Google ends plans for smart city in Toronto - <AUTHOR> https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-52572362 <comment><USER2> I know there's gonna be a lot of people here that are happy about this for various reasons (anti-Google, anti-"smart cities", etc), but this is really disappointing for me.

It's true that the concept of "cities" (or even just "gatherings of people") predates the Internet by thousands of years, and that cities themselves haven't adapted much to the Internet and what it enables in the 40ish years it's been around. This project was inspiring because it embraced what's possible in a new way and enabled many new possibilities that wouldn't otherwise be possible in the typical piecemeal upgrades a city typically sees over time (especially in terms of construction guidelines and sustainability). People hated on Sidewalk Labs since its very inception, but I guess they bit off too much area and got shut down by the locals (and, I guess, covid-19 made a handy exit strategy).

Hopefully the next EPCOT equivalent will either be a new city that attracts the kind of people who would want to live there, or at least find a city that would be happy to host their "experiments".

FWIW I previously worked at a "smart cities" company that I won't besmirch, but I will say I would rather see a more well-known (and IMO trustworthy) company that has more experience managing and securing data at scale than them. In experimental projects like these, it just takes one "city's data leaks" headline and the whole market chills.

<comment><USER3> The entire idea of a "smart city" is pure anathema to how vibrant cities function. It's a technocratic wet dream, the digital version of Robert Moses and Corbusier making a comeback. The people preoccupied with this should read some Alain Bertaud and learn how markets work and then go do more productive things with their time than trying to micromanage cities.

<comment><USER4> I don't see how, I would say most of the decisions that were made in the US are. Cities in the US are not "vibrant" compared to Europe.

I think cars are mostly to blame, roads are so large, no pedestrian-only streets, parkings take so much space, etc.

<comment><USER5> I actually prefer the vastness of space in the US. Just go out in the American country side and there is so much beauty. I would love to see a world where the idea of a city is obsolete, distributed local communities of 2000 people spread across the span of American wilderness. Basic services such as electricity, sewage and internet are all maintained by standards set by the state authorities, but run by locals. It all sounds too hipster, but it is not. This COVID-19 pandemic has taught us a lot about how we can survive as a distributed species as compared to dense city life.

Europe has no such luxury due to the density of people cramped in tight corridors and old (but beautiful) architecture. There it makes sense to have a well organized city life.

IMO city life is overrated but that's just my opinion/perspective of society.

<comment><USER6> You've invented small towns. What prevents you from moving to one post- pandemic?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> 4 years ago I co-founded a smart cities business. Basically a wysiwyg schema/api generator for non-technical municipal users. Idea being if you're procuring data generative "stuff" \- municipal workers can define an integration point. In the first few months of starting the company, I met with sidewalk labs at their request. We talked about working together and I said that wouldn't be possible because we wanted to give a data tool to cities that was vendor agnostic. They asked me what would happen if we met in a city, I told them they would probably integrate with our platform so the city could have cross correlation of data with other vendors, they told me it was more likely they would make sure we wouldn't exist.

<comment><USER8> The hubris of Google is just incredible. Half-baked commitments and then to tell someone who is actually dedicated to the mission that they will run them into the ground. It's really nasty. I've seen the same behavior from the first CEO of 'Spotlife', exactly the same tone of voice, exactly the same ending.

<comment><USER9> I think it's important to remember that Google is made up of people, as are their sub-companies. I would argue that you get any large group and at some point you get people making stupid, hateful, & hurtful comments. It is equally important to look at whether the organization as a whole is to blame or just pieces of it, and can pieces of it be addressed.

<comment><USER8> I think it is equally important to remember that those people were hired by other people who ultimately were hired by the people at the very top who set an example for the corporate culture they want to create. Companies being made up of people is no excuse for them doing these incredibly dumb, stupid and toxic things. That's what policies, mission statements and guidelines are for.

<comment><USER9> > Companies being made up of people is no excuse for them doing these > incredibly dumb, stupid and toxic things. I never said it was -- I didn't > defend anything about the actions themselves, but a lot of people were > blaming "Google" as being awful, which is generalizing a local problem.

> That's what policies, mission statements and guidelines are for. Yes... but > these obviously don't apply everywhere. That's like saying "that's what laws > are for" then being confused that criminals exist.

> people were hired by other people who ultimately were hired by the people at > the very top who set an example for the corporate culture they want to > create Yes... and again, Google is rated by most agencies and people as > having one of the best cultures out-there. This is not the end-all be-all > predictive measure. Taking a hyperbolic example, one could imagine a world > where Gandhi ended up recruiting someone who incited violence. You know, the > whole Christian-crusades thing might be another example.

While you start off the sentence with an implicit agreement with mine ("I think it's equally important") you then go on to directly oppose it with views. It's not "equally important", you can't hold both side by side (not saying one or the other is more correct).

It's not hard to make an argument that Google has done _the best_ at keeping their "do no evil" culture at scale than any other company of their size (or even half their size). My point is the opposite of yours, which is you cannot control at a certain point, just as cells in your body do not replicate perfectly and produce mutations -- studies have shown that you only get around 13% of an accurate look at someone in the normal interview process, mistakes are bound to happen. People change for other reasons too, their are external pressures. No matter how perfect your values are, you will end up with people doing stupid shit.

* Not condoning any of the actions of Sidewalk Labs.

<comment><USER10> I think the point of the GP, using your metaphor, is that a company's leaders have to identify and excise cancer early and often, lest it metastasize across the organization.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I know the average Torontonian wasn't into this, but I live nearby and was really excited about what it could have been, even though it was fraught with missteps.

This area is a concrete wasteland–just car-parks and abandoned lots–that's now going to be portioned off to more giant, glass condo buildings, and while Sidewalk's proposal had problems, it was focused on building something very different, community-oriented, without prioritizing roads.

Sidewalk really pushed the technology angle way too hard, and it was a clear overstep– most of it wasn't necessary for any sort of quality of life improvements, but many of the ideas like wooden 'skyscrapers' and de- prioritizing roads were exciting, now lost.

<comment><USER12> You can still advocate for such urban redevelopment and community planning without Big Tech behind it.

<comment><USER13> You can but change is measured in decades and even then often doesn't happen.

Starting "fresh" with a single leading implementer is really how it needs to be done.

Take San Francisco. There's the planning board, the planning department, environmental lawsuits, HOAs, abusing "historic landmarks" designations, political showmanship, developers, affordable housing, community meetings, unions, community groups (the cycling people are borderline militant) etc. etc.

All of those can bring any change to its knees. And they have, repeatedly. There are good parts of this process and people shouldn't not have input, but I might not oppose a dictator coming in for two years and just having at it.

<comment><USER14> San Francisco has changed immensely in just the last decade.

It may not be noticeable if you live there because you only see the incremental day by day changes, but as someone who only sporadically visits the Bay Area: it's nothing like it was in 2010. It's significantly more built up (and out), more skyscrapers, more apartments, more condos, more everything.

<comment><USER15> Housing prices would tell you there is actually less of everything, relatively. Demand has surged, sufficient supply has yet to be constructed, queue housing crisis. Not enough housing is being built in California's cities.

<comment><USER16> 14 new residential high rises were built in SoMA in the past 5 years. 3 more are going up as we speak and opening in the next few months. That's a LOT of residential construction in a very short amount of time.

(Mind you that's just a 15 block area in East Cut/SoMA - I'm not even talking about ALL of Mission Bay which didn't exist 10 years ago or the Van Ness corridor or Mid-Market.)

The problem here is we only started building about 10 years ago (with One Rincon being the first major new building in a long time) and the rest of the Bay Area (for example, Brisbane notoriously) is nowhere near doing its fair share of building.

<comment><USER17> How does the number of new units stack up to what was being built in the 60s, 50s, 40s, 30s, etc.?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Google doesn't need to invest in the gadgets and electronics in the walls that _appear_ to make cities smarter.

That money would be better spent on enabling city governments, elected policymakers, and especially their constituents _to be smarter and able to make better choices and designs about city planning, building permits, incentives, taxation, traffic, etc_ better.

The rest will follow. What we need is for people to understand how to choose better for themselves. Not a technology patch.

<comment><USER15> What do you do when city council members profit off of the status quo? It's not that they are poorly informed, they are well aware of what they are doing and choose to ignore expert advice on city planning decisions. This is the frustration I have with my local government in LA. Most people who live in my city are renters, but most voters in local elections are homeowners so their voice is heard above all else, and council members are landlords or have multiple investment properties. When plans come up for building more density around transit, they overtly say 'this disrupts my view' but really mean 'this will limit the tax-free exponential growth I've enjoyed on my property values.' It's so frustrating, and I'm not sure how it can possibly be changed.

<comment><USER19> > Most people who live in my city are renters, but most voters in local > elections are homeowners

Sounds like renters should start voting. Why would city council members do anything for the interests of people that don't vote? Not only is it against their own self-interest, it's anti-democratic. Elected representatives _have_ to do what their voters want - it's the bedrock of democracy.

That reps are profiting off the system is a side-effect, not the root cause.

<comment><USER15> I rent, I vote. Plenty of people do vote. But, a typical homeowner in LA is more well off and therefore has more free time to wait in line to vote, so that is who is most likely to vote. There are people here who need to work 60-80 hour weeks to survive.

<comment><USER19> > has more free time to wait in line to vote

Lobby for vote-by-mail, early voting, and holidays on election day. I'm sorry, but that's the only way. Hard problems don't have easy solutions. You can't expect any council member to go against their voters' wishes on any issue. Local elections are personal and people who vote in them follow the issues closely. A council member who listens to "expert advice" rather their voters will be voted out or recalled, and the next person would simply vote to put things back the way they were.

If you want lasting change, you have to broaden the electorate and educate them on the issues.

