Is A Nomadic Lifestyle Cheaper Than Living In One Place? - <AUTHOR> http://locationindependent.com/blog/2009/04/16/is-a-nomadic-location-independent-lifestyle-cheaper-than-living-in-one-place-a-12-month-breakdown-for-2008/

<comment><USER2> I live on a boat, and find it to be the ultimate in nomadic and independent lifestyle. Just fill her up with diesel and water, and I can go wherever I want. The biggest advantage is that I don't need a lot of planning to go somewhere - I've got my whole home, clothes, personal belongings etc. packed up and ready to go at any time. It's pretty cheap too, since I don't need to eat out all the time, and the only rent I need to pay is when I'm in a foreign harbour somewhere. And I still have the comfort of my own home.

The disadvantage is that I can't go across the globe, partly because it would take too long and partly because my boat and lacking sailing experience would make it a dangerous endeavour to sail across large oceans.

<comment><USER3> Are you kidding? What kind of futuristic non-money-sucking boat do you have?

<comment><USER4> It all depends on the engine and the boat. You'll probably only get a mile or two to the gallon, but then you're not driving it around like a car. You then also have to consider that people regularly drive around in vehicles on a daily basis that aren't all that more fuel efficient.

If you actually care that much, you could always spend a bit more money and go solar. Boats is one of the few vehicles where solar power works well and has proven itself (for example, the first usable solar boat is thought to have been made in 1975). You also don't have to go just solar, boats have been powered by wind for centuries and the water generally has much stronger wind than land anyway.

I wouldn't doubt that it would be easy to go green and make your fuel cost zero.

<comment><USER2> Mine goes roughly 2 kilometers on a liter of diesel, which is pretty cheap by boating standards. The reason is that the engine isn't terribly large, and thus cruising speed is around 7 miles an hour. If I wanted to go 30 miles an hour my fuel consumption would at least quadruple.

<comment><USER3> OK, but I was talking about maintenance/repair costs. You know, "A boat is a hole in the water you pour money into".

<comment><USER4> And a house isn't a hole in the land you pour money into?

Acceptable home maintenance costs are between 1 and 4% of the house value, however this doesn't necessarily extend toward the higher home prices.

Of course all these prices vary, some people pay ridiculous amounts for home maintenance because they can't do simple tasks and some people pay almost nothing because they can do everything themselves. However, I'm sure the same goes for boat maintenance too.

It's the mere fact that paying $4,000 in home maintenance of a house costing $250,000, and paying $4,000 in boat maintenance on a boat costing $50,000 that you live on.

I suppose your food costs would be significantly cheaper if you like fish though. Well if you're a good fisher. Personally if I had to rely on my fishing skills I'd probably die from blood loss.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> The problem is that environment really _does_ matter.

I worked from Thailand for three months on Koh Tao, had a great experience and learned a lot, but at the end of the day sketchy wireless + drunk spring breakers really put a damper on things. In Argentina everyone I knew was supportive of what I was working on, and all my friends always wanted to know what was up, take me out to grab drinks at a tango club, go to a drum concert on Monday evenings- my environment made it frictionless to work on a

startup. (obligatory pictures: <http://www.flickr.com/photos/copla201>)

Being in Thailand on the island of Koh Tao, though, had the downside that 70% of the population turned over every couple of weeks, and the people that live there are there to escape from the world. Now, I completely respect that- if you're choosing between a 9-5 and scuba instructor on a beautiful Thai island, easy choice. And there's a lot of cool people who make that decision- however, those aren't the same people who are gung-ho on building a great business, or necessarily think that doing so is a worthwhile undertaking. It was an environment where just going to work was an exercise in friction.

That doesn't mean that I didn't head out to the cafe to make progress every day, or get to read up on the topics that allow me to build what I build today from the gorgeous Echo Bar, but it does mean that the environment wasn't conducive to building a startup. I saved money, I had some great experiences, and I wouldn't take it back, if only for the learning experience- environment matters.

Yes, you can work from anywhere, but that doesn't mean you _should_. However, as I write this I'm packing up my things to move to Budapest on Sunday- my co- founder is Hungarian and after working together online for seven months we're going to push to launch working in-person. The difference between Budapest and Koh Tao is that in Budapest there's already a support network in place- all the friends of my co-founder's who have already supported us at every turn. And it's that support network that's so crucial when building a startup.

It's ok to take on the world, I wouldn't work on anything that _didn't_ take on the world, but you damn well need to have an effective environment to work in when you move halfway across the world.

</comment><comment><USER6> This is a disingenuous article. The real comparison is between the difference of what you make vs what you spend. While travelling in the 3rd/2nd world is cheaper than staying at home, unless you have a very particular job, it's also hard to pull in the same amount of income.

<comment><USER7> The business we run whilst we're doing this pulls in more than enough to support the outgoings; whilst it's not easy to set up a business that does this, it is more achievable than many people think.

<comment><USER8> I'd love to see posts about this side of things: how did you build that business, what were the challenges, etc.

<comment><AUTHOR> Looking at their blog, it seems to me they already have quite a lot of posts on the topic!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Personally, as I'm about to embark on a similar life, I find these articles (as in, the articles on this blog, as well as this specific one) extremely interesting.

It's good to see numbers that prove that it's possible to leave more cheaply in an idyllic location while still working on my start-up, blog, etc.

I wonder why more start-up founders don't take that option. What ties you to a specific place? For me, until recently, it was a relationship..

<comment><USER9> Relationships are a big one. Not just dating, but being isolated from family and friends can be hard (I lived in Beijing for 4 months, and enjoyed it, but it does get lonely).

Also, not every one is ready to live somewhere foreign. Especially if they don't speak the language.

<comment><AUTHOR> I guess I feel that less since I jumped country (from Switzerland to the UK) once already, so I feel less attached to where I am (though I do have many friends around here).

With respect to language, it seems to me there are so many ways to learn common languages these days, that this should not really be an excuse. Anyone can go on Bit-Torrent and download some language courses, and speak a language passably well in a few months... (well, unless it's a ridiculously hard language like Chinese...) Btw, for that, I recommend a combination of the Pimsleur courses, + a book about grammar, followed by reading a fiction book in the target language, before actually moving there.

<comment><USER9> Dating someone who speaks the language (before, as well as while you are there) is also very, very helpful. (I didn't do this in China, but my friends who did definitely had a leg up).

<comment><USER10> If you do this, beware that some languages are enough different for male and female speakers that you may end up learning lots of gender-confusing idioms. I've read that English-speaking men in Japan sometimes end up speaking fairly fluent "Japanese girlfriend" rather than the Japanese they'd be speaking if they'd mimicked other males.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> No, living in cheaper countries is cheaper. Be Nomadic in UK, Ireland, France, Germany, Austria... and it would be much more expensive than doing a sedentary life in Thailand.

<comment><USER12> I think your answer is right in regard to OP. But it seems to be not so interesting to everyone :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> The figures aren't quite honest: the UK prices are extravagantly high for mortgage anywhere apart from London, which is one of the world's most expensive cities. Elsewhere in the country you can expect to pay c. £700 or less, which brings the yearly total down to £15k -- well below the travelling costs.

<comment><USER7> Author of the article here - as the post states, the mortgage figures include other items too, not just the mortgage. The figures include: Council tax, contents insurance, buildings insurance, all utility bills (including phone/internet & mobile phones), TV licence etc. etc.

We recently came back to the UK for a few months and had to go through all this setting up of bills etc. again and were shocked at how much all the extras add up, which you just don't get when you live overseas in furnished rental apartments. I think many people would be shocked if they added up all these extra little bits too.

<comment><USER14> If you don't mind me asking, where in the UK were you came back?

Also it sounds like you were buying somewhere, not renting. A furnished rental apartment shouldn't require buildings insurance, contents should either be part of the rent or not at all (as the landlord is required to insure their equipment by law - but not yours - you'd do that separately but you'd certainly have to do that anywhere else I've been), a TV licence is optional - you only need it to watch live TV and all the major channels have on-demand Internet equivalents that are perfectly fine unlike other countries you may have been (we're looking at ditching the licence when the Digital TV switch kicks in). I'm surprised you're putting phone, internet and mobile phone in there - unless you're flatsharing I'm not aware of anyone that would include those as part of the rent, especially mobile phones?

I guess my point is that it's not a like for like comparison to compare your rental costs in one country with mortgage + all inclusive of everything, even secondaries in another. Rather than defending it, and I appreciate it's a PITA to do what I'd suggest and may contradict what you're trying to achieve, I'd like to suggest that you write a followup comparing like for like costs with their equivalents and provide explicit examples alongside the benefits and drawbacks of each - e.g. being near the beach at Cape Town versus being near the beach at Blackpool.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> As the old saying goes, whereever you go, there you are.

As someone who does not have an Internet-based income stream (e.g. has a job) and has been close to pulling the trigger on this several times, I think you have to consider why you want to be in a different location. I think I was thinking that I'd do a radical lifestyle/social makeover (e.g. all-in = quitting job+going abroad) but that probably would not be the case.

<comment><USER5> Totally works.

Just stay at a hostel for the first month in the new country. You'll meet a ton of people from all over world, including some who will be staying in the country, so you'll have friends for at least six months. Hostel folks tend to move around a lot :)

For meeting people, it'll be lifechanging just to see how easy it is- "where are you from?" "how long are you traveling for?" "where are you going next?" "where have you been so far?"

