Facebook Tests Bluetooth 'Beacons' to Feed Users Local Content - <AUTHOR> http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2015/01/29/facebook-tests-bluetooth-beacons-to-feed-users-local-content/

<comment><USER2> I don't really see the advantage of a physical beacon. How is it better than serving relevant information based on phone's native location capabilities?

<comment><USER3> > How is it better than [...] phone's native location capabilities?

That's what it is. The beacon doesn't transmit any data, only a serial number. This serial is used to get the relevant data over the internet.

The beacons work indoors, and have a potentially better accuracy than wifi geolocation. It is also simple to tie to a speciffic service.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Reminds me of _Facebook Beacon_ (2007): [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Facebook_Beacon](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Facebook_Beacon)

</comment><comment><USER5> Makes me really glad that I do not use the Facebook app.

<comment><USER6> Why? Can you elaborate on why this would be a bad thing for your uses?

<comment><USER7> I think it is pretty obvious... Do I want Facebook not only tracking my online activity but my physical activity as well?</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: Anyone making a living off of desktop applications? - <AUTHOR> I have this side project that has been stuck for quite some time, because I can't seem to make up my mind if I should go with a desktop or a web application. Is any single developer or small team making a living of desktop apps, and are they still relevant?
My side project is a kind-of productivity application, and my target users are not really technical people and will probably have one computer, but as I'm a "lonely" developer (working alone) I have to think about the future, and so I have to try to make the right choice on this..
It would be great to hear both successful and unsuccessful experiences made by single or small teams of developers.. <comment><USER3> First, of course you can make a living out of desktop applications. In the echo chamber of HN you could maybe get the idea that they are no longer relevant, but out in the real world millions of people need to do real work, but don't have a stable connection to the Internet.

Second, If you decide to create a desktop application, then make it native. I must strongly advise against using any of these "web frameworks" e.g. Electron, QTwebkit etc. to create desktop applications. They are slow, bloated and probably contain many security holes because of the huge complexity of browser engines.

They only exists because many developers don't know anything else than web development, instead of learning new skills they created this abomination. One earlier post said that minumum an i3 was required for the apps to remain snappy, think about it, that is just ridiculous especially in a time where PC's are upgraded much less frequently than they used to be. I would NEVER install an application created using a web framework.

I have good experinces with Rust and Golang when creating native applications for multiple OS.

<comment><USER4> > They only exists because many developers don't know anything else than web > development

I know how to write native apps in C# with WPF, Obj-C with Cocoa, C++ with Qt, Erlang with WxWidgets, and even in pure Tcl/Tk. I still prefer using HTML5 to any/all of those. It's about multi-platform portability, where "the web" is itself one of the targeted platforms.

> I would NEVER install an application created using a web framework.

Do you use web apps in a browser? Gmail or Outlook.com, say? Why would them adopting more native UX controls make you _stop_ using them, then?

If it's about the cost in non-shared runtime memory (i.e. basically running 5 separate instances of Chromium for five "apps"), this can be fixed; look, for example, at how the Chrome App Launcher works in Canary. Window-mode Chrome Apps are basically equivalent to Electron apps, but run as sandboxes under a common single-process runtime (Chrome) rather than each being a process of their own.

<comment><USER5> I use Gmail and other web apps, because I'm accessing remote data through them, and running remote apps to do so is a good idea IMO. However, I think "the Web" is not a good platform for native-like apps. It's not only slow and resource-hungry (I can edit pictures and video reasonably, yet web apps still stutter and hang up), it was also never designed for app GUIs. HTML is a nice text markup language, but it was never meant for GUIs. CSS is nice for styling text, but it's now used for much more. Layout is torn between HTML and CSS. And web apps don't "fit in" with their appearance, and I value consistency in desktop apps a lot. With Qt/GTK, I can change a system-wide theme, and all apps will fit in with each other, which is something web apps can't offer. And while creating new frameworks may help programmers, it doesn't solve the fundamental issue that the web is not meant for native-esque apps.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I make living off desktop app in construction industry. The app is 21 years old and is still written in Delphi 5. I still actively maintaining it and it runs fairly well on modern Windows OSes, but there were some low level problems in recent years.

We are team of two: I am sole developer and there is another person doing sales, support, training and all the rest of stuff.

<comment><USER7> What are the low level problems you have been running into?

<comment><USER6> Three main things: \- memory space for printers and sound cards changed in Vista, so when you have some constellation of printers and you change the printer in dialog whole program just crash, because it is trying to touch restricted memory or something.