<comment><USER15> Fundamentally, its a cultural issue we have in this country that is somewhat disgusting. Politicians should not be just listening to their voters, or their backers, they should be listening to all their constituents, everyone who lives in the areas they represent, with particular focus to the most vulnerable and not the other way around as what frequently happens. The incentives are completely backward. The interests of those that play the politick game well are prioritized at the cost of the people who need the most assistance from public government.

I'm very supportive of expanded voting and recently LA has made election day into an entire week that you can stroll in and cast your vote (Of course, everyone waited until the last minute and polls wrapped around the block at the very last day you could cast your ballot, but that is beside the point).

Even with vote by mail or other initiatives to get out the vote, this leaves a lot of people without representation in LA. There is the requirement that you have the time to study the issues and become an informed voter, which is a privilege not enjoyed by everyone. There are also a lot of undocumented people paying rent and working jobs in LA. I think these people who are contributing to the local economy should also be represented by the people in charge of the area in which they live their life. They have just as much right to be here as I or any other citizen does.

I think the best way to overcome petty politicking would be to limit the control elected officials have over what should be logical and factually rooted decision making. In LA, council members are more powerful in their district than the mayor or any other elected official, they have absolute control over what gets built be it on parcels of land or even paint on the roads. Just look at the patchyness of the bike lane network to see this effect in action; metro has money earmarked and is ready to build but local council members just refuse to allow it to happen in their district. They operate as little feudal lords who award contracts to friends and deny contracts if some who holds their ear takes issue for whatever reason at all.

Urban planning decisions should not be controlled by politicians, they should be controlled by urban planners who are highly trained civil engineers from the best engineering schools hired to do an apolitical job. They understand these issues better than anyone else in government, and their decisionmaking is rooted in the cutting edge theories and ideas present in their field, profit and personal preference be damned.

This is how public government should be run, deferring decision making to informed experts rather than the wills and wishes of those who command the most influence over their representative.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Good. Toronto doesn't need condo neighbourhoods with gimmicky smart-phone integrations. It needs re-zoning of low density neighbourhoods to allow medium density to be built, thus more uniformly distributing the large and growing population.

<comment><USER21> But... condo neighborhoods are exactly that medium density housing. Every city does need more condos in their existing neighborhoods if populations are able to grow. (Unless Covid-19 will reshape the trajectory of urbanization, and major cities will mostly shrink for the next several decades. That actually seems somewhat plausible).

But writing off all the sidewalk labs ideas as gimmicky smartphone integrations is pretty disingenuous. There were ideas for greener construction methods using more timber and less concrete, more space optimized for walking and biking instead of cars, interesting communal space arrangements to make spaces that can be heated in winter and converted to outdoor space when the weather is nice. There will always be some haters, but IMO all of these things would be amazing quality of life improvements in the majority of North American cities.

<comment><USER22> Condos are too expensive in general to fulfill the needs of most cities. In general construction of new condos is focused on the luxury kind of condos Google was undoubtedly looking at, which are absolutely not what cities need right now. We need affordable housing.

<comment><USER23> Building Luxury condos does create affordable housing. Where do you think those people move from? interesting thought from this link: If you destroy 10,000 luxury condo's in Toronto tomorrow, will your prices go down?

[https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2017/8/1/how-luxury- hous...](https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2017/8/1/how-luxury-housing- becomes-affordable)

<comment><USER24> People who buy _luxury condos_ are probably not vacating _affordable housing_ to do so.

Why would you think that to be the case?

The Strong Towns link you provided gives two examples of apartments build approximately a century ago.

Trickle-down economics at its best.

Build luxury apartments, fine. Probably not exclusively though, as in many cities the need is more pressing than that.

<comment><USER25> No, that would be patently absurd. Of course they're vacating (the upper end of) mid-priced housing.

It's almost as if an equivalent amount of mid-priced housing would suddenly become available. I wonder who you think would move into that?

Build _up_.

<comment><USER24> You don't reckon landlords of those upper-end mid-priced dwellings are asking more for rent every time a lease ends and a new one starts?

Because that _does seem_ to be what's happened in _many_ cities.

One issue here is ideological: is housing a universal right, or is housing a capital good to be accumulated and regulated to be artificially scarce?

<comment><USER26> Landlords charge more because people are still showing up to the open-house to rent. So of course they would increase rent. What you're describing is supply and demand. We lack supply. You can be sure the rent would go lower if nobody was at the door asking to rent their place. In fact, that's exactly what's happening right now with rent price in Toronto. Immigration is slowed, airbnbs visitors are gone and supply is up. Price are going down.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> I followed the Google Sidewalk Labs/Toronto development for a while from a place of confusion more than anything else. Never really figured out what problem Sidewalk Labs was trying to solve or how technology was going to make a positive impact on peoples' urban lives.

The dominant problems that cities face are really the ancient ones of class conflict, racism and land use, with the core issue being that of the rich making life worse for the poor through politics and exclusionary zoning.

You could make cities dramatically better with only 19th century levels of technology (ie. the bicycle). Of course you'd need to have a political culture willing to share land and remove it from exclusive car use. Apparently a tall order.

The core things holding NA cities back are entirely political in nature.

</comment><comment><USER28> The backlash against this is pretty ridiculous. Despite the dystopian rhetoric, in reality it was a small project of 12 acres that would have held a few condos. By comparison CityPlace is 44 acres and was also done by one company.

So shat do people imagine will happen now? Instead of trying something new and interesting on a small scale, that same land will be given to another generic developer (Concord/Tridel/whatever) and they'll just do more of same. It's not bad, just meh. But honestly, Toronto is a fairly conservative place, so it makes sense.

<comment><USER29> I think most people were bothered by the technology integration, and not the urban planning.

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> > An independent panel was set up to scrutinise its plans and released a > report suggesting some of its ideas were "tech for tech's sake", and > potentially unnecessary.

I wonder what could have given them that idea.

> In his blog, Dan Doctoroff said the firm continued to invest in start-ups > "working on everything from robotic furniture to digital electricity".

Oh, right.

<comment><USER31> > digital electricity

This marketing term piqued my interest. Turns out it is basically PoE. Ok.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> Sidewalk labs has a LOT of good ideas but, even putting aside privacy concerns related to Google ownership, the simple fact is that these good ideas are nearly intractable even when planned by trusted organizations with the best of intentions. Western cities just don't move very fast nowadays, for better and for worse.

Maybe this would work better in a country where cities develop faster and with less protest from citizens, but a lot of sidewalk labs best ideas boil down to "more affordable housing and less cars" which are mainly Western problems that derive from a lack of good urban development in the first place.

<comment><USER33> Works best if you can just steamroll through with the project from the start. PoC small scale (though much larger than 12 acres, which is about 2 Manhattan city blocks), then large scale.

Requires feds to be totally on board, have the power to green light everything quickly, and have tons of capital to deploy. Unfortunately for SWL, it's not possible for an Alphabet company to build in Saudi Arabia or China.

<comment><USER15> They could try in Jakarta, or Singapore, or Japan, or Korea, or hundreds of other places around the world. There are plenty of places with a dearth of capital and labor coupled with a willingness to build modern cities that aren't Saudi Arabia or China.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> TO dodged a bullet.

It's Google's nature to lose interest and abandon their products. You think it's bad with software, imagine them building part of your city.

<comment><USER35> The cynicism here boggles the mind. You can talk blue in the face about all the products they haven't killed that power the world and people will just shake their heads in dismay and walk away muttering about Google Reader.

<comment><USER36> Categorize Google's products into two buckets - "home grown" and "bought the company". Then it starts to make a lot more sense.

<comment><USER37> Hmm, I think I lack the insight to know what this means.

Knowing that YouTube and Android were acquisitions, suggests that acquisitions may have more lasting potential, but I don't know enough about gmail, docs, maps, etc to know if any of them were home grown.

And looking at the list of acquisitions don't really clarify anything, all of their successful products seem to have some amount of acquisitions involved, but it's unclear to me if they were all sourced from the company, or if they bought companies to bring in talent into an ongoing home grown environment.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> The scope-limiting to 12 acres announced on October 31 was perceived as a win for the regulators, giving them more control over the project over time. At that point the project timeline became untenable for SWL's plans but couldn't back out due to PR concerns for Alphabet. The pandemic is a convenient excuse for the company to abandon the Quayside project.

For the last three years SWL has bent over backwards to be transparent about its plans and address community concerns. Plans have repeatedly been scaled down to the point where it makes absolutely no financial sense to move forward.

The calculation to bet the company on Toronto was made before this recent backlash against Big Tech. I suspect it would have been made differently had the company started a year later.

<comment><USER38> The 12-acres (just Quayside) was what Toronto's RFP asked for in the first place and Sidewalk Labs won out for ([https://www.thestar.com/news/city_hall/2017/10/17/google- fir...](https://www.thestar.com/news/city_hall/2017/10/17/google-firm-wins- competition-to-build-high-tech-quayside-neighbourhood-in-toronto.html)), which now turns out to have not been financially viable for them given the high cost of their R&D (including those mass-timber buildings which aren't even in Ontario's building code yet). Sidewalk Lab's wider plans were really an unsolicited proposal that no one asked for, so it's unfair to blame "regulators" or the tech backlash.

<comment><USER33> Agreed that the responsibility was 100% on SWL to build consensus among the community and decision makers in Waterfront Toronto and Toronto's government entities. I'm just saying that this became a lot tougher due to the change in public opinion on big tech.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> What a colossal waste of time and money that confirms the obvious to anyone who actually lives in the city — they never really were about improving the downtown core neighbourhood of Quayside, which is ripe for development, and instead wanted to use public land and money for R&D. Good riddance and I hope people who are serious about aiding the public take note in the missteps Sidewalk made time and again, to fail to win the trust of the very city they were trying to become a community member of.

