-is- closed-source/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Gitlab are not an open source company. Their primary revenue generation stream is proprietary software.

<comment><USER31> Care to elaborate? Isn't their primary source of revenue gitlab(-ee) which is open source?

<comment><USER32> AFAIK, the enterprise edition (EE) used to be open source but is now closed [1]. There is an open source "community edition" which has many of the features of the enterprise edition, including self hosting, but lacks others [2].

While I find it unfortunate that GitLab doesn't have it's enterprise edition open sourced, I think they have enough goodwill in the community so that I'm not that angry about it. I would really be interested in hearing from the GitLab folk whether they think making their enterprise edition open source would really hurt their income and if they have any plans on eventually releasing their enterprise edition as open source (again).

TLDR; GitLab has an open core business model.

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GitLab#History](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GitLab#History)

[2] [https://about.gitlab.com/features/](https://about.gitlab.com/features/)

<comment><USER33> I thought the EE was open source: [https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab- ee](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ee)

<comment><USER34> you can look at the source, but it is not "open source": [https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab- ee/blob/master/LICENSE](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab- ee/blob/master/LICENSE)

<comment><AUTHOR> Isn't that open source though? Sure you have to pay, but you get access to the source and you can modify it and use your modified version as long as you pay.

Isn't this the vision that Stallman had about open source or free software and copy left?

<comment><USER35> There is a canonical definition of open source by the OSI[1]

This is generally called source available or public source, like the Unreal Engine, rather than open source, which implies you can actually do something with that source code.

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Open_Source_Definition](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Open_Source_Definition)</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: Simple group contact sharing - <AUTHOR> http://numblee.com/

<comment><AUTHOR> Made this app while I was learning AngularJS. It's quite useful for getting the contact information of everyone in a group (instead of having to pass around phones and risk missing numbers, etc).

Figured I would throw it out here instead of it sitting around on my hard drive! Comments and feedback welcome!</comment>


A Guide to Using Android Without Selling Your Soul to Google - <AUTHOR> https://fieldguide.gizmodo.com/a-guide-to-using-android-without-selling-your-soul-to-g-1827875582 <comment><USER2> This article has a couple of issues. It suggests downloading apks from apkmirror in your browser. While apkmirror is not the worst thing you can do, its security record isn't exactly stellar. Until about a year ago or so, their downloads weren't even https by default. Leaving that aside for a moment, this method has no meaningful signature verification built in. Unless you are going to verify signatures manually, which you most likely aren't, you are just trusting apkmirror. Further, you are adding chrome as a source of apk installers, which opens the door for more questionable apks coming to your phone. If you want apps from the play store, use yalp store.

<comment><USER3> Is yalp better?

<comment><USER2> Yes. Yalp is free software, and yalp is getting them directly from the play store. Yalp is doing the bookkeeping for you. You also don't need to have chrome as an allowed source for installations.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Sony seems to provide an official way to build your own Android ROM without Google:

"For some of the Xperia™ devices, we provide Android™ Open Source Project (AOSP) device configurations on GitHub. This means that the software will be open for you as a developer to use and contribute to. This is a way for us to support the open Android community, and it is also a tool for us to facilitate and verify contributions to AOSP."

[1] [https://developer.sony.com/develop/open- devices/](https://developer.sony.com/develop/open-devices/)

<comment><USER5> The problem is half the stuff doesn't work properly using those because they don't provide drivers for propriety stuff like the camera or playstation services for example. The camera will no longer work in low light and the 23mpx camera takes pics like a 5mpx

<comment><USER2> Yeah, that's a known thing. Sony uses some DRM system for cameras, and you lose the keys when you flash AOSP. If you google around, you can hack it to save and restore the keys. Not worth buying Sony on general principle. Plenty of other alternatives.

<comment><USER6> > Plenty of other alternatives.

What is one alternative that ships with a Google-free Android in non-China countries?

<comment><USER2> Best option: Pixels, since they are reference designs, and also have support for self-signing builds and using verified boot. You can build AOSP using official documentation. Pricey though. You need to buy the version sold on the google store to get an unlockable bootloader. Carrier versions don't allow it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> No mention of MicroG? [https://microg.org/](https://microg.org/)

It's a very impressive project to reimplement or stub out the Google Play Services APIs so you can use third-party apps that rely on them.

<comment><USER7> To be aware, this still uses google servers. I'm not quite sure what the benefit is then (beside it being open source).