Everyone's in a foreign country, everyone's looking to meet people, so everyone makes themselves super easy to meet. If you're in a good hostel (I'd HIGHLY recommend Hostel Suites Palermo in Buenos Aires, ~$10/night) then this won't be something you'll consciously be thinking about, it'll just happen.

I worked from the patio of the hostel the first day and wound up going to dinner with eight folks from all over the world, by the end of the night you'd have thought we had all known eachother for years. Give it a shot!

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> I've had similar experience. My wife and I did a RTW trip for about $27K (and we lived it up quite a bit) covering 12 months. We were surprised at just how affordable it is to travel, and it's cheaper to travel long term than short term.

</comment><comment><USER17> What about the costs of constantly finding new accommodations/services in unfamiliar countries?

I'm sure there are certain time savings from not having a long term domestic existence, but it seems like overall you're spending a lot of time to make the nomadic life work. I'd like to see this time cost broken down in a similar fashion.

<comment><USER18> I can only comment that in Thailand it is super easy to find accommodation in the island, at least off-season. We could just walk around and just run into places that were very affordable. We found clean hotel rooms, small cottages right at the beach and nicer bungalows a bit farther inland all for $10-$20 per night. I imagine with more knowledge of our options we could have had even nicer places for the price. One thing I learned is that the 3G Internet connectivity advertised does not actually work in any usable way at least in Koh Samui / Koh Tao / Koh Phangan where we tried it, and had to rely on wifi. It was kind of a fun pastime to try to find places to stay in by scanning for wifi spots and walk to the direction where it gets stronger.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> for something more stationary, but somewhat similar in spirit, check out this place built right on the ocean on a tropical island in Panama:

www.cocovivo.com

</comment><comment><USER20> Similar in spirit: Bemmu posted this idea on Hacker News some time ago, but to the best of my understanding, he had to pull out. <http://www.coworkthailand.com/>

</comment><comment><USER21> Although it's not quite the same thing, this reminds me my semester in Budapest (undergrad math program). I actually saved a few thousand dollars by doing so. American tuition is just really expensive.</comment>


Reasons to not use Ember.js - <AUTHOR> http://aokolish.me/blog/2014/11/16/8-reasons-i-won%27t-be-choosing-ember.js-for-my-next-app/

<comment><USER3> Haven't used Ember.js myself (though have been wanting to for quite some time). This struck a cord with me though:

> 8\. JavaScript

> Writing most of your app in JavaScript is simly[sic] not fun. JavaScript is > known for being designed in 10 days. Ruby is known for being designed for > developer happiness - which sounds better to you? \</comment><comment>---

I don't think it's fair to compare Ruby and JavaScript because they are fundamentally used for different problems. You can never write Ruby for client-side, so why is it being compared? You have to use JavaScript (or CoffeeScript, or what have you), therefore you use it to get the job done.

In essence, complaining why use JavaScript is not a fair reason against Ember. It's more of a reason for: "Why go with a client-side JS framework in general", rather than specifically Ember. This was the only point I wanted to make regarding the article.

Aside from that, I definitely appreciate the learning and will take these reasons into consideration if/when I decide to use Ember.js. Hopefully one of the core team members can explain more about the other reasons mentioned.

</comment><comment><USER4> I've had better experience with Angular, though some of the complaints apply to Angular too (e.g., silent errors in templates). Recently I started using Facebook's React framework, and so far it's worked well for me. You'll probably end up writing more code than you would in Angular/Ember, but that's because React is only a view framework (so it frees you up to use vanilla JavaScript for other things, like ajax, routing, etc.). React is also much faster than Angular because of its virtual DOM patching technique.

But my favorite part of React so far is that view logic is grouped together with the views. This goes against the "best practice" of separating views and logic, but I think it makes navigating the codebase easier. You want to learn everything about how some custom view widget works? It's all in one file, rather than spread across app/assets/javascripts/widget.js and app/views/widgets/widget.html.erb. No directory hopping needed to learn how the widget works.

</comment><comment><USER5> I am shocked how highly this is rated on here. You used Ember for the first time and thought you moved slower? That is...expected. It's called a learning curve. The first time I wrote a Rails app I worked much slower than writing Sinatra.

How old is this post? Google search for "Ember pagination" [https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome- instant&ion=1&e...](https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome- instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=ember%20pagination)

The graph? I'm surprised you didn't break "Ember Template" into "Regular Expressions", "String Concatenation", and "Returning Variables" to further your point. Why does "Rails" have one box?

I really hope I'm not missing some joke and making a fool out of myself right now.

<comment><USER6> he did work on it for 3 months. I haven't used ember but that seems to be a lot of learning curve.

<comment><AUTHOR> Sorry, I was unclear in the post. Building the dashboard took about 3 months. We then add features to it, and maintained it for 5 months after that.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> The diagram comparing the stacks feels pretty unfair to me. You have one box for "rails", but then break apart ember's stack into "models", "controllers", "routes", etc. a similar diagram could be drawn for activerecord, actioncontroller, etc - right?

<comment><USER8> What difference would it make? The Rails box is the same for both columns. He could have ommitted it and just add a generic "backend framework" box with the results being the same.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> This is an architecture preference disguised as a tool review. It should be called "Reasons why I don't like client-side web programming and prefer to work with server-side logic".

<comment><USER10> The title and some of the critics are unfortunate but this post nevertheless is hitting a soft spot for me. I've been through backbone & angular and I'm starting to question the necessity of a full blown framework when all I want is some structured js for each page/resource.

More fundamentally it seems the offer on js libraries are either tailored to eye-candy widgets or the big SPA. Nothing has popped in my radar as proposing an incremental step from server side HTML to MV([A–Z]) Dom/json manipulation which entices you to almost build the app twice.

What I'd really like to see rather than a client-side-solution is a server/client migration path from html to spa without being tide to one or the other

The links he included (see below) bring up the same concerns....

[http://mir.aculo.us/2013/02/26/client-side-mvc-is-not-a- silv...](http://mir.aculo.us/2013/02/26/client-side-mvc-is-not-a-silver- bullet/)

[http://www.shopify.com/technology/15646068-rebuilding-the- sh...](http://www.shopify.com/technology/15646068-rebuilding-the-shopify- admin-improving-developer-productivity-by-deleting-28-000-lines-of-javascript)

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> > Our development speed was about 1/3 of what it would have been with normal > rails development.

How much experience did you already have with Rails? I would expect that learning a new tool would take longer than using one you are already intimately familiar with.

> Additionally, using Ember really increased the layers in our stack.

I don't think this is that much different than Angular.js. That would also add a significant number of components to the stack.

> Writing most of your app in JavaScript is simly not fun.

Typos aside, this is hardly a downside of Ember.js. I work in JavaScript full time (node.js), and while it has its gotchas, I really appreciate the functional nature of the language. I was writing some C# yesterday and I was disappointed at how hard it was to do function passing and function composition compared to JavaScript.

It's good for the Ember.js ecosystem to understand the short comings of the framework, but I don't think it's particularly useful to say "Don't use this tool because...". The fact that people DO use the tool means that some people do find value in it.

One of the complaints is that there isn't enough sample code posted, yet this post didn't provide any sample code of their issue or their solutions. Doing that would add more value than just saying "Don't use Ember."

</comment><comment><USER12> > Deep linking - <USER2>

The deep-linking example comes across to me as an issue of setting up initial state. Loading those other routes first either loads data or modifies the state of the application in a way that is required to display that route.

(or the author doesn't understand the difference between example.com/path/to/route and example.com/#!/path/to/route, but seeing as it "works 50% of the time" it's probably not this)

<comment><AUTHOR> Hi there. I omitted the hashbang just because I find it ugly.

> Loading those other routes first either loads data or modifies the state of > the application in a way that is required to display that route

That should be a non-issue as far as I understand, because visiting a nested route causes the parent route code to be executed first. Hence, the confusion.

<comment><USER12> Yes and no. Depends on how the routes are structured in the code. In your example:

      /users/
      /users/15/
      /users/15/photos/

Your router map probably looks like this:

      App.Router.map(function() {
        this.route('index', { path: '/' });
        this.resource('users', { path: '/users' }, function () {
          this.route('index', { path: '/' });
          this.route('show', { path: '/:user_id' });
          this.route('photos', { path: '/:user_id/photos' });
        });
      });

This translates into a structure like:

      ApplicationRoute
        IndexRoute
        UserRoute
          UsersIndexRoute
          UserShowRoute
          UserShowPhotosRoute

Note how all of those Users*Route classes are all siblings rather than in parent-child relationships. Also note that if you're sharing controllers, they won't pass through Route.setupController on the sibling routes because those routes aren't run.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> What a terrible post.

Actually, it does have one use. If you're a recent grad or new to the industry, pay close to attention. Don't be like this guy.

Before you envelope yourself in the comfort of frameworks and libraries, learn how to poke around the internals and understand the underlying architecture. Remember that these are tools written by humans just like you. They'll have bugs. Performance problems. Maybe an edge case the creators haven't thought of. And sometimes you'll be making the mistake.

My personal rule (YMMV) is to never adopt a framework or library unless I'm ready to open a pull request. There are obvious exceptions like databases and other huge projects. I'm specifically referring to small libraries and application frameworks for this rule.