</comment><comment><USER40> Shame, some genuinely descent ideas in terms of building science and urban design. 11/10 chance the technology elements would have gone the way of the Google Grave yard after 10years, but at least it will leave a set of interesting buildings to draw lessons from. Now nothing. Lots will stay empty or be filled with generic condo developments with questionable longevity. The Google branding and Silicon Valley outreach style didn't help. Simultaneously, the inability for western societies to at least entertain rapid urban experiments is going to backfire. I'm not a big fan of Google, but they have fuck you resources and at least tried to direct it in prosocial designs with the expected cost of privacy. If they can't succeed in Toronto then it doesn't bode well for anyone else.

</comment><comment><USER41> Enjoy the HN cynicism from July 2018: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17487838](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17487838)

<comment><USER42> For those of us that live in Toronto and have experienced Palmerston and City Place; Kensington Market and Metro groceries it's so obvious that another set of condos built by a giant corporation are not what we need. You can call me cynical all you like, I'd rather have my city move in the direction of Europe (Vilnius or Paris) than Manhattan or Tokyo.

Count me as one of the many happy people that this fell through, even though I'm generally positive about Google's other enterprises.

<comment><USER43> What is the difference between the four cities you mention? At least three of them have been restricting density, resulting in steadily increasing prices.

<comment><USER44> I would guess skyscrapers vs. 4 stories. West/East Village in Manhattan are generally considered the most pleasant and they are skyscraper-free.

<comment><USER45> What is the source on Sidewalk Labs planning to build skyscrapers? The definition of a skyscraper is over 40 floors, the most I see in any of the mock designs are at most a dozen floors. Sure it's not 4-floor either, but Quayside is fairly small so if they put 4-floor apartments, you'd maybe fit 100 people total.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER46> I'll add another perspective to this, beyond the privacy/data ownership debate.

The global building stock currently supplies roughly 40% of the world's greenhouse gas emissions; and we are in the midst of the largest growth of urbanism in human history concentrated in neighborhoods least equipped to deal with it. I've worked in the architecture/urban design sector for 6+ years (half as an architect, half as a researcher), and one of the most critical problems we have to address is the way we are attempting to optimize the building energy/embodied carbon use of buildings. It's a messy multivariable optimization problem, tied to time-consuming, complex simulation engines, that the industry is forced to try and solve as single-variable optimization with various hacks and rule of thumbs.

I am very biased on this topic since I work in this area, but I feel this is fundamentally a ML/AI problem and I had/have some hope that Sidewalk labs could add the resources and brainpower to move the needle further, faster with the existing SOTA. Personally, I felt this provided the project with a very straightforward, explicit ethical utility, so as a Torontonian I've never been against it. I also was excited about the prospect of building up a community of building science-focused ML/AI researchers tackling a currently underserved existential threat. I know this isn't the end of Sidewalk Labs, but I feel like this is a huge loss for us.

</comment><comment><USER47> People are cheering, but as a broader statement this is a small sample of how difficult it is to do business in Canada.

<comment><USER44> The article says the issue is Corona not Canada?

<comment><USER45> Whether the final blow was due to COVID-19 or if it was just an excuse, it doesn't change the fact that it's been an uphill battle for over 3 years with very little progress.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER48> I consider it part of my neighbourhood. I am glad this is over. There are so many issues, but essentially the city is in over its head on this entire concept from the beginning. Further, I think Waterfront Toronto overstepped it's mandate. At the time, Google love was high, and politicians were enamoured with the attention and jumped into bed without even a thought.

In the end, Google is an ad tech company, so no thank you. The scorpion and the frog...

</comment><comment><USER49> This is great news. As a Torontonian I found their plan to be nothing more than a money grab on public space and the public in general. They also massively overreached in all their applications to the city.

<comment><USER35> > I found their plan to be nothing more than a money grab on public space and > the public in general

You're going to get a big real estate developer doing it instead.

<comment> 52-6F-62 _Maybe_.

Their plan would have implied the eradication of the properties of much of the film industry in the city who would have had to move to likely more expensive locations.

Frankly, I was surprised they were cleared to build residences in that area (or were they?)

When I worked in the film industry down on Commissioners—just a short bit west of Cherry St—there was still phosphorus seeping up through the ground on occasion...

AFAIU Waterfront Toronto has rule over the area and they've done some pretty great work with the Harbourfront area, so I would put faith in them to do a good job with the region. I think their major roadblock (prior to the pandemic) is funding. [https://www.waterfrontoronto.ca/nbe/portal/waterfront/Home/w...](https://www.waterfrontoronto.ca/nbe/portal/waterfront/Home/waterfronthome/projects)

[https://portlandsto.ca/project-details/](https://portlandsto.ca/project- details/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER50> Isn't it ironic to blame the coronavirus? I imagine an alternate timeline in which it's a success story for the already-built 'smart city', with the masses of data it offers aiding crisis management in <ways>.

</comment><comment><USER51> Seems like they are using COVID-19 as an excuse to dump a sinking ship while trying to save face. Real estate value isn't going up, interest rates are going way down. But since people found out what Google was trying to do with Quayside, they've had nothing but opposition.

EDIT: Update from CNBC: "Toronto was expected to make its final decision on whether or not to let the project move forward on May 20."

</comment><comment><USER52> "Ann Cavoukian, former Ontario privacy commissioner, resigns from Sidewalk Labs", 2018-10-21. [https://globalnews.ca/news/4579265/ann-cavoukian-resigns- sid...](https://globalnews.ca/news/4579265/ann-cavoukian-resigns-sidewalk- labs/)

"Google's 'Smart City of Surveillance' Faces New Resistance in Toronto", 2018-11-13. [https://theintercept.com/2018/11/13/google-quayside- toronto-...](https://theintercept.com/2018/11/13/google-quayside-toronto- smart-city/)

</comment><comment><USER53> 'I've met thousands of Torontonians from all over the city, excited by the possibility of making urban life better for everyone.'

This is simply not true, in my experience as a Torontonian. The overall opinion of this project was incredibly low, from at least dozens of people it's come up with - at work, at events, with friends - if anything, there'll be a lot of people happy to hear this. There were even questions as to why our tax dollars would even support this when we've got issues like homelessness, etc. As Forbes said, it was 'tech for tech's sake'.

Forbes: 'In June of 2019, Sidewalk's master plan was released, eliciting a barrage of controversy around privacy and participation.

The Canadian Civil Liberties Association initiated a lawsuit against local, provincial and federal government over data privacy concerns. Vice called the proposal a "democracy grenade".'

[https://www.forbes.com/sites/ellistalton/2019/09/26/why- side...](https://www.forbes.com/sites/ellistalton/2019/09/26/why-sidewalk- labs-toronto-plan-is-flawed/amp/)

Edit: I'm shocked at the number of downvotes for similar comments - I guess backing up your points counts. If you don't think this closure is good for Toronto, especially if you live here, I'd like to know why.

<comment><USER54> Couldn't agree more as a Torontonian. It didn't help that they conducted most of the discussions in bad faith with the whole "trust us with your data" approach when these were geniune concerns due to the amount of oversight and control they were provided.

<comment><USER55> I agree that this was a train wreck in slow motion. What is sad is I didn't see any significant open engagement with GTA's existing tech scene (did hear a lot of talk of it though). Maybe the VCs club had access but as a technologist, I certainly didn't. If this was happening in SF, there would be grass roots meetups all over the place, and a more serious focus on action rather than planning.

<comment><USER40> They did a series of town halls, funded a bunch of urban / tech meetups. Pretty proactive for a period. The townhalls were very... SF style, it didn't mesh with the local culture well. But I don't think they did a lot of work either, there's a pretty lackluster showroom and they put out some very middling concept sketches - not proper renders like you see in most smart city projects. Didn't seem like they were taking things seriously. A lot of words. Maybe too many. At least not enough right ones.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER56> Discussion at [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23103610](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23103610) as well

</comment><comment><USER57> As a former Toronto resident I'm glad about this. In my eyes, Google lacks the track record or level of trust appropriate to make them a good fit for the project. They fall short on basics like privacy, user experience and commitment.

Toronto has a thriving tech community; I'd love to see some of the less- controversial ideas pioneered on a smaller scale by local small businesses who will eat their own dogfood.

</comment><comment><USER58> "The city of the future" has been a passion of mine for several years now. I even co-founded a company driven by the desire to create one eventually (the company then moved to a cool product to digitize titles, US only for now; and secured seed funding long after I left).

I always had a problem with this initiative by Google, and others in general. These things don't scale.

You want to build the city of the future? It should be 10x more affordable, 10x less polluting, and be built 10x faster than traditional cities. It should find inspiration from Jane Jacobs, Christopher Alexander, Leon Krier, etc.

Sometimes I still dream about doing something about it. This blog post somehow summarizes where this desire comes from: "unf*ck" [0]. It's such a massive problem though. I keep thinking that I don't have the chops to be able to do anything about it.

[0]: [https://medium.com/the-naked- founder/unfuck-710afbaa4092](https://medium.com/the-naked- founder/unfuck-710afbaa4092)

</comment><comment><USER59> Thats a shame. I always thought Google would do a double plus good job of it. Who wouldn't want a listening device in their toilet. Just skip the town, and make a better smarter toilet Google. Control the world, starting with the throne. Thats where many are already watching youtube from anyway now. Take my temperature and test me for corona, update my social score and unlock the e-lock to leave my apartment. The Future.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QcUAG6t5aN8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QcUAG6t5aN8)

</comment><comment><USER60> $50M and two years later - where are the conclusions? The results? A blog post of what happened? Two years seems like enough time to say we tried some amazing things and this is how it did or did not work.