\- running Paradox in network is quite difficult. Whole database was written in 80s before things like tcp/ip was thought as a good thing and all the networking part was hacked inside and it shows. Because of weird architectural choices made 20+ years ago I am not able to migrate out to sane database without rewriting whole application. (250+k lines of code)

\- BDE could be quite unstable in various scenarios and you spend quite a lot of time fiddling with memory space, memory size and other variables to make it work.

<comment><USER7> Thanks for the explanation. A lot of my code is getting old (just like me), but I was lucky in that it was designed from the start to be cross platform. This ended up meaning that it was written in C and all the platform specific code was kept as separate modules.

My big problem is I have so many code paths that I can't fully test the interactions between the different modules and functions (there are over 10^25 different possible paths). I am not sure what can be done about this given the functionality of the software is critically dependent on this flexibility. The best I have been able to come up with is testing 99.99% of the most popular paths and building in a lot of error recovery code.

<comment><USER8> >My big problem is I have so many code paths that I can't fully test the interactions between the different modules and functions (there are over 10^25 different possible paths).

Interesting. Have you considered the pros and cons of writing a custom fuzzer for your app, and whether it may help?

<comment><USER7> I actually have written a custom fuzzer. It has been really useful in chasing out bugs caused by improper handling of corrupt files, but fuzzing won't help solve the combinatorial coverage problem.

<comment><USER8> >possible paths

But don't all those paths depend on the inputs, ultimately? Trying to understand this here. Can a fuzzer that generates lots of different inputs, not be used to exercise all those paths?

<comment><USER7> Not when you have 10^25 paths to cover and each path takes around 2 seconds.

<comment><USER8> Wow. Got it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I'm making video games for PC, Mac and Linux (like this one - [http://store.steampowered.com/app/386900](http://store.steampowered.com/app/386900)), it's a very traditional release cycle, I work on a project for x months, and then I release it, moving onto the next game after a few weeks of post-launch support. PC games are generally seen as more valuable than mobile games, so I don't need to sell a terribly large volume in order for me, a single developer, to make a living.

<comment><USER10> When you say "make a living" \- how does that compare to a "typical" US developer salary/benefits - say around $120K total compensation? (and yes, I know that's far below a SV total compensation, but you wouldn't have to live in SV for this kind of lifestyle business).

<comment><USER11> Just to keep your expectations in check - I work for a major games company in the UK as a C++ programmer and make 25k pounds/year($36k USD). US salaries are an abnormality.

<comment><USER12> $35K is what a decent developer in India would make. So, your UK seems too low.

<comment><USER13> Much of the games industry is incredibly low-paying. I felt fairly fortunate to have worked in my 20s for a good game company (where I was paid OK, learned a ton, and we eventually had an exit to Sierra), but I feel like most of my peers at other companies were working for terribly low pay and often under poor management.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I can offer the perspective of the customer. I am a bit fed up with web apps these days, and would find a good desktop solution refreshing. You should include cloud backups and sync, however, that is key. But, web apps are getting slower and slower -- even the 1 or 2 seconds it takes to open a new link stresses me out when I'm in the zone and trying to work fast. I am even trying to move away from Gmail to Outlook now.

<comment><USER15> Would you still choose a desktop app over a web app if the web app's response time was within the 100ms window[0]? In other words, is speed your only complaint with web apps these days?

[0]: [https://www.nngroup.com/articles/response- times-3-important-...](https://www.nngroup.com/articles/response- times-3-important-limits/)

<comment><USER14> I think so, assuming the web app has full keyboard shortcuts. But if I notice response time, we're in bad shape - I'm admittedly ADD and will likely switch to another tab while waiting for the page to load.

<comment><USER16> I am the same, I have buttons mapped on my mouse for switching to the last- used tab (Ctrl-Tab), closing the current tab (Ctrl-W), etc.

Usually I will middle-click any link to open it in a new tab, then immediately switch back to the original tab while that one is loading. Only when I see that it is loaded (text on the tab turns red) will I switch to it.

All too often I see web-apps as a regression. We have super-fast machines now, but we're choosing to make ourselves dependent on the slowest link in the chain, the network. Might as well go to Pluto. [https://blog.codinghorror.com/the-infinite-space-between- wor...](https://blog.codinghorror.com/the-infinite-space-between-words/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> This type of analysis paralysis will kill your project.

> I have to think about the future, and so I have to try to make the right > choice on this..

You don't have to make the right choice right now. For now, focus on getting something complete so that you can prove the idea out.

<comment><USER18> separation of concerns. Just write the logic in a fairly portable language.