Treating frameworks and libraries as a magical-voodoo-black-box is asking for trouble.

Moreover if you decide to write a blog post warning people not to use a framework or library, you better have some deeper technical insight to back it up. This is just rude.

</comment><comment><USER14> Never start a real project with a deadline with a framework nobody in your team knows. Especially if you consider the language it is written in "not fun".

The same thing would have happend to some degree with any other choice.

E.G last year I nearly went insane doing a project with Django. Although I am a Python developer, the framework is extremely mature and well documented …

<comment><USER15> Hm... Django isn't hard. Mostly the problem is caused by using a framework. Since you throw a tool at things which only needs like 5% of the whole Framework. Even if it is as modular as Django/Rails etc. it's just unnecessary. Thats why more and more Developers love tiny Frameworks/Tools like golang/Sinatra/Flask

<comment><USER14> I totally agree with the 5%, that's why I never used Django before for a real project and preferred Flask mostly. But for this project it made sense since I'm using almost all of its documented features and some undocumented ones like model swapping plus a couple of extensions.

My point was, that it doesn't have to be hard to slow you down. Whatever framework you choose, you will get stuck at some point. A Django developer will have starting problems with Flask, glueing together the basics and choosing a folder/file layout (or changing it later), while for me, I had a very quick start with django building a prototype in no time but then got stuck a lot later on while customizing an having other opinions that the opinionated framework.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> It feels like the author is not familiar with JavaScript, and is taking it out on Ember. JavaScript is a whole different environment than Ruby, not in the least part because JavaScript provides async code-entry. Maybe that would be causing the direct URLs to fail, as some global state is expected in the child pages, but isn't setup yet.

</comment><comment><USER17> I'm no ember fan, but comparing a system that talks to a transactional database and creates html strings to one which handles low latency user interactions and syncs state with a remote service seems disingenuous.

</comment><comment><USER18> I'm not personally a fan of ember but this article seems to paint it in a pretty unfair light. In the end he reveals that he really just doesn't like javascript so...

</comment><comment><USER19> Since a lot of the complaints here are about bloat, complexity, and the steep learning curve, I'd recommend that anyone with similar concerns check out Mithril:

[http://lhorie.github.io/mithril/](http://lhorie.github.io/mithril/)

It has a wonderfully simply design philosophy (similar to React's), can be learned in a matter of hours, and weighs in at 5k.

</comment><comment><USER20> The comparison of Ember to Rails is incorrect. Rails is a serve side rendered framework. Ember is completely client-side. Pick any client side framework and you will face the same diffculties or obstacles. Deep linking breaks if you are not loading depending models.

</comment><comment><USER21> Terrible post! I'm an Angular/Rails guy myself but this guys just doesn't know how to dig into the internals of something and figure it out. That's what really makes an engineer an engineer.

<comment><USER22> For those of us coding for a business purpose, we don't often _want_ a library that requires digging into the internals.

Ideally, you want something simple that saves time. But sometimes you have to compromise and use something opaque that just gets the job done without forcing you to understand it.

The curiosity and intellectualism that make an engineer an engineer, in your opinion, can be toxic in a business environment. Spend a lot of time tinkering, learning cutting-edge technology, or reinventing wheels, and your deadline whizzes by. There's a delicate balance.

I only point these things out because, to many people, Ember.js (and many other libraries) are time-savers rather than something we want to deeply dive into just to use them.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> Which version of Ember you were using? and do you experience working with other Javascript based frameworks like Backbone, Angular, knockout etc.?

</comment><comment><USER24> Interesting post. I've been using Ember on lots of projects for about a year and a half now, and I think it's great. What this post really hits on, however, is the fact that Ember has quite a high learning curve.

After many years of developing SPAs using plain JS/jQuery, the benefits that a framework like Ember could provide were immediately clear to me. As a result, I was willing to push through this curve and subsequently reap the many rewards. For someone like the OP, however, who doesn't seem to have built many ambitious SPAs and for whom building a traditional server-driven web app is an option, I can understand why dealing with Ember's learning curve just doesn't seem worth it.

For those seriously interested in trying Ember, I would advise you not to make the mistake of confusing Ember's somewhat steep learning curve with the quality of the framework itself.

Thoughts:

> 1\. Silent Errors.

These can definitely be annoying and difficult to debug, especially if you're newish to Ember.

> 2\. Deep linking - unreliable.

This is probably because you're not handling your route setup properly. I ran into lots of issues with this when I was learning Ember, and although the guides do a better job explaining how this works nowadays, I do agree with you that it'd be nice if there were more real-world coding examples on the web.

It's important to be aware that the "model" hook in your routes isn't always called. When you use the {{#link-to}} helper in your templates or the `transitionTo` method in your routes, you pass in the model directly and the model hook is skipped. However when navigating directly to the URL, the route's model hook is called and is expected to resolve the model using the params from the URL.

There are also a few common gotchas that involve dealing with nested routes, but I'd have to look at your code to see what exactly is causing your routing issues.

> 3\. Few libraries

If you're using Ember Data (which hasn't hit 1.0 yet), I could see pagination being somewhat of a pain in the ass. Still, I'm using Ember Data on a couple of large projects right now, and I was able to get pagination working fine in a couple of days.

If you're not using Ember Data, pagination shouldn't be harder with Ember than it is with plain JS+jQuery.

> 4\. Few code examples / resources

I agree with you here. There are some good open source Ember apps that you can learn from, but definitely not enough simple code examples online. This is one of the reasons that the learning curve is so high.

> 5\. Slower development

Learning something new is almost always going to be slower than going with what you know. This is especially true of Ember, which the team very accurately bills as "a framework for creating _ambitious_ web applications" (emphasis theirs). Ember is often overkill for a lot of the apps that people need to build. However, if you're building something ambitious, Ember will save you time and headache in the long run. And once you get familiar with it, you'll be pretty speedy.

> 6\. Added layers and complexity

I think your diagram comparing a Rails+Ember stack to a Rails+jQuery stack is totally misleading. You've simply taken everything in Ember and squished it into "Javascript/jQuery". If you're writing a very simple front-end app or a complex app composed of terrible jQuery spaghetti code then yeah, I guess it's an accurate diagram. But if your front-end app is actually complex and well- written, then you're going to have to spend a considerable amount of time implementing some form of glue to handing routing, templating, model state, etc on the front-end. Ember does that for you.

> 7\. It restricted our design

Ember shouldn't limit your design. It seems more likely to me that you guys were new and unsure of how to use Ember to accomplish a specific goal. That said, it'd be great to hear what kinds of snags you ran into, as these would probably make for some good code examples.

> 8\. JavaScript

Ember is for developing applications in JavaScript. If you don't like writing JavaScript-heavy apps, Ember is not for you. And that's okay. It's very often the case that traditional server-centric applications are more than good enough for the task at hand. But when the situation calls for building a modern and ambitious single-page application, you're stuck with JavaScript whether you like it or not, and I believe Ember is a great way to go.</comment>


Ask HN: Does self-hosting your email mean that you'll be flagged for spam? - <AUTHOR> I'd like to host my family's emails. Maintenance is not a problem. What I'm concerned about is being flagged for spammed (due to using Digital Ocean or similar). I'd like to know what those of you who self-host can say about that.<p>There was a related thread two days ago [0].<p>[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18511650 <comment><USER2> Yes. In theory no, but in practice the big the providers just randomly disappear a certain percentage of your emails. They don't get marked as junk, just never get to the recipient. After 15 years of running my own email server I gave up and paid one of the commercial suppliers to ensure my emails arrived.

</comment><comment><USER3> I have not had problems with this (although I am going through my ISP's SMTP server to send, using my own SMTP server to receive; if you are installing Exim by the Debian package manager, select "smarthost" from the menu to enable this function)

(Also, I use multiple email addresses on my computer, although all of them are my own; I do not host any email for anyone else, although you can just as well use the same software to host email for other people too.)

<comment><AUTHOR> Never thought of using a third-party relay SMTP server. That's a great idea.

Gmail has a relay [0][1], but I'm not sure if it's still free now that the G Suite free tier is gone.

Amazon SES [2] has competitive pricing, or it's free (first 62,000 emails per month) if you're using EC2 for sending email.

Then there's a bunch of marketing oriented SMTP providers that have free tiers. E.g. mailjet [3].

[0] [https://kinsta.com/knowledgebase/free-smtp- server/](https://kinsta.com/knowledgebase/free-smtp-server/)

[1] [https://support.google.com/a/answer/2956491?hl=en](https://support.google.com/a/answer/2956491?hl=en)

[2] [https://aws.amazon.com/ses/pricing/](https://aws.amazon.com/ses/pricing/)

[3] [https://www.mailjet.com/pricing/](https://www.mailjet.com/pricing/)

<comment><USER3> I meant the ISP's server; it should come with your internet service (at no extra charge) if they provide a SMTP server.