<comment><USER61> Two years is nothing when it comes with planning and development in the US, unfortunately.

A little anecdote, here in Cincinnati I was peripherally involved with a local nonprofit taking over management of an abandoned bit of city part to build new multi-use trails. It took 20 years for the park board to even listen, then once an agreement was reached it took another /year and a half/ to get the paperwork to the point where they would officially sign it. Just for a group to build trails, with no money needed from the city, no permits, etc.

Projects like what sidewalk labs was trying to accomplish frequently take 5-10 years+ to get anywhere. Planning in the US is absolute garbage. It is a big part of the reason SF and other large US cities are so expensive. Luckily there are some groups like YIMBY making headway here.

<comment><USER14> _local nonprofit taking over management of an abandoned bit of city_

This is why it took a long time. The city was handing over management over _part of itself_ in perpetuity. That needs to be done with care and deliberation.

Moreover, there are liability issues related to third parties making alterations to city lands that could result in ruinous liability to the city if citizens get injured on the altered lands and the city didn't fully inspect the alterations.

You also have potential drainage and soil issues to deal with, which need to be reviewed by geologists. And that's not getting into environmental reviews if there are at-risk species dwelling in that park.

All of those things take time. Programmers always complain about their customers wanting X in a few weeks when it really takes months.

So why are programmers always complaining that it takes engineers, geologists, architects, and city planners months to do _their_ jobs? Unlike programming, the stuff these professionals are doing/reviewing can't just be fixed with a patch.

<comment> 52-6F-62 Thankfully Waterfront Toronto has been doing those studies and has their own plan for the region! They want to convert a large part of the area into green lands and proper drainage of the Don River to prevent further flooding.

I'm not sure if SWL's plan would have worked in conjunction with that work or if they would have overridden it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER62> The idea of "smart cities" seems great, and a lot of prominent people in tech/VC seem to be on board.

Yet at the same time, I just don't see a realistic way to make this happen (zoning, NIMBYism) unless we're talking about desolate places that still have cheap real estate, but where nobody wants to live anyways e.g. Montana and the Dakotas.

<comment><USER15> History repeats itself. I'm willing to bet none of these people are aware of the failure of Epcot, the first smart city effort, when they take their families to Disneyworld. There are just too many people in this world who would prefer to say no to change.

</comment></comment><comment><USER63> The promised green-space would have been awesome. In all, I'm thrilled that Toronto won't be the first guinea pig testing out a privacy-flexible smart city. If it works well in other places and everyone's happy, we can get the new improved one with the quirks fixed.

</comment><comment><USER64> No doubt this was likely guided by some misguided desire to make everything look and function like one of their Google campuses. Google is one of the most dehumanizing companies in the entire history of civilization.

</comment><comment><USER65> Google HQ never seemed to have to much to do with this. It was rather their subsidiary Sidewalk Labs that was going to make it happen. They always struck me as long on "vision" and short on execution.

<comment><USER66> I am a very optimistic individual, and have considered this project as vapourware since day one. All vision and posturing, and no execution over years.

</comment></comment><comment><USER67> They will find a city for the next go-around that has more to gain and less nimby-ism. A Pittsburgh or a Detroit.

</comment><comment><USER68> I'm all for smart cities, just not ones built by advertising companies.

</comment><comment><USER69> Google has a pattern of pull out of high profile announcements. Its striking.

</comment><comment><USER70> This should be next in the killedbygoogle.com entries

</comment><comment><USER71> The last thing we need is super rich foreign corporation building spyware company towns and buying our government.

</comment><comment><USER72> Could have tried in India...

</comment><comment><USER73> And collectively, Torontonians breath a sigh relief

</comment><comment><USER74> "Smart city" sound like a Orwellian dystopia

</comment><comment><USER75> LOL .... man, google is a joke.

I'm half expecting an announcement that they're sunsetting their search business.

</comment><comment><USER76> Does this count for the Google Graveyard? I'm still waiting for that miraculous Google Fiber to come rolling in here.

I am wondering precisely how projects get the green light at Google. This kind of thing is just ... it's like someone read some shiny-eyed sci-fi story from the 1950s and decided to Brave New World it into being with metrics without asking if anyone would find it objectionable or even desirable.

<comment><USER77> Google Fiber was a major success that got ousted by the incumbents with never ending lawsuits and resistance. Take your anger out on the monopoly ISPs across the country.

<comment><USER51> This is untrue. Talk to Louisville, where Google put trenches in the roadways, loosely covered them up with foam, letting the average snowplow rip up their network.

Fiber used real cities as experiment grounds, and ended up with at least one solution so bad they left the city rather than fix it, and had to settle with the city for all the damages to their roadways.

Pictures: [https://www.wdrb.com/news/google-fiber-announces-plan-to- fix...](https://www.wdrb.com/news/google-fiber-announces-plan-to-fix-exposed- fiber-lines-in/article_fbc678c3-66ef-5d5b-860c-2156bc2f0f0c.html) (Ignore the title, Google decided not to repair anything.)

<comment><USER45> > Talk to Louisville, where Google put trenches in the roadways

Yes, Louisville was indeed a failure. They tried something different to help speed up laying out lines, and it didn't work. All that is not really relevant to the comment above, which still is true regardless of the issue in Louisville.

> Ignore the title, Google decided not to repair anything

That's misleading, they decided to instead pay the city for the repairs instead of doing it themselves.

[https://arstechnica.com/information- technology/2019/04/googl...](https://arstechnica.com/information- technology/2019/04/google-fiber-exits-louisville-pays-city-3-8m-to-clean-up- the-mess-it-left/)

<comment><USER51> Originally they intended to repair the fiber lines and keep the network in Louisville, they decided to give the city money when they backed out so that the city could clean up the damage: Presumably by ripping up the fiber network entirely.

Most of their other ideas were similarly discount. They bought fiber in places it was already run, and their issue with ISPs revolved around a push to demand the right to move AT&T's equipment around on AT&T's poles to make room for their own without supervision.

ISPs have their problems but Google wasn't in it to build a long-term, quality infrastructure. They were trying to make a splash on the cheap, but the costs would be bound to go up anywhere they couldn't employ cheap hacks.

<comment><USER45> > the right to move AT&T's equipment around on AT&T's poles to make room for > their own without supervision.

That makes it sound like Google was being pushy here, but in reality, ISPs were being intentionally as slow and obtrusive as possible to cripple Google's expansion, which is exactly why Fiber failed. If they were given X days to do something, they would do it on the (x-1)th day on purpose to waste Google's time and delay them as much as possible.

<comment><USER51> It makes sense to be very careful with this sort of thing. Comcast is infamous for "accidentally" severing other ISP's lines whilst running their own.

Also, given that Google has been playing the (x-1)th day game with the EU for _nearly a decade_ , and asking for every possible extension in order to respond to even the most basic requests... let's not act like ISPs are bad and Google is good. Google is a bad actor that was trying to edge in on another market of bad actors.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER78> My issue with Sidewalk Labs was the incredibly obvious facade they put up: pretending to care about making cities better when it really was just a thin veneer over finding new ways to expand surveillance capitalism. In fact their "Head of Urban Systems" was quoted[0] as saying that public discussions over data ownership and privacy were "irresponsible". The true agenda is plainly obvious to anyone who cares to look.

I'm heartened to see that there is a slow but growing opposition to parasitic business practices such as Sidewalk Labs' proposal and surveillance capitalism in general. Despite Zuckerberg's attempts to convince us that privacy is dead[1], I think people still realize on some base level that privacy, especially offline, is still valuable.

[0] [https://www.citylab.com/design/2018/09/how-smart-should-a- ci...](https://www.citylab.com/design/2018/09/how-smart-should-a-city-be- toronto-is-finding-out/569116/)

[1] [https://youtu.be/LoWKGBloMsU](https://youtu.be/LoWKGBloMsU)

<comment><USER79> So this comment is being downvoted a lot, but i've got to say there was a lot of concern from local residents. The largest concern everyone raised with me was that "Google will ditch this as soon as it suits them, leaving us with a mess of 'smart tech' to deal with for decades to come".

Well, i hate to say it, maybe they were right? Turns out they ditched it before it even got moving, this might be a blessing in disguise.

<comment><USER80> Unfortunately, a lot of people in tech ascribe to a kind of utopian imperialism. It doesn't matter what people themselves want, it's about what engineered fantasies can be imposed upon them.

<comment><USER78> Yeah I dunno, I'm basically showering in downvotes right now but it seems to be just Silicon Valley types who are upset that Torontonians didn't welcome their dystopia with fanfare and adulation.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Mark Zuckerberg Is the Most Powerful Unelected Man in America - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/03/opinion/facebook-zuckerberg-2020-election.html <comment><USER2> I'm certain there are unelected people with much more influence, but they don't get as much publicity.

<comment><USER3> Robert Mercer and Peter Thiel seem like obvious examples but there must be dozens more.

<comment><USER4> All three infuriate me (and Mercer, even more than Zuckerberg) but Facebook is possibly the most powerful entity in the world. Regardless of whether you believe it already has, Facebook has the power to topple governments, if it chose to wield it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Nah, a bit dramatic I would say. Anyway to the extent people see Facebook, Bannon, Trump, and the like powerful I think is because they do so in a power vacuum. Congress both in its institutional action and a lot of inaction over the last six or so administrations has left so many problems to grow and grow putrid.</comment>


X is down - <AUTHOR> http://blog.jgc.org/2010/10/x-is-down.html

<comment><USER2> I don't recall seeing too many people that were outraged when twitter was down, more just talking about it. Those that create services that depend on them know what they're getting themselves into. I did, however, see a lot of angry people when Heroku was down.