<comment><USER6> It doesn't have to use Google services, it's FLOSS and configurable. For example, you can replace the location backend with one that uses Mozilla's location service: [https://github.com/microg/IchnaeaNlpBackend](https://github.com/microg/IchnaeaNlpBackend)

Furthermore, I think there's a difference between closed-source software running on your device reporting who-knows-what and open-source software that makes known, specific requests to cloud services.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> There's much more you can do, like disabling all Google apps (you usually can't uninstall them), and deleting their data (frees up a tiny bit of space). At least that works on Fairphone OS for FP2, based on Android 6.

I use a combination of F-Droid (most apps) and Yalp (for downloading a small number of free apps from the Google Play Store from parties I mostly trust).

<comment><USER4> As long as you have Google Play Services installed on your smartphone, it's a Google phone, because it can call home whenever it wants.

<comment><USER8> If Google Play Services is disabled, it shouldn't be able to run. Disabling it takes a bit of extra effort, but is possible without rooting, at least on my phone. (The Fairphone forums advise not to root the phone and uninstall it, because then the phone won't boot. That does make me a bit suspicious, but at least the process is not running during normal usage.)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I like that the author provides different degrees of separation. Everytime I tried to do it, I went completely extreme. It was so difficult that I would give up. A middle of the road approach that reduces, but doesn't eliminate, Google's knowledge of me is probably best.

</comment><comment><USER10> I find it rather easy to use android without selling my soul to Google. In fact, I use android on a Google Pixel 2 on Google's own Project Fi network and yet I don't feel as if I've sold my soul to them.

I could switch to an iPhone running iOS on Verizon in the span of a few hours if I felt like it, or just chuck my phone into a river and call it a day. I can install FireFox if I don't want to use Chrome, F Droid if I don't want to use the Play Store, and a huge number of other apps from a huge number of other companies.

The idea that you have to "sell your soul" to Google to use android, even hyperbolically, is stupid.

</comment><comment><USER11> BS With those setting start capturing packets, you probably will reconsider using Android phone.

</comment><comment><USER12> I create a new Google account per device, no real name.

<comment><USER6> It's almost certain that Google knows all those accounts belong to the same human. They can correlate IP addresses, GPS locations, app installs, usage behaviour, etc.

<comment><USER13> They can surely tell if they want to. It used to be their stated policy that they do not try unless requested by law enforcement. I don't know if that policy is still in place.

This is in complete contrast to FB, whose modus of operandi had always been "we will do whatever we can to figure out who you are".</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: What do we, Indian remote workers, have to do? - <AUTHOR>

I'm getting towards the end of my university (CS degree), and I've done a bunch of freelance work (for many of you here even), as well as open source work. But recently, as I've started looking for more long term work, I find people looking to under-pay (the 'indian' tag).
But even that's OK, living here costs less, I can hang. What bothers me most however, is when people hint (or even bluntly say) they're skeptical about hiring remote Indian workers. I have a portfolio, a handful of connections, I've worked hard to prove myself honest, skilled, and hardworking.
So, is the mindset on HN the same as well? I can understand people who've had bad experiences with either Indian, or remote workers, but it's still so frustrating. I'm not interested in the corporate grind - I want to work with a startup where I can actually have a meaningful impact.
So what, my fellow HN'ers, would it take for YOU (you specifically) to hire me? I'm specifically interested in those of you who are in a position to hire, or have experience hiring. What do I have to show? What do I have to say? Hell, at this point, I'm wondering what I have to wear.
And when I say 'me', I mean any young Indian worker who's passionate about what they do but are getting shot down because of external factors.
Thank you for your advice HN! <comment><USER2> Hi,

I understand your pain. Things you could (not must) do:

\- have many recommendations on your LinkedIn profile from previous startups CEO you worked for (a portfolio is great, but I also want proof that things went smootly)

\- show me that you are a long term contributor to an open source project (I know that many startups are afraid that you are gonna close skype and never "show up" again, I think that could reassure them)

\- show me that you have a reputation online (twitter/stackoverflow/HN) if you are an authority I will not be skeptical

\- dont be (too) cheap. cheap = low quality

That's my PoV, and again it's things you could do not must do. You shouldnt need to prove anything more than a US remote worker (in a perfect world).

<comment><USER3> These are awesome recommendations. Get recommendations from anyone you've worked with, on LinkedIn.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> People hate this word, but I will say it anyway, you need to have a brand of your own. Create a presence online (via Linkedin, Github, your own blog etc) with a distinct identity that projects your capabilities. Absent this, people will do the easy thing, which is, generalizing and stereotyping you as just another developer from India or whatever country you come from.