<comment><AUTHOR> Yeah, but I don't have a long-term ISP. Anyway, I don't see any disadvantage in using a non-ISP SMTP relay.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I do this for my personal email, but use AWS SES for sending. So far, no emails have been flagged/lost.</comment>


Working remotely, 4 years in - <AUTHOR> https://jvns.ca/blog/2018/02/18/working-remotely--4-years-in/ <comment><USER2> 5+ years here. Definitely not looking back to go to an office. After doing the DN thing in Asia for a year, I bought a farm house in my home country in Europe and moved over here. Being able to live in nature instead of in a city is an amazing, life changing experience. I often have people over visiting me - either friends or couch surfers. Planning to AirBnB the barn as well, which I converted into a nice big loft. I don't feel much lonely - I can always chat with neighbors - everybody knows everybody here in the village. Or I can drive to the city whenever I feel like. I love the fact that I've never used an alarm clock (except when I need to catch a flight or something). And yet I am always getting up earl and full of energy. I often nap during the day, which I love, and would be hard to do in an office. I sometimes disappear for a couple of hours to do some work in the garden. And I sometimes check on work on weekends. Overall, the flexibility about how you spend your time and where you live is what makes remote work worth it. You also need the discipline though.

<comment><USER3> _Or I can drive to the city whenever I feel like._

Imagine how open the highways would be if this was how everyone worked/lived.

Clear the highways. Save the planet. Work from home.

<comment><USER4> How can we make this happen? I've been thinking of this as a potential startup idea. What hardware/software can we build that would make companies feel comfortable with many remote workers, and also ensure those remote workers are able to collaborate and work efficiently?

<comment><USER5> The comfort level would be: are you completing your projects on time? Good. You are not? (b/c goofing off at home instead of working) Goodbye! That would do it.

<comment><USER4> That's something employers have been able to do for thousands of years, and yet working remotely remains fairly rare. So I don't agree that "that would do it".

<comment><USER5> I don't know, I really think at its core it is that simple. I worked remote for 12 years as a developer, sysadmin/devops (multi-hat deal with a small company) with no issues whatsoever. I got my projects done. It does require discipline, good communication skills and a bit of organization, but if you don't have those skills already you are bound to fail in any endeavour IMO. But you are correct it is not common. Probably b/c historically: 1) there is the belief if we can't see you you are screwing around 2) Employers do take a chance that they are getting someone who does not have the skills to thrive in that type of environment (who wants to spend all the resources hiring/training to find out)

EDIT: Also if you have the skills to work remote (or partial remote) you will never want to go back to the old "must be in the office every day" job again ;)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I had a totally different experience from the author of this article. Maybe, this was due to the fact that I was working remotely for 4 years with different startups maniacs.

Biggest issues were :

\- Nobody sees how much you are invested into your day to day work. They just see bunch of commits / builds and the little gray or green presence indicator on your messenger app. But if you are struggling for 3 days x 10 hours per day to fix a bug, chances are high that nobody will realize this.

\- You're constantly alone. Even if nowadays we have great communications tools, the reality is that you'll spend 95% of your time alone in front of a computer in an empty apartment. I am excluding working from coffee shops because of the noise and bad setup (chair/table), this can only work once in a while.

\- There is no separation between private and professional life, unless you have an office space and you dedicate yourself to go there on a daily basis (which is at the end equivalent of having an in-house job...). Being in the same place where you live and work makes it very challenging to not think of job in your private time or vice-versa. I also have to be honest and tell you that temptation of using your working time to do private things are much higher when you are at home.

\- You need to be everything. In regular companies, you usually have direct manager, human resources, office manager, cleaning personnel, legal department, IT support, etc... When you are alone at home you need to do everything by yourself, organizing/cleaning your space, negotiating your vacations, dealing with your personal issues, etc...

So now, let's analyze the most common issues of working in an office is... ... The time lost in transportation.

Right now in my new office job, I am spending around 1h30 everyday to get ready and to travel back and forward to the office. At first I started to see that at pure waste. But actually this is not that bad. The days weather is good, I am biking to work and also doing sport, days weather is bad, I drive listening to music and relaxing.

With the biggest advantage of not thinking of job as soon as I leave office, I will definitely never go back to remote work!

<comment><USER7> > Being in the same place where you live and work makes it very challenging to > not think of job in your private time or vice-versa.

Can you expand on this? I do not work remotely right now but as programmers, we're problem solvers. Often times I leave the office after 8 hours but the problem I was solving is still in my head through the night. However, I do not open work stuff over the weekend or in the evening unless there's an emergency. Do you find yourself doing work stuff after your working time or just thinking about it? Also, do you have a work computer and a personal computer, or both in one? Back when I first joined my company was cheap and I used my personal laptop for work, and it made it hard to ignore work stuff when I wasn't in the office.

<comment><USER8> Imagine it's 8pm and you try to work 9-5. You get an email or slack message, you just quickly glance at it and it sounds like there's a tiny fire somewhere in the system that you know how to fix/respond to. It's very easy to sit down on the computer since it's literally a few feet away and get sucked into an 30-90min debacle multiple times per week. I use the same computer for games/internet time and work so that definitely doesn't help. I just don't have room to set up another desktop since my home office has a nice desk, monitor, chair already.

<comment><USER7> That can happen with onsite jobs too. My solution is I don't check work email and barely check Slack after work.

If I worked remote I'd do that I do now - request a work only laptop.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I've been working remotely for about 8 years, and I have to say it's a challenge. I have great colleagues and a great manager and we work on stuff we care about, so I am in no position to complain.

However, all things being equal, I would much prefer to be in the office 3 days per week (not 5!). For all the advantages of working remotely, the social isolation is extremely unnatural and not good for you. Today, for example, I will chat with my personal trainer at the gym, and have a couple phone calls, and that's it for human interaction on a Monday.

Also, while heads-down coding is probably better in the home office, brainstorming and whiteboarding and collaboratively figuring stuff out is _way_ better in person.

> First, I have 5-6 weekly 1:1s with different people with no agenda

That's a great plan, and I wish it were realistic for my team. We've done things like that but they always fall apart once everyone gets really busy. I'd love to blame the 6 time zones but it's not that.

Funny, when I was younger and worked remote on a couple of startups, the isolation wasn't that big a deal. But I went out almost every night, and one (hopefully) outgrows that.

Anyway, good article, and I hope the author continues making the best of a good but tricky way of working!

<comment><USER10> I have been working remotely for approximately 17 years now and has always seemed quite normal to me. I grew up on a farm where my parents worked predominantly from home themselves, so that may have given me a model to follow. Really, when you think about it, when we were a primary agrarian society, working from home was the norm. There are probably a lot of good lessons to be found in history.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> After working remotely for 4 years I am switching back to the office at least 3 days a week and moving back to our company HQ in the States.

Hardest challenge for me was staying in shape, because I lacked self- discipline to workout and eat healthy, but funny enough work didn't suffer and it was the most productive period in my life.

It gets extremely easy to start slacking (no pun intended) and not do your work out. You tell yourself "oh let me just push this feature, fix this bug or communicate about a new feature". Work gets prioritized and everything else is put aside. That actually damages your productivity in the long run and the chance of burning out is far bigger than if you dedicate time to do other things.

Took me a while to recognize the trap I was in - I felt obligated (no peer pressure, but just the fear of missing out) to always be online, answer emails or slack messages. Of course, my mental and physical health suffered due to this FOMO.

Since I have about six months before I get back to the office I promised myself to tackle these things by doing:

\- Fix morning routine by working out, cooking and taking time to do other things (read, play video games, hobby)

\- Snoozing notifications at 6pm my time.

\- Learning to say "It will have to wait 'till tomorrow".

\- Spend more time outside of my apartment at night.

\- Dedicate more time to my SO.

\- Learn Elixir/Erlang during the weekends.

<comment><USER12> > Hardest challenge for me was staying in shape, because I lacked self- > discipline to workout and eat healthy, but funny enough work didn't suffer > and it was the most productive period in my life.

How do you expect that will be fixed by spending more time in the morning and at the end of the day commuting to work?

<comment><USER13> More freedom requires more self-discipline. When you are doing things like everyone else the systems are built for you. When you aren't you have to build those systems yourself, which can be harder than people think.

<comment><USER11> Exactly this. Building systems that work for myself has probably been one of the hardest things and is taking a lot of trial and error.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Most career stories are unique and driven by the circumstances and the person involved. So one's experiences may be very different from another's.

My experience working remotely for 10 of the last 13 years is that it suits me very well and leaves me feeling _differently_ than when I worked in an office.

I don't know if I can say I'm happier, but I'm generally more satisfied. I work MUCH harder and I work MANY more hours. Both of these are sort of my choice, but my behavior is driven by my goals to succeed with whatever project I am on or have defined. Thus, I don't know if I'm overall happier; but I feel less like I am just wasting my life compared to when I burned hours in an office at a much lower productivity.

Another difference (for me) is that the kind of projects I work on and the clients I work for give me a greater chance of financial success at this point in life compared to a more typical job. It may not be a greater pay-per-hour result when you factor in the hours I work, but I have much more opportunity to be part of a winning ($$$) outcome than I did in the corporate world.

And finally, one of my favorite perks is that I can work from anywhere in the world. It's not always easy to work for a month from a Caribbean island while squeezing in scuba certifications, but it makes life a lot more interesting than walking into the same building every day.

I doubt I'll ever walk into an office again for anything more than a week or two at a time. Finances aside, that gives me the feeling that I have _won_ the rat race.

<comment><USER15> >It's not always easy to work for a month from a Caribbean island while squeezing in scuba certifications

(ง'-')ง

<comment><USER16> Is that a fisticuffs emoticon? I'm stealing it.

<comment><USER14> In this case I think it's a _flex muscles_ illustration. Either way, it works!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> I've also worked remotely for 4 years now, but in a company where remote workers aren't that common. I absolutely love it - I love the autonomy, the lack of office distractions, etc.