<comment><USER3> Yeah, I really can't believe this made the front page. Really man? You're whining about people whining? It's just noise to me. Social media reflects what's happening in the universe, however deep or asinine. When people die or twitter is down, I find out about it first on Social Media. Granted, I try to put forth a little more signal than noise in my own communication, but I don't think blog posts complaining about it is really "signal".

<comment><USER4> This is a post he made in 2010.

<comment><USER5> And was linked here back then: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1763663>

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> i really like the response to the first hacker news' round of comments.</comment>


Attlo: Email as never seen before. Literally. (Images in Subject Lines) - <AUTHOR> http://www.attlo.com/

<comment><USER2> Every marketing persons/spammers dream. Yes please, put more distractions in my inbox.

(I'm sorry about the negativity, but I really can't see how this would work out in a useful way. Aggressive whitelisting of senders maybe?)</comment>


Blazor 0.1.0 released: web apps in the browser with .NET and WebAssembly - <AUTHOR> https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/webdev/2018/03/22/get-started-building-net-web-apps-in-the-browser-with-blazor/ <comment><AUTHOR> Release notes: [https://github.com/aspnet/Blazor/releases/tag/0.1.0](https://github.com/aspnet/Blazor/releases/tag/0.1.0)

Blog post and tutorial: [https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/webdev/2018/03/22/get- start...](https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/webdev/2018/03/22/get-started- building-net-web-apps-in-the-browser-with-blazor/)

<comment><USER2> This is great. Can the new razor syntax - that can finally have nested child content - also be used server-side, i.e for amp components? Will it be possible to build universal apps, and re-hydrate server-rendered content on the client like with react?

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Awesome! C# love everywhere. Is Xamarin.Forms web using Blazor?</comment>


Ask HN: What's happening to openssl? - <AUTHOR>

For example here: http://www.openbsd.org/cgi-bin/cvsweb/src/lib/libssl/src/crypto/dsa/dsa_asn1.c.diff?r1=1.7;r2=1.8
It looks like them taking out an attempt to ensure PRNG is seeded by throwing some data at it. Worst case scenario is that it has no effect, you can't lower entropy in a pool by adding data as long as you have a working hash function.
We know that with DSA the entire security of the signature depends on having a good random source, unless you are using a deterministic scheme, but that's a different function.
In this case it looks like they are taking out possible entropy sources just when entropy is most required. Why is this a good thing? <comment><USER2> This does not actually seed the PRNG. User-provided data is not entropy: entropy needs to be random, not deterministic. In OpenSSL, PRNGs are pluggable, as well, which means that some modes of seeding the PRNG could actually leak sensitive user data out of the process!

This code shouldn't have been there in the first place, and wasn't doing any good.

</comment><comment><USER3> OpenSSLs internal PRNG framework was ripped out and only the (noop) API is left. arc4random is the only PRNG source left, it can not fail and doesn't need to be seeded.

OpenBSD goes to great lengths and sacrifices some performance to ensure the kernel PRNG is always useable.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Clickable: [http://www.openbsd.org/cgi- bin/cvsweb/src/lib/libssl/src/cry...](http://www.openbsd.org/cgi- bin/cvsweb/src/lib/libssl/src/crypto/dsa/dsa_asn1.c.diff?r1=1.7;r2=1.8)</comment>


You only get one chance to be a beginner - <AUTHOR> http://37signals.com/svn/posts/3179-you-only-get-one-chance-to-be-a-beginner <comment><USER2> _But until then, you're in a magical position to make great strides. To propose radical solutions, deliberately ignorant ideas that just might be brilliant._

A more general opportunity is the opportunity to document misconceptions. I'm in the process of learning Clojure, and it's the little misconceptions that hang you up. But just a little change in perspective in how you see things can totally unstuck you.

Documenting those little changes in perspective, those little ah-ha moments, could really help future travelers.

I've been recording them as much as possible, noting the "the one thing/sentence that I could have told my future self that would have helped me understand it" (<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3998679>). Being able to view a collection of everyone's would be enlightening.

<comment><USER3> Do you have those up anywhere? I'm also learning Clojure, and would find that very useful.

<comment><USER2> Not yet -- I'll work on putting those up somewhere. Until then, I can tell you this: Stuart Halloway's "Programming Clojure" ([http://www.amazon.com/Programming-Clojure-Stuart- Halloway/dp...](http://www.amazon.com/Programming-Clojure-Stuart- Halloway/dp/1934356867/)) is the best book (I've read through them all).

Stu works alongside Rich so he understands Clojure at a deep level, but he's still in tune to the beginner's mind and is able to clearly explain concepts and provide the context you need for the ideas to resonate.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> You may only get one chance to be a beginner, but you can cultivate "Beginners Mind" or "Shoshin" (<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shoshin>)

Edit: "Saadat A. Khan suggests that "Beginner's mind embodies the highest emotional qualities such as enthusiasm, creativity, zeal, and optimism. If the reader reflects briefly on the opposites of these qualities, it is clear to see that quality of life requires living with beginner's mind. With beginner's mind, there is boundlessness, limitlessness, an infinite wealth."

</comment><comment><USER5> Reminds me of Neil Gaiman's recent commencement speech at the University of the Arts. I definitely recommend checking it out if this little tidbit of advice from 37signals was inspiring at all.

EDIT: forgot to link to the speech: <https://vimeo.com/42372767>

<comment><USER6> That commencement speech was awesome, but I really wish 37s would take a break from blogging for a while. They jumped the shark like 2 years ago when they stopped saying new things.

<comment><USER7> You're behind the times. We jumped the shark seven years ago: [http://37signals.com/svn/archives2/have_we_jumped_the_shark....](http://37signals.com/svn/archives2/have_we_jumped_the_shark.php).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> It would be awesome to collect some concrete examples of complete beginners coming in with revolutionary ideas - both in business and coding.

<comment><USER9> "I once asked Ivan Sutherland, how could you possibly have done the first interactive graphics program, the first non-procedural programming language, the first object-oriented software system all in one year? He said, well, I didn't know it was hard!"

\-- Alan Kay, <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mOZqRJzE8xg#t=3m45s>

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> _... you have the clarity to make things drastically better. You won't miss the non-sense the veterans have long since accepted as the norm. Once you've acclimated to the temperature of the pot, you'll get boiled alongside all the other frogs._

The message of this one paragraph is kind of ok but the rest and in particular DHH's choice of words is as usual awkward and feels like flatulent talk from a self-help book—too many adjectives and over-zealously constructed metaphors.

What he is talking about is not about being a beginner or that you only get one chance to be a beginner, it's just about _change_ :

\- That you face change all the time

\- That you should always be prepared for change

\- And that you should actively seek for change the entire time and see change as something beneficial

Thus, you get a chance to be a beginner more than once with every change.

</comment><comment><USER11> >You won't miss the non-sense the _veterans have long since accepted as the norm._

I couldn't help but think "Isn't this one of those things veterans accept as the norm? That you can only do this once, and, after that, your view is tainted forever?"

I refuse to accept this.

</comment><comment><USER12> It is true that you can make quick progress as a beginner but there are other areas where is can be painfully slow. Launching a new product while dealing with the growing pains of a new business can cause a lot of wasted time. Having someone with more experience around can be invaluable to a new start up, especially if you are doing something other than software where the start up costs are prohibitively high (tooling, patents etc)

</comment><comment><USER13> I wonder if DHH feels like Rails was his best work and that's now behind him (at least the revolutionary capacity).

</comment><comment><USER14> <http://www.thomasgray.org/cgi-bin/display.cgi?text=odec#99></comment>


The demise of the nation state - <AUTHOR> https://www.theguardian.com/news/2018/apr/05/demise-of-the-nation-state-rana-dasgupta <comment><USER2> Lost me about the time they said we must have global financial regulation. First of all, that sounds really scary, since it would doubtless (whatever the initial intentions) be written by and for the largest financial institutions. But, second of all, it's not so scary because the chances of the U.S.A, Russia, China, India, and western Europe all agreeing on a single financial regulatory authority are nil. Objectively nil, since not even within western Europe were they able to do that.

I think the writer is part of the late 20th-early 21st century intellectual elite, who learned that globalization is the future, who are now stuck in a state of cognitive dissonance because things seem to be going "backwards". Since it is an article of faith that this cannot be the case, they are trying to argue their way into a different scenario.

For better or worse, the nation state is not going away, and it appears to have been on the ascendance for some years now.</comment>


New Developer Tools Features in Firefox 34 - <AUTHOR> https://hacks.mozilla.org/2014/09/webide-storage-inspector-jquery-events-iframe-switcher-more-firefox-developer-tools-episode-34/ <comment><USER3> Ok debug logging into a table is probably one of the best improvements to logging I've seen in a long time. I kinda want this in every programming language. There are so many useful things about it, especially the ability to then randomly sort it at will!

<comment><USER4> It's been available in Chrome for a year and a half.. [https://plus.google.com/u/0/+AddyOsmani/posts/PmTC5wwJVEc](https://plus.google.com/u/0/+AddyOsmani/posts/PmTC5wwJVEc) ..this is actually one of the things that's most annoying about web dev - <USER2> browser has some really cool stuff for debugging, but none of them has everything. The Firefox team are addressing that though - [https://hacks.mozilla.org/2014/09/firefox-tools- adapter/](https://hacks.mozilla.org/2014/09/firefox-tools-adapter/) \- Firefox nightly can connect to Chrome's debugging interface so you can use Firefox's toolset to debug a page in Chrome. Which is insanely cool.

<comment><USER5> I was under the impression that it only connects to the debugging interface on chrome for android. Has this changed?