</comment><comment><USER5> I have a much different suggestion that most. Connect with a local group that is already doing work for a start up or major company. Building relationships is far more valuable in my mind then anything else you can do. While having a killer portfolio is good, just like resumes often times porfolios are not as authentic as one would have you believe. Quality relationships that can give you referrals or references are by far the most valuable thing you can develop.

I worked for a large company here in the states that outsourced all of their development to India, we had about 100 full time developers on staff. That team no longer exists however whenever I need to outsource I go to the relationships I established from that team to either contract directly with them or get recommendations from them.

It might not be what you want in the short term, however it is a great way to make connections and reduce the barrier to entry for you.

In my mind the barrier to entry for most startups is time and to a certain extent money. I know I cannot afford to take flyers on developers who I don't have confidence will deliver for me on time and on budget and what is worse if someone fails to deliver not only am I late but I am also out anything I may have paid for the work.

I hope this advice assists you in some way.

</comment><comment><USER6> Your problem is not unique to Indian software contractors.

Unfortunately, there are a lot of profiteering opportunists who will cut and paste code from programming sites and pass it of as their work. Some of the work I've seen wasn't even worth the low rate paid for it. So your key strategy is to rise above that swamp. Bidding for work on some outsourcing site is probably always going to be an uphill battle.

I think that you need to specialize, in an area that really interests you. You'd research the forums in that area and contribute to them. Find open source projects in your area. I would even go as far as to suggest doing a masters degree part-time in that same field. After a while, you start noticing the same people and companies popping up in multiple places. You build contacts with them. You build up a profile of the sorts of companies that do stuff in your area and then you actively seek out others like them.

Yes, as many others have said, you are a brand and that requires persistent marketing and selling activities. When you work for a company, then others fulfill that role. But it still needs to be done in order to succeed.

</comment><comment><USER7> My opinions are known on occasion to be wrong, but ...

You've been given several items of good advice here, none of which is easy, all of which are (as far as I can see) right.

You need to create a "presence" on the web. You need a portfolio of work, writing and comments. You haven't submitted to HN often, but many, many of your submissions have got excellent upvotes. Your comments score less well, showing that you're not adding as much value through them, but that's not surprising.

Work on writing well.

But more importantly, contribute to projects.

Become known.

Then you're not simply a programmer from a country that supplies cheap programming. You're an individual, and you can take on specific tasks, not as an out-sourcer, but as a remote-working contractor.

</comment><comment><USER8> SingAlong,

I have been working with remote workers from India for 20 years. I have not had a single experience compelling me to do so again, since 2000. The choice over the last decade hasn't been mine, but often the result of having to help US corporations solve performance and scalability issues, in conjunction with their on/off shore partners.

I could complain about how various companies from India and how US companies utilizing them have caused terrible harm (both to me and others directly) by a mix of negligent and non-professional behavior, but it has happened to a degree where the feelings have become generalized and deeply and sometimes even actively belligerent towards individuals.

You've received some excellent advice from bjonathan, but I'd also like to encourage you to provide a personalized blog. Include pictures or video about yourself.

Assume that half the resistance to working with you is going to be the dreaded "language barrier". If you can't provide directly transparent and creditable links to your work and references on LinkedIn, I suspect you'll have a very hard time obtaining meaningful work as an individual.

Keep in mind, however, that you're just out of school. You're going to need to do the same thing any other engineer will anywhere else in the world. Mature, gain work experience, demonstrate value, etc.

</comment><comment><USER9> Off topic:

I've always thought that the top talent in India either:

a) left to a G8 type country

or

b) worked at an Indian start-up, that will in times to come, be better placed to understand hyper-scaling than those working soley in the US market.

So why not b? :-P

</comment><comment><USER10> As a person who has twice tried to hire remote/foreign workers, it boils down to this (for me): when I'm looking at markets, how do I differentiate you from the rest?

I've had 2 mediocre/bad experiences, trying to piece out some component work for my startup. Both didn't go well. I thought I had picked the best of the available applications, but in the end, I was unable to distinguish them from each other, so I semi-randomly selected.

If you can figure out how to differentiate (both yourself, as well as a more general solution), I believe you will have solved a major problem in the industry.

</comment><comment><USER11> Stereotyping the indian workers (from India. not the ones from overseas who have _very_ different attitudes):

Love what you do. Enough that you have a portfolio of cool OSS shit I can check out. Enough that you read HN or your favorite Node/Django/Rails sites in your spare time.</comment>


Show HN: Control 3D CAD software with your iPad - <AUTHOR> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4JGgW3vPbu8

<comment><USER2> Neat stuff. How long does it usually take someone to get used to the gestures?</comment>