I think the key things for me are

\- Love your work, motivation then comes for free

\- Communicate a lot, as the article says. Personally I'm a fan of written communication, as I find that is frequently more impactful. Easier to share, and so on.

\- 1to1s are also great

\- Have someone in office you can talk bullshit with over text chat. That helps a lot with the isolation and staying on top of office gossip.

\- Being remote naturally encourages a more independent working style. Being forced to solve problems myself and actually think has been great for me. Not being in office provides the calm and quiet to do exactly that!

\- A lot depends on your manager. Mine is trusting and accomodating, and I very much appreciate it.

\- Finally, having a good internal network in the company is important. Putting in the travels to get some face time is important, as written communication gets a lot better after having met.

<comment><USER18> Question: how does promotion work within the company you work remotely at?

<comment><USER17> Yearly reviews, where high performers get recognized and promoted. My career progression has matched that of my peers, so I have no complaints there.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Bingo: "My current theory about this is – as long as I work on a team with a lot of other remotes, everything will be fine. "

reality is, if your team is 80-90% not remote, forget about career advancement. People who show up have two things, a) they want to advance their careers so will use proximity to their advantage and b) don't understand why they can't be working remotely.

Plus of course processes and culture aren't going to be tailored to remote folks.

The only time I've ever been able to make this work was when the manager was also remote.

<comment><USER17> > reality is, if your team is 80-90% not remote, forget about career > advancement.

That's quite a sweeping statement - and doesn't resonate with me at all. I fit that statistic, but I work in a company that has a mature process for career advancement and that also has multiple sites scattered across the world. I cannot claim that remote work has held me back career-wise. That is, I'm still quite early in my career, maybe the wall comes later.

It has, however, likely steered my career away from management (and thus towards the technical track), which I'll happily admit does not bother me in the slightest :)

<comment><USER19> In rare instances it'll work if you're incredibly in the top 5% of gifted. But, the thing with that, is only 5% of engineers are in that group.

<comment><USER17> So you see it as a general career progression impediment - even the gifted gets "slowed down" progression wise?

Are you talking from personal experience, or guessing? I strongly suspect a lot of this depends heavily on how the talent review process works in the company this takes place in. A gifted engineer will likely get recognized anyways, but an average engineer will need the review process to look beyond face value.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> 5 years for me, and counting. I'm so much happier and more productive, especially since where I work went to an open plan office: bright, noisy, visual distractions everywhere, speakerphones on every desk, little "huddle" tables in between developer desks in each 4-or-5 person "cube".

I have no problems connecting with people on Lync (or more recently HipChat). Interactions are via phone, email, Confluence and Jira.

I get to have a home-cooked lunch with my wife every day. I save all the time I'd spend commuting and dealing with interruptions. No money spent on gas. No getting sick from people coming in and spreading germs (something of an epidemic right now at my office).

I'm pretty sure at some point I'll be forced to give this up, but man, it's been a fantastic ride so far.

</comment><comment><USER21> 14 years as 100% remote... living in the middle of nowhere, 40 acres of land to run around and enjoy (fly huge model planes at lunch time, fire up the bbq with the wife and fams, etc etc) and life is good. I have a reclining workstation that has helped for a number of reasons, but it's made from a chair that's light enough to carry out to the back porch when the weather is nice. Some companies like to take a little off the top of your pay due to being remote, but if you go looking in the right spots you can get remote work at bigger city salaries. Even when the pay was shorted a little, the lifestyle more than makes up for it.

...make sure that you get enough personal interaction (the hardest and most important depending just how "remote" you are), and make sure that you appreciate the lifestyle perk that it is, and be happy.

As much as I love it, it's really not for everyone... I've seen some people be allowed to go remote, move away from the office, not be able to deal with the remoteness and quit. It happens.

</comment><comment><USER22> I have worked remotely for three years. Here are my tips:

Slack is your best friend but if you chat for more than a minute straight about something technical call your collegue otherwise you will lose your time.

Written language is not spoken language. Sometimes misunderstandings can arise.

Do separate your work environment from your daily life. If your house is small, like mine, light off your computer during lunch otherwise you will find yourself reading some docs, checking some code, etc.

Video conferences are not phone calls. When my team need to stay focused everybody have appear.in open in the background.

Always dress like you will dress if working in your office.

</comment><comment><USER23> Obviously everyone is different, but I could never work from home. I really need social interaction to get through the day, I struggle even in my office of 8 people.

I used to work in a coworking space of 250 people, and I loved it. If I'm being honest it's not great for productivity, but socially it was amazing. It was also a really good way to meet people and make new friends, which was important because I moved to a new city and didn't know anyone.

I couldn't handle spending over 20 hours a day in the same building either, I'd get cabin fever. Even spending a whole weekend at home drives me crazy, I have to get out of the house.

I could totally do remote working in a coworking space, or the digital nomad thing, but not working from home. I also think that remote working works best if the whole company is remote. You can't have some people remote and some people on location, because you get an "us and them" mentality. It also makes communication difficult, an on-location team member might tell everyone in the office something, but forget to put it in Slack, as an example.

At the end of the day though, different things work for different people.

</comment><comment><USER24> Almost 10 years for me. The main thing from this post I would emphasize is the point about the company culture. My current employer is all remote, and so support for and integration of remote engineers is natural for them. By contrast I worked at another small company where the engineering management admitted remote employees only reluctantly. Meetings were a nightmare, and the remote attendees could often not even hear or see what was going on. Every now and then the SVP in charge of the group would remind us all that having remote employees meant "twice the effort for half the results." This was the same person who told me during our interview that he only considered remote engineers because it wasn't possible to find good engineers in the small southern city they were located in ("they" meaning the company; the SVP himself was located on the west coast and commuted). Needless to say I didn't last long there.

</comment><comment><USER25> Except for onsite contracting gigs at Google and a search company in Singapore, I had about 20 years or working remotely from our home in Sedona Arizona. I got really tired of not having a local team to work with so my wife and I moved last summer to a new state and I took a job managing a machine learning team.

While sometime I will go back to remote work (and return to Sedona), for now I find it much better to be in an office. My advice would be to not do the same thing for too long without moving on to something different.

</comment><comment><USER26> I've been working remotely for close to 20 years, but it's all been a bunch of short contracts (days to months).

I've worked with people from all over the world across many different time zones. Email, Google Hangouts / Skype, IRC and Slack are all what I use on a regular basis to communicate with clients and it works out well.

I offset working alone from my place of residence by going outside a bunch of times per day for exercise and talking with people around the neighborhood. I also try to goto local tech meetups when I can.

Overall I would say I feel happy and generally feel like I'm making the best use of my time. I don't think I would trade this life style in for anything (within reason :D).

<comment><USER27> What level of urbanization is your neighborhood?

<comment><USER26> Typical suburbs. Nothing like a big city, but houses and small businesses are all over the place.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> Any recommendation for video conferencing? We are using hangout and it is not reliable at all :(

<comment><USER29> We use zoom ( [https://zoom.us](https://zoom.us) ) and works quite well. Beside that, I heard a lot of good things about Jitsi ( [https://jitsi.org](https://jitsi.org) )

<comment><USER30> Yeah, Zoom has been good for us. It's good quality, and you can still see other participants during a presentation.

On the free plan there's a one hour cap to meetings, which is ideal as nobody wants to be in a meeting longer than an hour.

<comment><USER31> > It's good quality, and you can still see other participants during a > presentation.

I regularly use Hangouts, Slack calls and Zoom and I totally agree. Especially quality of Slack calls is awful. Just earlier today we had a call, where audio was delayed ~2s while video was perfectly fine.

And Zooms grid view is so nice. I wonder why their competitors don't offer the same functionality.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> The author initially writes,

> Before we get into the struggles of working remote, [...]

but then never gets around to describe those struggles. I wonder what they are.

<comment><USER33> He mentions being lonely during the 3rd and 8th months and provides links I believe.

<comment><USER34> _He mentions being lonely during the 3rd and 8th months and provides links I believe._

The author's name is in large type at the top of the page.

<comment><USER35> I think on about 30% of my blog posts that end up on the hacker news front page:

* someone refers to me as "he"

* someone else corrects them to "she"

* an extended argument ensues about whether "he" is a gender neutral pronoun, whether "they" is a gender neutral pronoun, whether it matters if you refer to a woman as "he" or not, whether the original author cares whether they're referred to as "he" or "she", and on and on and on :)

From my perspective (since I've seen this argument so many times) this argument is very repetitive and doesn't add a lot of value to the HN comments -- I think it would be much better if people just accepted being corrected with "it's she" and then go back to discussing the actual contents of the article in an interesting way (in this case, a lot of people are sharing their experiences with working remotely and it's been really interesting to see what everyone's different experiences are!)

so if you care about this topic I would humbly suggest that you don't comment further about pronouns and instead maybe share your experiences with working remotely! =)

<comment><USER32> ...and my initial question still isn't answered. :/

<comment><USER33> Have you read [https://jvns.ca/blog/2014/06/06/working- remote/](https://jvns.ca/blog/2014/06/06/working-remote/) and [https://jvns.ca/blog/2014/06/06/working- remote/](https://jvns.ca/blog/2014/06/06/working-remote/) ?