<comment><USER6> Yes, that's correct: The "Firefox Tools Adapter" targets Chrome for Android and Safari for iOS:

[https://developer.mozilla.org/en- US/docs/Tools/Firefox_Tools...](https://developer.mozilla.org/en- US/docs/Tools/Firefox_Tools_Adapter)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I'm more excited about this coming in the next version(s)

[https://wiki.mozilla.org/Electrolysis](https://wiki.mozilla.org/Electrolysis)

[http://arewee10syet.com/](http://arewee10syet.com/)

Back in August they were debating enabling by default in November but it is probably not ready for prime-time yet

[https://wiki.mozilla.org/Electrolysis/Meetings/2014-08-21](https://wiki.mozilla.org/Electrolysis/Meetings/2014-08-21)

<comment><USER8> If you're running the nightly channel, you already get a prompt introducing e10s and allowing you to enable it.

<comment><USER9> You can enable it in Aurora, but so far I've found way too much things to be broken for it to be useful.

Especially things like cookie-handling not working 100% and breaking login on lots of sites (like reddit, google, etc) makes enabling it a no-go, or at least did when I tried it a few weeks ago.

<comment><USER10> You do not want to enable e10s for Firefox Aurora, Beta, or release. The Nightly release channel has many critical bug fixes that are not in the other release channels. :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> The jQuery events inspector looks super useful.

I keep meaning to give Firefox another try - after ditching it for Safari, and then Chrome, some years ago - but I never quite find the motivation.

<comment><USER12> Is there a tool for chome that also does this?

<comment><USER13> Yes - it's called jQuery Audit, and it's super helpful when figuring out whether evens are bound, if there are memory leaks etc.

[https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/jquery- audit/dhhnp...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/jquery- audit/dhhnpbajdcgdmbbcoakfhmfgmemlncjg?hl=en-US)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> This is great! Firefox Aurora has been my main browser for over 6 months and now these great improvements will keep the status quo for me!

</comment><comment><USER15> Is the bug that treats re-requests source files when opening the debugger fixed yet?

[https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=156435#c52](https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=156435#c52)

<comment><USER16> also this strangeness while using dev-tools:

[https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=771043](https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=771043)

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> What about firebug? Who long will firebug live with sight of the developer tools becomming better and better?

</comment><comment><USER18> I was excited about the WebIDE but apparently it's only for firefox OS apps. Is there any way of linking a webIDE to devTools? I'd pay for a tool that lets me click on a jsconsole error message and then takes me straight to the editor at that line and column on the original file.

<comment><USER19> That's the plan. Work in progress.

<comment><USER20> This sounds tremendous. It would be great for educational contexts — a development environment that doesn't require anything more than installing a browser…

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> A ton of very compelling stuff. I hope it all works nicely; I have found the Firefox dev tools to be weirdly clunky of late and keep going back to Chrome, but this may drag me back.

<comment><USER22> Hmm, I never found them to be clunky. I prefer them over Chrome's, but perhaps that's just because I'm used to them? I guess if you used Chrome for months, then read about Firefox' features and try them, they will always feel off.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> Finally a way to easily inspect and delete cookies on the run. I remember getting voted down here for complaining about it previously.

EDIT: Ok, read-only. Too bad but at least they have it planned.

<comment><USER24> [https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/editthiscookie/fng...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/editthiscookie/fngmhnnpilhplaeedifhccceomclgfbg?hl=en)

<comment><USER23> It's for Chrome and Chrome already has the features I want built-in. My point is that Firefox is lacking these.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> The only feature in Firefox I miss in Chrome is the view that shows the stacked layers of a website. I dismissed it when I first tried, but it can be surprisingly useful. It's no reason to make me switch to Firefox though.

[https://developer.mozilla.org/docs/Tools/3D_View](https://developer.mozilla.org/docs/Tools/3D_View)

<comment><USER5> You can get an extension for chrome that does this: [https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/3d-view-for- webpag...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/3d-view-for- webpages/noflnemoniodcoagmaapcdlmeljohdnm/reviews?hl=en)

Although the reviews say it doesn't work, I tried it and it works fine.

<comment><USER26> hehe... read the add-on comments.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> Does anyone know if there is a way to theme the developer tools? Like you can do in Chrome?

Like [https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/devtools-theme- zer...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/devtools-theme-zero- dark/bomhdjeadceaggdgfoefmpeafkjhegbo)

<comment><USER6> The Firefox devtools have two themes built in ("dark theme" and "light theme") and can also be themed with CSS by Firefox extensions (just like all parts of the Firefox UI).

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> something that got "broken" for me in recent version of firefox (I think starting with 32) is that doing a console.log of a very long string does not display the whole string anymore

i.e it will print

"a looooooong string [..]" (with the [..])

same if i try to observe the variable in the debugger. And I cant find a way to get the full string in anyway, I understand for a lot things you dont want to print accidentally a 200k characters longs string as it will use a lot of memory for maybe nothing, but in my current use case (getting long xml documents to copy paste them in a beautifier / send to colleague as attachments for bug report etc.) it breaks my workflow (I'm posting here because google does not seems very talkative about this issue)

<comment><USER29> This is [https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1027997](https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1027997)

'workaround…is to click the value to edit it and then copy and paste somewhere else'

<comment><USER30> I think allan_s is talking about the value as displayed in the console proper, which can be expanded by clicking the "[…]" part:

[http://i.imgur.com/qgBXdGZ.png](http://i.imgur.com/qgBXdGZ.png)

Tested by doing console.log(('test').repeat(100000))

<comment><USER28> thank you, actually I didn't thought about clicking on it, maybe making [...] appears in an other color ?

also the "edit and click value" on debugger was not working for me (also "cutting" the value to a certain limit)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> is there any way of making the inspector show simple textContent inline with the nodes without having to unfold them? i keep going back to Firebug for this.

        test

rather than

           test

<comment><USER31> I filed [https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1071067](https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1071067) to get this issue tracked. I agree that we could do a better job here, as the unfolded view takes up 3x the vertical space compared to the inline view.

<comment><USER16> thanks, vote added.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> Finally, the storage manipulation has arrived. Now I can get rid of Firebug completely.

</comment><comment><USER33> How big are the developer tools compared to the rest of Firefox? 5% of the total size? 10%?

Can't the more sophisticated tools be split into a separate extension, leaving only some basic things in the distributed package?

<comment><USER22> As long as they don't impose any load while you're browsing without the tools opened, I see no reason to. And Chrome also includes them.

<comment><USER34> Dev Tools load on demand and do not affect casual browsing.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> Sweet, sweet console.table()! I've never been happy with the way that console.log works for objects/arrays, I'm eager to use this one

</comment><comment><USER36> Oh, this is neat. This is probably the first time the built-in debugging tools make me think about ditching FireBug.

</comment><comment> ux-app great to see the iframe switcher. Was such a pain to manually switch the context between top and child frames.

</comment><comment><USER37> good list of tools, thanks!

</comment><comment><USER38> Sourcemaps?

<comment><USER6> The Firefox debugger tool has supported sourcemaps for over a year: [https://hacks.mozilla.org/2013/05/compiling-to-javascript- an...](https://hacks.mozilla.org/2013/05/compiling-to-javascript-and- debugging-with-source-maps/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER39>  </comment>


Show HN: Double Your Twitter Leads Automatically by Sensq - <AUTHOR> https://sensq.com <comment><AUTHOR> Hi, Kai Chew here.

I'm working on a new project, Sensq ([https://sensq.com](https://sensq.com)), a Twitter Lead Generation Automation tool.

Short description:

Sensq automates your social selling process, instantly responding audiences with personalised offers, converting more twitter leads to paying customers.

Background story:

As a social media manager for many years, I found out that people love it when businesses respond to them quickly. It shows that they are heard, that you care, and it shows appreciation for your potential or current customers.

So, I built this simple single feature project, with only one goal in mind, if someone mentions your brand (or any custom triggers) on Twitter, make sure that you respond to the tweet ASAP. Especially, when people are comparing your product with your competitors.

How's it work (in 3 simple steps):

Discover: Setup a campaign with custom triggers to start looking for ideal customers & selling.

Convert: Instantly responding to tons of audiences automatically with personalised offers.

Analyse: Visualise engaged customers, potential or converted, and segment them with a click.

What do you think about it? Will you find it useful?

I am happy to provide people here in HN more trials in exchange of advice to improve Sensq. Try it now at [https://sensq.com](https://sensq.com)! Thanks in advanced!

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> I might have done the due diligent poorly, is there any alike service (twitter auto reply) around?</comment>


Tilt: Visualize your web page's DOM in 3D - <AUTHOR> http://hacks.mozilla.org/2011/07/tilt-visualize-your-web-page-in-3d/ <comment><USER2> I'm keenly interested to see if this provides a visual indication of markup or layout clutter/complexity. That would be nice for sniffing out UI design smells, particularly in big enterprise portals.

Sadly, when I launch the tool it seems to create an overlay that prevents input to the page but doesn't show anything. Not blank, just invisible. I can close the overlay and keep using the page. But, I can't see anything. Hopefully I can figure that out.

I plan to use this for a side-by-side comparison of my product, Oracle web UIs (I'm scared), some nicely-designed and clean sites and some prominent web apps like Amazon or Backpack. Might be a useful tool for me on the "Marketecture" side of things.

<comment><USER2> Got it working. Short answer, Intel igfx cards (aka, "work laptops") are garbage. Chrome WebGL worked, Firefox didn't. I got it working, albeit slowly, using OSMesa on Ubuntu.

Marketing department power!

Hope that helps someone.

<comment><USER2> And, I'll stop spamming after this, finally got it working with the same awful video card on FF on Windows. I upgraded my video card and that still didn't work, but I told it to force WebGL in the about:config. Apparently just that setting was enough. Again, hope that helps someone.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> This is actually very useful, Snoop is a utility for debugging the WPF visual tree and it has had this feature for several years now. I don't know if snoop was the first to have it or not though.