There might be answers in there if not in this article.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> I have been self employed, working from wherever, for just shy of 7 years now.

Overall the experience has been life-changing in a positive way, and I would highly recommend people try this arrangement at least once in their careers to see if the tradeoffs give them an advantage.

Here are some benefits, in no particular order:

\- I have the flexibility to rearrange my days so I never have to take time off work for things like shopping, errands, appointments, visits, meetings, and even events I want to attend during the day

\- Because I can choose when I work, I am able to capture my most creative and productive times during the day for work, and spend my downtime doing chores or things that require little creativity

\- By changing my surroundings according to my mood, I can 'hack' my productivity to a small extent (going to a lively environment when I feel unmotivated, isolating myself when I need to focus and block out interruptions, etc)

\- I don't have a set wake up time, nor a set bed time. If I need to work late one day and it works to my advantage to stay up later rather than break, I can 'push' my next day back

And here are some downsides, in no particular order:

\- You can go a little stir-crazy working from home too much, the onus is on your to get out of the house and surround yourself with other people to stay social

\- Sometimes you will find yourself pushing life out of the way to make room for work because of the same flexibility that lets you push work out of the way for life sometimes. Not having set hours is a blessing and a curse at times, but overall beneficial

\- It can be hard to gauge how you stack up to others if you're not seeing other people doing the same kind of work as you are. Some people are self- starters and compete against themselves for continual improvement, but if you lack in this area it can be a struggle to not stagnate and get too comfy in your role

For me, the benefits have far outweighed the downsides, and I can't imagine ever going back to the 9–5, butt-in-chair-all-day kind of work arrangement. I feel that by working remotely I am doing my best work ever, and I have the freedom and flexibility to improve myself too!

</comment><comment><USER37> Best thing about reading more and more success stories of working remotely online is, for someone hoping to make the jump eventually, that there does indeed seem to be a trend.

I'm not sure there's much valuable advice however, as the way you should set up your process seems pretty obvious once you really decide that including remote workers is a high priority.

</comment><comment><USER38> I have worked remote for the last 3 years and in the office for the 10 years before that at the same company. I can definitely say I will never work in an office again if at all possible. Remote work is definitely not for everyone, but for those of us that prefer it, its more important than pay or benefits. I won't rehash what others have said, but i do have an experience that may be different than most.

I work for a company of close to 3000 that has maybe a dozen remote workers. Most of which are sales people, a few workers that work on site all over the country and then me, a developer/analyst.

As a general rule, the company allows occasional remote work for select teams (mostly just IT), but as a whole, it's against remote work. I am the only developer (or IT for that matter) that is full remote.

Working for a company that is NOT a remote friendly company is an absolute challenge. Here are a few of the additional challenges you deal with above and beyond the normal remote work. \- missed conversations. they happen way more in an office that doesn't have remote workers

\- no advancement possibilities. I'm already sr. so I don't care)

\- jealousy issues. not a real problem aside from I can't tell people I am working in another state for the winter

\- you are an inconvenience to everyone. every meeting requires the phone or remote desktop just for you

\- all processes have to take into account 1 remote worker

\- missed team events, although I attend most of them since I only live 1.5 hours away (most of the year)

\- VPN... if there are issues, I am the first to know

\- expectation of 8-5 m-f. Although I actually prefer it because routine is good and sets defined work/life time

Ultimately, if you are not sure if you would like to be a remote worker, I wouldn't recommend it at a company that isn't at least 50% remote (or at least the team you would be on).

<comment><USER39> I am suprised that at 3000 people the company doesn't have offices all over.

I worked mostly remotely for one Bank - mostly because I arranged to have 2 desks and then slowly moved home and worked from the different offices. I love face to face sometimes and remote (full concentration) other times.

Again I find that a lot of people can't handle it. Like a basic rule should be that you should respond within 1-30 min to any chat message.

<comment><USER38> We have 1 primary office and then a couple of smaller offices in different states.

I generally live by your basic rule. I actually respond better than the majority of the people in the office.

There are two types of people i have noticed that are challenged the most with working remote. Those that need lots of social interaction and those with smaller kids at home. One simply hates the isolation and the other is usually too distracted.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER40> I think working remotely has it's pluses and minuses. I'm a few years in and have only had one in-office programming contract.

The positive is that I am entirely focused on GSD. I'm not sure about everywhere, but the place I was in-house at was fairly sparse and focused as well. I dread the thought of ever working at a place with pool tables or other distractions.

Working remotely puts a lot of trust in my work. They trust that I'm doing what I say I'm doing when I track hours. I've never had an issue disputing hours, so that's not a negative.

Working remotely pegs you as one of the smart ones. Apparently I earned the right to work remotely? I don't know, it's just work to me, but I also do a lot of short-term contracts, so the image is probably different.

This leads to the big downside. Out of sight, out of mind, out of personally caring. This somewhat goes both ways, but it's difficult to make text friends. Humans are simply wired for face-to-face, and I don't think Skype really replaces that.

This causes some problems with impedance. If I ask a question, I would need an answer right away because that's likely a blocking issue. If everyone else is on lunch, in a meeting, and so on, it leaves me hanging.

A positive is seeing a whole lot of codebases. It really helps you understand where you and everyone else is in the pecking order. It also brings up a lot of issues surrounding the meaning of good -vs- bad code, experts programmers, and so on. Exposure has shown me that these concepts are murky at best.

A negative is that some companies try to pay lower, selling remote work as a benefit. It isn't. I often have to split my day and work odd hours to keep myself on the same page as everyone else, nullifying whatever inconvenience I gain from not going to and from a local company.

But, really, it all comes down the company that you are working with. It is obvious when they haven't worked with outside developers, so I think it's a lot more about the company than the actual ability to work remotely.

Remote work is just work, and I don't think that, outside of direct human interaction and speed of communication, there is a significant difference between in-house and remote. Either way, code is written and shipped.

</comment><comment><USER41> Does Stripe (presumably where they work) still allow full-time remote work? I looked at their job board and it seems like none of the job posts are for remote positions.

<comment><USER35> I can't speak for the job board, but there are dozens of full-time remote developers (including me, obviously), and I see remotes devs being hired frequently.

</comment></comment><comment><USER42> It's great to hear that some people manage to love working remotely. In this case, there's /some/ difference in time zones (3h). Generally, people don't seem to mention the time zone difference in the commentary each time articles like this gets posted on HN, but I'd actually love to hear where people are working remote from/to, since there can literally be a night and day difference.

</comment><comment><USER43> 8 years in here. The team you work with really makes the difference. Not sure I ever plan on moving to in-house.

</comment><comment><USER44> "I have 5-6 weekly 1:1s with different people with no agenda."

Wow, five meetings a week not even counting project or departmental recurring status meetings or random crop up ones? That would totally annihilate any hope of the uninterrupted 3+ hour stretch it takes to do any real work.

<comment><USER35> I think managing calendar fragmentation is important! Added a "calendar management" section to the post to address this :)

here are the strategies I use to keep my calendar under control:

\- try to cluster meetings together (have a 1.5 hour meeting block so I only get interrupted once)

\- block off 4-hour chunks of "focus time" in my calendar. People are good at respecting that.

\- add an "end of day" block on my calendar at 5:30pm EST every day. This means that people know not to schedule things with me after I'm done for the day. Sometimes it's unavoidable because 5:30 EST is 2:30 in the home office, but people always ask if it's okay to schedule something after my end of day.

</comment></comment><comment><USER45> On the subject, what are the best places to find remote jobs? (I'm a linux oriented senior sysadmin, currently going to school for data science)

</comment><comment><USER46> I worked as an online freelancer for 6 years. I can relate to the story. Yes its scary and chalenging shift of career.

</comment><comment><USER47> I just graduated from college any tips on landing the first remote work?

</comment><comment><USER48> The whole reason remote work is feasible, is that the problems we deal with, as well as the politics of the companies we work for, transcend place. In other words, it's the same as working in an office as far as the actual work and the working relationships are concerned. Sure you video chat more, and eat lunch together less, and try to find ways of addressing that difference. But, in many ways it's the same. I wish I felt as ecstatic as some of my fellow commenters here claim to.

But ultimately, it's just another way of working, and the basic unpleasantness of working in corporate America/tech industry remains. Don't get me wrong, I relish the ability to do my laundry when nothing is going on. But it's not really that different, and the things that bum me out about working are mostly not to do with office space, though I do lament the move to open offices.

</comment><comment><USER49> Just playing the Devil's advocate here.

These days I work with a person who was working remote for around 5 years or so. He now works with us full time. There are somethings you forget and forgive me for saying this, you also gain a lot of bad habits. The worse among them being ability to work with a team and collaborate. You also lose out on learning from technical discussions, practices going on in the industry, colleagues who share things. And most important of all ambition that comes from peer pressure. You sort of lose out on so many things that it will hard to start working with a team again.

Sure if you are at the top of your game, you can drive things on your terms. But please rethink your stance. Also, its quite hard for long term remote workers to start working with teams. Many bad habits crawl to the workplace. Most important of them being dysfunctional communication, sometimes its as simple as committing code and writing documentation.

Remote workers can be bad cultural fits for almost any culture. Simply due to the fact that they are exposed to none.</comment>


Hartli - a Web Design analysing Robot - <AUTHOR> http://www.hartli.com/ <comment><AUTHOR> I think this is rather amazing. And kudos to the creators, but I cant help but feel that the "Create a site based on this design" is a little on the ethically grey side. Essentially saying copy this persons design and charge me for it. That being said it does seem to (using the Machine-Learning / analysis) err on the side of being less evil more clever.