<http://snoopwpf.codeplex.com/documentation>

(scroll to the bottom)

<comment><USER4> Snoop is an amazing utility and I used it quite often when I was coding WPF.

<comment><USER5> Their logo is.. quite something. I'm going to guess that it's developer humour/culture, and not just an exercise in poor taste.

I mean, I really want to like it, because it's hilarious and audacious. But then I feel a bit base. Oh, petty conundrum. Then again, obsessing over logos is a significant part of our trade.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> This is very cool. I really like the effort Mozilla has been putting into showing people what can be done with modern web technologies recently. They've got a whole bunch of other cool demos at demos.mozilla.org

</comment><comment><USER7> The technology is pretty cool and all but I fail to understand why I need a 3D view of a 2D world.

<comment><USER8> The 3D dimension provides an additional data point: nesting level.

<comment><USER9> I have to agree. My first thought was going to be to disagree because I always just use something like view formatted source or something to look at my nesting levels within the dom but having it show nesting levels in place that has a trivial-to-digest visual effect is pretty nifty.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> huzzah!

<http://mcqueen.mit.edu/tilt.html>

</comment><comment><USER11> This is an awesome tool. I can't even tell you how much debugging time this is going to save me. Said time won't be reflected in my estimates or in my billing rate, of course, but at least I'll have more time to work on my RSS feed.

</comment><comment><USER12> Wow, this is very cool, and very useful as well!</comment>


Throwing some light on NP-completeness and the P=NP problem  - <AUTHOR> http://www.unknownprogrammer.com/2009/throwing-some-light-on-np-completeness-and-the-pnp-problem/

<comment><USER2> From the article: "Another interesting feature of NP problems is that a solution can be checked in polynomial time by a deterministic Turing machine. So, checking a solution of a NP problem is a P problem."

That's not just an interesting feature of NP problems, it's an alternate definition. You can define NP as the class of problems that have polynomial- time "verifiers". That is, the class of problems for which, given a candidate solution, you can determine in polynomial time whether that solution is correct.

Examples: given a proposed assignment to the variables of a boolean formula, you can check in P-time whether that assignment satisfies the formula. Given a proposed route through a set of cities, you can check in polynomial time whether that route has length less than K. Given a set S of integers, a subset of S, and a target T, you can check in P-time whether that subset sums up to T. Etc.

I find the "polynomial time verifier" definition of NP to be much clearer than the "solvable by a polynomial-time nondeterministic Turing machine" definition. They're exactly equivalent -- I don't know why the latter is so much more common.

<comment><USER3> Verifying that length is less than K and verifying that length is the shortest possible route are two different questions. Can someone clarify how the travelling salesman problem is NP-Complete (i.e. how does it have a P verification?)

<comment><USER4> There's a bit of confusion here. Saying the traveling salesman problem is NP- complete means more than simply it has a P verification. Saying the traveling salesman problem is in NP implies it has a P verification. But saying that it is NP- _complete_ implies that, in addition to being in NP, any other NP problem can be (deterministic-polynomially) translated into it.</comment></comment></comment>


Amazing HTML5 and CSS scroll effects - <AUTHOR> http://www.samsung.com/us/microsite/galaxysII/?cid=ppc_GII_goo_C-Galaxy+S_Galaxy+S_samsung+galaxy

<comment><USER2> Here is a similar type of page but for a Sony Tablet S product <http://discover.store.sony.com/tablet/#specs/diagram>

</comment><comment><USER3> Campaign monitor used this effect quite some time ago... <http://www.campaignmonitor.com/hiring/>

</comment><comment><USER4> I remember seeing this one a couple months ago: <http://www.nikebetterworld.com/>

</comment><comment><USER5> script doing the work: <http://www.samsung.com/us/microsite/galaxysII/js/script.js>

Quite nice to see in action from a code perspective, but I'm not sure I actually like the final page layout...

</comment><comment><USER6> Nice idea, but very jerky for me (FF7)</comment>


Ask HN: Review my coming soon page, SettleIt.org - <AUTHOR>

<comment><USER2> Hey, I have some thoughts for you: \- it's a bit cluttered. People don't have time to read through all the stuff to understand what the page is about. I'd make it simpler with a couple of graphics. \- If your goal is to sign up customers, you should highlight the feature and put it in the center. Also, what's the incentive for people to sign up? Give them something to be excited about. \- How long will they have to wait and what do they get after that? \- The box on the right side is a left unexplained. Might need some context or get rid of it. \- Yesterday I found a threat here for people to promote their beta launches. You might want to check it out :) Best of luck

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks so much for the feedback. I have been cutting the length of the content. I'll see if I can cut some more. Maybe add some links to more information and keep them off the front page. The box to the right is a screenshot so I can label it. The features are difficult to explain so I tried to have the benefits. I'll think through it and see what I can do to make it clearer.

I couldn't find the thread about promoting beta sites. If you can give me the link I would appreciate it.

Thanks Again.

<comment><USER2> You're welcome! This is the thread I meant: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6488822](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6488822)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> I am sorry i still don't understand what your start-up does after reading "I hope to help you be awesome at settling complex arguments". Are you providing legal services or something?</comment>


Ask HN: Help us decide a landing page. - <AUTHOR>

Hi,
We've been building a mobile-web based product for restaurants past 2 months. But we've found ourselves quarreling over design of our landing page. Not everyone on team has a taste for good design. So, we're stuck debating over this.
1. http://imgur.com/uyDdu
2. http://imgur.com/OPm3K
3. http://imgur.com/J771h
I personally have dabbled a lot trying to be a good designer once. I love the work done by our designer in 1 and 2. But we got (I don't know whats up) very bad feedbacks on 1 and 2 from  our sales and investor. They prefer 3 !!
Democracy is a wrong way we're following here ( http://goo.gl/I7xzb ), but I'm exhausted fighting for 1 and 2. I didn't expect so much of corporate style slow decision making in a startup though.
Among those 3, what do you think is the best design to go for ?
Thanks in advance. <comment><USER2> None of them? I like 1 the best, but it still needs work. Try this for ideas: [http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2011/09/01/elements-of-a- vir...](http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2011/09/01/elements-of-a-viral-launch- page/)

Also: [http://www.quora.com/What-startup-homepages-are-most- simple-...](http://www.quora.com/What-startup-homepages-are-most-simple-clear- and-effective-and-what-makes-them-so)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the links. Found the Qura page really helpful in communicating ideas across.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> I think 1 and 2 are better than 3. I would recommend using just the "above the fold" from 2 which has the simplicity of 1 while retaining a short/clear description of what it is that you actually provide. This way your call to action of "Take the Tour" will be even clearer. Assuming that is what you want your site visitors to do first.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks! We found 2 to be a bit cluttered overall because it's text heavy. Keeping 2 till fold sounds great.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Why ask us? Just split test and let the users decide.

I think I would like to combine #1 and #2, though, if I had to choose without user data. I think that's because #1 is very simple and elegant but #2 does better at drawing attention to the call to action.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks we were completely confused going by our own tastes. Finally, we found <http://usertesting.com/> to be very helpful here.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Click-ables - 1. <http://imgur.com/uyDdu> 2\. <http://imgur.com/OPm3K> 3\. <http://imgur.com/J771h>

</comment><comment><USER5> Definitely Number 2. Though I was looking for a list of benefits to me. What clients are saying section wasn't too helpful - would rather read benefits to complete my decision. Real nice design.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks. We're working on to make our copy clearer.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Definitely Number 2. But needs a little face lift and reducing text load.</comment>


Why Microsoft Will Never Win (they blew their lead on web apps) - <AUTHOR> http://seekingalpha.com/article/80363-why-microsoft-will-never-win-again

<comment><USER2> If MS had introduced their customers to web apps in the early 00's, they would have both shot themselves in the foot and allowed competitors to have a go at the other foot.

By killing NetDocs the average business person stayed ignorant to the possibilities of applications online, therefore extending MS's cash cow several/many years longer.

Beyond the IT savvy I don't see anyone using Google Docs or Zoho, and pretty much every client I interact with still relies heavily on MS Office (I have a hard time even recommending OOO as people are so used to their old tools). I'd say MS's strategy is still working quite well.

<comment><USER3> People keep ignoring the importance of what the early adopters are doing. The fact that the bleeding edge users have all but abandoned MS should be a sign of concern.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Microsoft still dominates the Desktop, both in OS and productivity office programs. When they do decide to go 'online' they will just ad it into the existing offerings - example:"Office 2010, now comes with free online office as well.. including powerpoint, word, excel... with 30 gigs of free online secure storage" - also a double save feature if your connected to the net, when you save a document local it will ask if you wanted to save to the 'cloud' -

\- MS is more trusted for the average business than zoho or even google, and already has a built in market.

</comment><comment><USER5> My 2 cents:

Scott Gu, Silverlight, Mesh, MVC, the DLR - if MS can get wide developer adoption (I don't see any reason why they won't..all are quite compelling technologies) they will still be a force to be reckon with.

MS's problem is they are battling on soo many fronts - it's all about market share these days since the web game is moving towards a commodity play now and will be with the "cloud" services in the next few years.

What will happen is the classic coke vs pepsi, molson vs labatt battles we've seen - each just fighting for a few percantage of market share more (which translates into billions).

MS will never die, neither will IBM. They will continue to morph in new ways to increase shareholder value. Google will face the same challenges once the web advertising game slows down (which won't happen for at least 5 years IMO but there is still weakness).

Pick your poison, MS has a massive warchest of cash and is dying to spend it, they if anything, will be a major disruptor in the web game.

</comment><comment><USER6> "But just think about how much further along that understanding curve the company would be now, instead of letting the fear of cannibalization push it away. At some point, the company will have to grab that nettle firmly, and it's not going to get any easier — if anything, it's only going to get harder."

I don't think Microsoft CAN catch up.

</comment><comment><USER7> The mistake people make is thinking that Microsoft needs to be the dominant player in a market to make their participation in it worthwhile. They're perfectly happy to have their hand in any cookie jar that poses massive future revenue, even if they're late to the party (as they generally are).

</comment><comment><USER8> Virtual Earth and Photosynth prove that Microsoft can make great web apps if they want to.

</comment><comment><USER9> Doesn't it seem likely that MS created Silverlight so they could build web based versions of their applications that don't suck? I wouldn't be surprised to see Office 14 really blur the lines between desktop and web based software.

That being said, Microsoft will probably continue to flounder until they commit to a new BHAG.

</comment><comment><USER10> If microsoft is dying, when will it start paying stockholders dividends?

<comment><USER11> Although it's not super-high, they have been paying 10-11 cents for the past few quarters:

[http://finance.google.com/finance?chdnp=1&chdd=1&chd...](http://finance.google.com/finance?chdnp=1&chdd=1&chds=1&chdv=1&chvs=maximized&chdeh=0&chdet=1212782400000&chddm=491878&q=NASDAQ:MSFT&);

<comment><USER10> Thanks.</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN:  How would you convince your company to start using version control? - <AUTHOR>

I recently started working at a fairly progressive marketing company with a small web development team (5 people).  Up until this point, they've managed the multitudes of sites that they have done by creating a "dev" folder on the web server, and then editing those files directly.  After everything looks great, they just do an rsync to the production folder and call it good.
Obviously there are a number of things wrong with this.  For instance, rolling back changes in the event of an error is difficult.  As someone who uses Subversion even on personal projects, this disturbs me greatly.
My question is:  How would you convince your company to start using version control software?  I'm not particular about the software, because at this point, something is probably better than nothing.  Also, the lead developer is the one who came up with the "dev" folder system and seems hesitant to talk about version control with me.  How would you go about dealing with him? <comment><USER2> Didn't Joel write an article about that sometime ago? Ah, here it is: <http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000332.html> The point of it is, use it yourself. If you use subversion or whatever else (seems you are familiar with subversion so go ahead and use that) then you can roll back changes, you can do diffs, you have a full copy of the source with revisions, and you can always tell rsync to ignore the .svn directories when you copy things over to production. Eventually something will break, and you will be the guy/girl with the magical powers to bring it back to a non-broken version and find what has changed. Eventually, it will trickle to the rest of the team that it's not a bad idea. Version control can be incrementally adopted. Just sneakily do a commit after other people's changes, and show people how it works. If not everyone adopts it, fine. There is certainly a strategy that's necessary to make sure you don't step on each other's toes while editing things. Use that to mediate between the source control crowd and the non- source-control crowd. Forcing it on others is likely to be counterproductive. Start using it yourself and let others see what happens.

</comment><comment><USER3> I just wonder that if they're not savvy enough to use a RCS what other types of battles will you have to fight in the future?

If I was in your shoes, I'd start looking for another job with a company with a bit more technical sophistication. Somewhere that the battles you fight aren't over trivial technology problems and practices and issues that already have solutions.

Now that doesn't solve your problem, so probably the best thing is start using an RCS yourself, then create a build system that will push changes out to the server. You could initially sell this as a time-saver in updating the server. Then start selling the whole history part of using an RCS to go back to previous versions of a file.

But, if they're not using an RCS in the 21st century, what else are they doing wrong, and should you really stay there? :)

<comment><USER4> I am having this same problem with our development team (mostly c) at my job. They find subversion too arduous but then don't understand why there are so many problems and bugs in their releases.

Thank you for mimicking my sentiments precisely. I want to fight battles that aren't over trivial technology problems that already have solutions!

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Start using it yourself, maybe even with a cron job that regularly pulls the latest changes into your local repositories. I give it 2 or 3 version conflict or deleted file incidents where your use of VC saves the day.

<comment><AUTHOR> I feel that there may be a chance of "Why would we need to user version control when we can just use you instead?". I do like the idea though and will probably set up a repository today for projects that I'm working on.

<comment><USER5> That would be you taking on more responsibility? Reason for a raise if you ask me.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> When I started my last job they weren't using version control, so I just told them that if nothing else it would be very easy and painless to just check in every time we push to production so that we always have a snapshot of the last version. The problem with them was that their developer would go and make changes to files in production to fix bugs and issues, even after started using version control, so it was always a chore keeping up with his hotshot prod changes. You don't have to implement a full continuous integration environment or start branching each developer separately, you can just start catching snapshots along the way and it will have a positive impact on future development.

<comment><USER7> The right solution to that is to overwrite his "hotshot prod changes" from version control until he learns that he has to do it in version control first.

If you don't have enough political pull to make that stick, then you have a second problem...

<comment><USER8> Or you check in the production changes....

If you can't do this from your source control system, try something more powerful.

<comment><USER7> That is a workaround but it has two major shortcomings. The first is that you aren't getting the other developers to use source control. The second is that you wind up with the challenge and the blame for breaking it in the case where someone fixed it in production, someone else checked a different fix into source control, and you are expected to merge them.

The simple rule, "You knew I was going to go from version control, your fault for not fixing it in there" is a proven technique for getting people to actually use version control. I've seen it done, and know people who did it at several other organizations and it works. (Though at this point my first impression of developers that don't know how to use version control is that they must be incompetent people I'd prefer not to work with. Not using version control a decade ago was somewhat more excusable than not know about it today.)

<comment><USER8> >"You knew I was going to go from version control, your fault for not fixing it in there" is a proven technique for getting people to actually use version control. I've seen it done, and know people who did it at several other organizations and it works.

I know being an ass to people works. Tried and true for sure, very passive aggressive technique to get developers to do things.

Also just keeping a production branch and development branch works too. Check in the production changes to production branch.

Production hotshot doesn't port over changes or at least mention the important ones to the guys working on the dev team? Kick that poor behavior to his boss about how he's not pulling his weight, staffing problems are HIS problem not yours, and by strongarming the guy with passive aggressive overwrites, you're screwing the company AND the hotshot, rather than just the hotshot.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> one advantage you might use to "sell" the idea is that it lets people work on laptops away from their desk more easily (i'm imagining that a marketing company is full of people wandering round, brainstorming in cafes, etc... :o)

<comment><AUTHOR> I hadn't considered the usefulness of this for the designers. Being able to go pull up "that awesome design from last week" would probably be very attractive to them.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> I'd say you should start using Git or Hg or any distributed system immediately. No need to worry about getting complete adoption for those to be exceedingly effective. Svn (or any "centralized only" SCM) is less capable in an environment such as this as it requires everyone to adopt at once.

After you have a week or two worth of changes in your repor then you can convert people one by one, and you don't even have to tell people about the repositories you're using until it's time to try to convert them.

</comment><comment><USER10> I would tell him you want to setup a source control server (That you personally will administer so no overhead or extra work for him.) Have it be fully optional aka people who use it have to fully comply with current practices(Everyone has to be able to work as if it doesn't exist.) That way he gets zero complaints from other staffers who resist change.

</comment><comment><USER11> Drop a note explaining potential disasters of using such a system to everyone including your lead developer's boss. Then wait for the disaster to happen. And then shout again pointing to your email.

</comment><comment><USER12> Perhaps put a business case forward with the benefits of transferring to a version control system?

For example: * Easy rollbacks * Easily work on separate branches * etc</comment>


Listing of the Apollo Guidance Computer(AGC) program that landed man on the moon [pdf] - <AUTHOR> http://authors.library.caltech.edu/5456/1/hrst.mit.edu/hrs/apollo/public/archive/1701.pdf

<comment><AUTHOR> And the listing for the Lunar Lander is here:

[http://authors.library.caltech.edu/5456/1/hrst.mit.edu/hrs/a...](http://authors.library.caltech.edu/5456/1/hrst.mit.edu/hrs/apollo/public/archive/1729.pdf)

The AGC program, called Luminary, was coded in a language called Mac, (MIT Algebraic Compiler), which was then converted by hand into assembler language that the computer could understand. The assembler code was fed into the AGC using punch cards.</comment>


I'm majoring in Facebook, how about you? - <AUTHOR> http://money.cnn.com/2007/10/08/magazines/fortune/blakely_facebook.fortune/index.htm?postversion=2007100811

<comment><USER2> This seems kind of silly. Maybe I'm just cynical, what could you learn from this class that you couldn't by just reading the documentation?

<comment><AUTHOR> I imagine the interaction with other students and their experiences is extremely valuable in the same sense that you don't necessarily learn technical skills from YC, but being in the right environment makes your existing skills that much more effective.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> I got banned from facebook yesterday and they still won't tell me what I did. I feel lost. It's a lot worse than getting banned from Digg.

<comment><AUTHOR> The only reasons I can think of for getting banned are spamming or multiple accounts. I've heard of developers getting their applications booted, but I've never heard of someone getting banned themselves! Probably the worst site to get banned from (besides Hacker News, that is!).

<comment><USER3> I have one FB account. I have an open dev account and an empty application.

I got an official Facebook warning about one year ago for creating a group "For every 100 people that join this group Apple will donate a laptop to a needy child." I think it got to 250 people in an hour and then it was gone.

I had a middle name listed on Facebook as "rupertmurdochsucks" which was kind of a running joke. The only thing I can think of is that I recently contacted support about a bug that switched my class year to "Alum." They told me how to fix it and I did. But the CS person reported me for having a fake name, which seems really stupid, especially because they won't tell me what is going on. I also had a group that promoted Kratom, which probably goes against the facebook Terms of Use but the group co-admin didn't get banned and the group is still there.</comment></comment></comment>