<comment><USER2> on the other hand, I feel the sophisticated language is rather shallow, probably based on simple rules (e.g. if a form is dominant on the website, add "accepting" to the opinion).</comment></comment>


The war of privacy is coming - <AUTHOR> http://jcutrell.svbtle.com/privacy-war

<comment><USER2> > What will you do when you have the opportunity to trade your privacy as a > currency?

The common view that people are doing a simple economic trade has some problems. Namely, people don't know what their personal information is worth when they give it to Apple, Facebook, Google, or whoever. Additionally your privacy can have latent value (i.e. it may not be important to you right now, but may have value to you in the future when you don't have it): [http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2059154](http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2059154)

<comment><AUTHOR> That makes sense.

I think perhaps it's from the opposite perspective that I'm approaching this. Specifically, creating things that require customers/users to give up privacy. The model itself stands in place of a different exchange, and while it's not clean, it does create a trade of some value.

I suppose we could argue that none of us know the value of a dollar, either, but I agree more with you than I do the devils advocate in my head.</comment></comment>


All country codes in a module (currency code, TIN or VAT code, language, etc.) - <AUTHOR> https://www.npmjs.com/package/country-codes-list <comment><AUTHOR> This module includes a list of codes per country, with a lot of codes info about them:

\- Country code (ISO 3166-1 alpha-2): Obtained from Wikipedia

\- Country Name: Each name in english and in the local country language

\- Currency Code (ISO 4217): Obtained from Wikipedia

\- Currency Name (ISO 4217): Obtained from Wikipedia

\- TIN Code (Taxpayer Identification Number, also known as VAT in some countries): Obtained from Wikipedia

\- TIN Name: Obtained from Wikipedia

\- Official language code (usually from ISO 639-1, or ISO 639-3 otherwise)): Obtained from Open Street Map. Returns only the first official language code per country

\- Official language name: Each name in english and in the local country language

\- Country Calling Code: The phone calling code for the country. Obtained from Wikipedia.</comment>


Author of Python's pandas and statsmodels demos them [vid] - <AUTHOR> http://www.vcasmo.com/video/drewconway/13268

<comment><AUTHOR> Project links:

<http://pandas.sourceforge.net/index.html>

<http://statsmodels.sourceforge.net/></comment>


Google did the right thing with NASCAR crash video. Why it matters - <AUTHOR> http://paidcontent.org/2013/02/24/how-google-did-the-right-thing-with-the-nascar-crash-video-and-why-it-matters/ <comment><USER2> I don't know. It kind of seems like Google just followed the rules. I tried to find a spectator contract or something similar and could not. The Daytona website ([http://www.daytonainternationalspeedway.com/Track- Info/FAQ.a...](http://www.daytonainternationalspeedway.com/Track- Info/FAQ.aspx)) does not really have much information on what you can do with recordings of the event. It does explicitly state that cameras are allowed on site though.

Fans may enter with:

One soft-sided cooler, no larger than 14 X 14 X 14 inches.

Coolers of this size typically have a removable plastic liner and are branded to hold 24-36 cans of Coca-Cola or other beverages. The soft sided insulated cooler may contain ice.

One lightweight backpack similar to those used by school students, to accommodate cameras, radio scanners, and souvenirs.

Note: Fans are allowed to bring in one each of the bags described above.

Binoculars, scanners, headsets, cameras, not in a bag, worn separately over the neck or on the belt and seat cushions carried separately are also allowed.

Seat cushion bags with compartments will be reviewed on an individual basis. All items brought through a grandstand gate will be inspected.

The following may not enter the admission gates:

Firearms, Fireworks and items restricted by Local, State or Federal laws

Hard-sided coolers, thermos and insulated cups of any size.

Items restricted by track policy:

Strollers, umbrellas, etc.

Any bags, backpacks, or containers larger than the allowed size.

None of the above-restricted items may be left in or around the gate area. (The above are subject to change without notice).</comment>


Surface Pro: Kaby Lake gives longer battery life, but still no modern ports - <AUTHOR> https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2017/05/surface-pro-updated-at-last-kaby-lake-gives-longer-battery-life-but-still-no-modern-ports/ <comment><AUTHOR> Essentially the old one with some minor changes under the hood, and an updated pen. Worth an upgrade from Pro 4? Don't think so.</comment>


Gnome removed solid-color backgrounds based on what developer's friends use - <AUTHOR> https://www.reddit.com/r/gnome/comments/dayto8/can_someone_point_me_to_the_train_of/f2214ql/ <comment><USER2> GNOME, 2020:

> The entire backgrounds panel was rewritten from scratch, so technically > every single feature that it had was momentarily removed and then most were > subsequently re-added as entirely new implementations.

jwz, 2003:

> I report bugs; they go unread for a year, sometimes two; and then > (surprise!) that module is rewritten from scratch -- and the new maintainer > can't be bothered to check whether his new version has actually solved any > of the known problems that existed in the previous version. [...] It hardly > seems worth even having a bug system if the frequency of from-scratch > rewrites always outstrips the pace of bug fixing.

</comment><comment><USER3> Reading the thread, including the parent post the OP omitted, it looks like they rewrote the background picker. And decided that this wasn't worth the time to reimplement.

Well it's not as if people are paying for GNOME.

Is there something on the issue tracker to add it back?

Rather than creating some drama or calling out a GNOME developer, why not see if you can implement the feature?

The odds are they'd welcome the contribution.

Edit:

Looks like it's not part of the "design vision" of GNOME.

However gotta say there seems to be a lot of hostility generated.

[https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/gnome-control- center/-/issues...](https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/gnome-control- center/-/issues/717)

The ability to change the background is apparently still available via cli:

$ gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.background picture-uri ''

$ gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.background primary-color '#123456'

<comment><AUTHOR> Wow... discussion locked by the same dev who made the initial call...

<comment><USER4> I'm glad to see they locked it so rapidly once the pile-on began. I don't agree with their position, but the comments over the past couple weeks have all the hallmarks of Internet mob behavior: "It's been months since you made your decision and I've decided to stir up controversy about it again". I'm not sure where this was posted about three weeks ago, but that led to the pile-on beginning here:

[https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/gnome-control- center/-/issues...](https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/gnome-control- center/-/issues/717#note_787127)

And now we're here having a dramatic outrage over it too. It's not a great decision, but linking to this Reddit post was far less effective than linking to a blog post about this controversy would have been.

I wish we could have read a proper written story posted to HN about this, rather than being expected to sort through a haphazard pile of user comments without context. Is this only interesting because it's disagreeable? Is the survey methodology the focus? Why did this matter to whoever posted it? Tell us a better story next time, OP.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Why is Gnome forgetting that Gnome is being used by many newcomers.

It has lot of defaults non-appealing to many(no minimize, maximum window buttons, trackpad defaults to MacOS style controls, etc.). Also bar on left is non intuitive to many. Due to these reasons,bany extensions are necessary.

That's the reason why i think that Mate and KDE Plasma are better alternative DEs for beginners.

</comment><comment><USER6> Well, this is how Gnome works, their way or highway. It's funny when they emphasize community importance, but most of the time few people are calling the shots.

</comment><comment><USER7> I tried to find it today! I ended up making a solid blackish image instead. Reidiculous.

<comment><USER8> I think I had to do that with my phone one time. Did feel silly.

<comment><USER9> Years ago, on my Android phone, I took a photo of my finger covering the lens, so I could have a black wallpaper. That way, I could save battery, and easily see all my icons.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> This is why people call it open sores. You have no idea what feature you need will be removed tomorrow. Software perfection is not achieved with constant churn, so I'm not really sure what they are aiming for. Fresh code? Rat wheel. Good thing mate exists and is maintained.

</comment><comment> t-writescode Doesn't Gtk provide a color picker component they could just shove on a tab and use?

[https://developer.gnome.org/libgnomeui/stable/GnomeColorPick...](https://developer.gnome.org/libgnomeui/stable/GnomeColorPicker.html)

?

</comment><comment><USER11> I don't use Gnome because of this kind of attitude they take toward its development (XFCE and Cinnamon are my jam). But for people who do use Gnome, do you expect these kinds of changes and welcome them? Or do you stick to a particular version?

</comment><comment><USER12> It's nice to read stuff like this. I'd hate to think I moved to Mac a decade ago only for Linux's most popular GUI to get it's head out of it's ass afterwards.

Gnome being Gnome gives me a deep sense of a decision well made.

<comment><USER13> Yeah Apple never removes popular basic features from their devices...

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Gnome devs don't really like solid background colours. the cli is so much more practical, user friendly, and follows headless ui system guidelines.

Also you can call to your inner geekness when discovering this easter egg. All fun!

<comment><USER15> I'm really not sure if you're being sarcastic or genuine.

Obviously, if you're being genuine, you shouldn't ever wonder why no one uses Gnome.

And if you're being sarcastic, well then... carry on! :)

<comment><USER14> Thanks, I'm afraid my Sarcastic level was on extra-high mode :/

I loved gnome, but since moved on to xfce.

Edit: I still love gnome, just bring the goddamn solid background colours back

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Add that to the great idea of using JavaScript everywhere because it is more "welcoming" for new developer members.

And this is why I ended up using XFCE instead.

</comment><comment><USER17> I've had my backgroumd as pure black on every machine I've ever used... Even my phones.

<comment><USER18> Dark gray for me.

Save memory too.

This decision seems dab to me, as the feature had to pretty simple to keep in.

<comment><USER19> > _This decision seems dab to me_

What does that mean?

<comment><USER18> Crazy autocorrect issue. I typed "dumb". Weird.

<comment><USER20> Autocorrect is always ducking amazing :D

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> It's simply a huge memory regression, thus a bug. Low memory devices cannot use gnome then. Maybe they do care about low memory devices, but I doubt so.

</comment><comment><USER22> Does xsetroot not work? I just set my background in my .xinitrc file with:

xsetroot -solid grey25

But in general, unless you're a novice user, I've never understood the need for the heavyweight DEs like gnome or kde. A terminal and a window manager with no border decorations is a lot more pleasant.

<comment><USER20> ... yes, because everyone should know how to do that? That's obviously a core part of learning to use a windowing system.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> Ah, the science of UX.

</comment><comment><USER24> Setting solid background is... Super niche. Good idea to just not bother.</comment>


Show HN: AlchemyList.com – Find keto, low- and slow carb foods while traveling - <AUTHOR> If you have done any amount of traveling outside of your home country, you know how tricky it can sometimes be to find a protein bar, yoghurt or snack that is not loaded with sugar and carbs, without having to decipher a label in a distant language, or stay long enough to find out what is available. But fear not, I've created a list of the best keto, slow- and low carb foods found in Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Iceland and Estonia for your enjoyment. You can find it all in this public spreadsheet: http://master-list.alchemylist.com
However, there are still lots of countries where there is no information. You can improve the list by editing the spreadsheet, I've already added 200+ countries and territories, anywhere from Andorra to East-Timor.
I also created a discussion group if anyone is interested: http://discussion.alchemylist.com/
Please share your thoughts, and let me know what you think. To add a new product, edit the spreadsheet. <comment><AUTHOR> It looks like some of the countries for some reason didn't save. I have re- added every country and territory, all 200+ of them.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> The whole spreadsheet has been re-structured, to make it more practical and scalable.</comment>


Show HN: Experiment on unscatter.com, only showing result details on hover - <AUTHOR> http://www.unscatter.com/search/?q=obama

<comment><AUTHOR> Looking for love it or hate, and would be really helpful if you can tell me why in either case.

If the "obama" search offends or annoys anyone, sorry. I use that search a lot because it's usually pretty active and a good way to test how fresh of results I'm getting.

Thanks ahead of time for anyone who replies this late (well late Eastern time). I'm off to bed after banging on the site most of the night. I'll check replies tomorrow afternoon/evening when I can get online. Got a busy family day.</comment>


NSA E-Mail Eavesdropping - <AUTHOR> https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2013/07/nsa_e-mail_eave.html

<comment><USER2> It is a terrible disgusting shame that this whole thing is slowly fading into the backdrop. In a few years, it will just be taken for granted that the US government listens to / stores data on everything you do.

I would very much like, now more than ever, for services to build on encryption in a way that allows it to be used by everyone, with little to no barrier to entry.

I've wanted to encrypt all my email for a very long time, but the logistics of doing so when you interact with normal people are... rough, at best.

<comment><USER3> > In a few years, it will just be taken for granted that the US government > listens to / stores data on everything you do.

I doubt it. Google/Apple/Facebook/AWS/AWS customers/Microsoft have more non-US customers than US customers, and while the US population might not care, all of those "foreign entities" that Obama explained are targeted without warrants aren't going to put their high-value confidential data into those services now that this is common knowledge.

These companies had better get their asses in gear and get this whole surveillance architecture shut down, or it's curtains for the US internet industry.

If this isn't visibly and loudly fixed, nobody (the 6.5+bn nobodies that don't get 4th amendment protections) will trust US-based companies with high value data ever again. (It may already be too late, if only because if they shut down this one, their track record of dishonesty and evasion suggests they'd just build another and lie about its existence like they did this time 'round.)

There are already European municipalities banning the use of Google Apps on security grounds, for instance. This is just the beginning.

<comment><USER4> I just hope you're right about the rearguard action which might now get underway. Apparently the US nomenclatura seems to think that privacy is a privilege only for Americans - and then only in a formal sense. Hit them where it hurts, in their pocket. Best part is that not paying to be bugged is something any of us can do as a tiny pathetic action which might turn out not to be so if there are enough of us.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> What I don't get is that in the USA, figuring out a password to an email account is a crime punishable with years of jailtime (think of the Sarah Palin case) [1], but somehow, when the NSA does it _to everyone in the world_ it's just "yesterday's news"?

[1] [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_Palin_email_hack](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_Palin_email_hack)

<comment><USER6> That's a ridiculous comparison. The government has more power to do things than individuals. When people kill people its murder, no matter how guilty that person is. When the government does it pursuant to a legitimate sentencing, its no crime.

<comment><USER7> That's a ridiculous comparison. For one, the courts didn't find everyone who was surveilled guilty of something for which surveillance was a sentence, and government actions are justified by law, not fiat. For another, your choice of murder is unnecessarily extreme and emotional. A better comparison would be opening someone's mail. It is illegal for someone to open someone else's USPS mail, but the NSA thinks it's not a big deal to open everyone's mail and construct a big chart of who knows who and what they talk about. Given that no one under surveillance has been convicted of anything, running a program of that audacity and scale is not what a government "Of the People" should be doing. In previous times of war, we have said that governments who do that should be removed.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Why do we keep talking about the legality of what is being done? Instead, our standards should be what should and should not be done. Just because you can do something, doesn't mean it's a good idea.

<comment><USER9> You make a good point, but subjective standards are harder to enforce than objective standards (laws). We subjectively decide what should and shouldn't be done, and then we objectively codify that in law to make prosecution straightforward and fair. The law is a tool.

That's the theory. We're fucked when the govt turns around and subjectively interprets objective law to do whatever the fuck they want.

<comment><USER8> Sure. But really, I meant why does the NSA or other orgs need to do everything up to the letter of the law (regardless of the suggestion that they went beyond the law)? Just because the speed limit __is __70, doesn 't mean you have to go 70.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> The PRISM revelations are causing people to question using online services such as GMail and Facebook for fear that the NSA could access their information. Some have said they would prefer a model where all their data is stored locally on their phone rather than trusting it to an online company.

However, wouldn't it be easier for the NSA to get data directly off your phone rather than requesting your data from all the online companies individually?

It's probably trivial for the NSA to remotely access the data on your phone or even turn it into a remote listening device when you're not using it. Snowden intimated this when he recommended to all the people he was meeting to put their phones in the icebox because its insulation blocks reception.

<comment><USER11> The point is about dragnet surveillance. Since info is centralized, it can be copied without too many people being aware that it's being done. E.g., the copying of info from Google etc was done without any "hacking" or backdoors.

Whereas doing the same scale of info copying by individually accessing users' computers/phones would be _WAY_ WAY more detectable.

Typing in a hurry, sorry if the point isn't clear.

<comment><USER10> As I understand it, the NSA does not have unfettered access to all of Google's/Facebook's data so it makes FISA requests on individual users, which the online companies have not been permitted to include in their transparency reports ([http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/userdatarequests/](http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/userdatarequests/)). Dragnet surveillance techniques such as tapping fiber is a different issue.

Regarding detectability, I'm sure they have methods for downloading phone data that are hard to detect and would look like malware if someone happened to detect it.

<comment><USER12> >As I understand it, the NSA does not have unfettered access to all of Google's/Facebook's data so it makes FISA requests on individual users

You may continue to hold that opinion, but I see no reason to trust denials by either the gov't or by Google/Facebook/et al. "Unfettered access" is easy to deny, but it may be the case that what the gov't has amounts to the same thing, or is effectively unfettered access. The gov't officials involved have little incentive to tell the truth, and a large incentive to conceal their activities. The corporate parties may be compelled to lie, or at least be unable to tell the truth (under duress).

>Dragnet surveillance techniques such as tapping fiber is a different issue.

A single program of many. Don't confuse gov't denials concerning one activity under one program, as proof that the gov't isn't conducting that activity under some other program by another name. Also, gov't officials have been caught in outright lies James Clapper, for example.

>I'm sure they have methods for downloading phone data that are hard to detect and would look like malware if someone happened to detect it.

Phones report their users' every activity, this has been discussed here and on the internet at large, at length, several times over the past few years. Most recently was the disclosure related to Motorola phones which is still on the front page. [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5973282](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5973282)

<comment><USER10> > Don't confuse gov't denials concerning one activity under one program, as > proof that the gov't isn't conducting that activity under some other program > by another name

I'm not ruling out any scenario -- just pointing out that even if Google/Facebook refuse to comply with the NSA or you decide to stop storing data in the cloud, it may not do much to protect your privacy because your phone is not a safe haven.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> All this makes me wonder if the NSA has the ability to tap your medical records. Has this reach been talked about?

In their terms, nothing is off limits, correct?

</comment><comment><USER14> Newsroom NSA episode predicted this.

<comment><USER15> Newsroom NSA storyline was based on earlier leaks that basically said the same things, just without evidence and government admissions to back them up and the stories died out quickly in the news without most people paying attention.</comment></comment>