<comment><AUTHOR> I do have it in Python! I've successfully build some frontend experiments with Android ([http://joaoventura.net/blog/2014/python- android/](http://joaoventura.net/blog/2014/python-android/)), Web (with Flask) and Qt (PyQt5 and pyotherside).

My problem is with the choice of the best frontend approach, and since I'm only one guy working on this, I am trying to find my "best" decision..

<comment><USER19> Generally, if it works as a website use that. Desktop apps are for things you can't do with a website.

EX: File system tools, AAA FPS, etc.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Our desktop app Pinegrow Web Editor ([http://pinegrow.com](http://pinegrow.com)) is build with HTML / JS / Node.js packaged with NWJS/Electron. Three years ago I started by myself, now we're three working on the app full time and making a comfortable living (mid six figures in yearly sales).

Choosing this tech stack lets you postpone web vs desktop app decision and keep both options open. While recurring web app revenue sounds appealing it requires servers and responsibility to secure user data. With desktop app you'll never receive a 3am call that your service is down.

Btw. Subscriptions and desktop apps are not mutually exclusive. We give both options (one-time license purchase or monthly subscription) to our customers and the split is about even.

<comment><USER21> I'm not sure why it bothers me, maybe I'm just grumpy this morning haha, but I might have preferred "Enter your email for a free trial" rather than being forced to do it after I've already downloaded and installed and run it and can't use it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> We have a desktop application that uses QtWebkit for the UI.

We had no choice technically-we need to use audio APIs on Win/Mac to get our job done.

Based on my experience, I would not recommend building a desktop app unless there is a technical reason to do so.

Data storage, building installers, signing your app for target OS's, and dealing with auto-update are all technical problems that I'd prefer to avoid if I could. Building cross-platform code is also a pain and, while totally doable, will slow down a team that is not familiar with it, I think.

If I really needed to build a desktop app in the future, I'd investigate building building a headless app that hosts a websocket, and use the user's browser to connect to a localhost websocket to communicate with it. (i.e., a technical choice freeing my from Qt)

<comment><USER23> Hi, if I can ask: "why QtWebkit instead of Qtquick?".

<comment><AUTHOR> +1, I'm wondering if anyone is using Qt Quick for productivity-like desktop applications?

<comment><USER24> I built Tasktopus[1] using QtQuick/QML/C++. Highly recommended. I built it on the LGPL version.

[1][https://gumroad.com/l/ADWm/tasktopus](https://gumroad.com/l/ADWm/tasktopus)

<comment><AUTHOR> Can you comment on your experience? One of my doubts is if I should go the QML / Qt Quick Controls way or the standard Qt Widgets (with PyQt).. For instance, do you think you could implement your app's interface with Qt Widgets by itself?

The problem is that I know how far I can go with Qt Widgets, but on the same way, I would like to build something more "modern" and Qt Widgets may be quite limited..

<comment><USER24> I could have implemented it with QtWidgets, however I had found a decent UI widget library that suited my use case very well ([1]). Hence went with QML/QtQuick.

My advice - just do it :-). If you want to build a cross-platform desktop app then go for QtQuick/QML/C++. QtCreator has a bunch of example projects. Use those as reference. The Qt docs are solid. Worst case - you will learn that Qt/C++.

I am not a big fan of PyQt/PySide, especially when starting fresh with Qt - you would have a hard time figuring out how everything fits and where the issues are.

[1] [https://github.com/papyros/qml-material](https://github.com/papyros/qml- material)

Paraphrasing a previous comment:

I have used web-based task/todo lists (trello, asana, etc.) but I wanted something that could be used offline - my work does not allow storing company sensitive data on 3rd-party servers.

Started the project with Electron, using AngularJS and Angular Material. That allowed rapid prototyping with a slick UI and it was fairly easy to find additional Angular-based plugins. My main motivation in selecting Electron and Angular was to learn the two technologies (easier to learn something by doing a project in it). Screenshot: [http://imgur.com/NZzEFKX](http://imgur.com/NZzEFKX)

Had a few issues with the Electron app - big download size (50-70MB zipped), no print functionality, app felt non-native, very convoluted process to get it published on the Mac App Store.

Decided to change the tech stack to Qt/QML. I have published C++-based games, built on Cocos2dx. Wanted to try Qt to build a serious app.

Gumroad has been a slick experience - I have opted for the fully functional trial option and let the user buy a license to use beyond the trial period. Gumroad's onboarding (buy workflow) and tech (license key generation and validation) have been a revelation.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> From a desktop-application standpoint, the Web provides something very useful: easy upgrading. Like, you go to a URL, and if you aren't seeing the latest production revision of the site code, _that 's a bug._

IMO, if you think you'll ever have edge cases where users might struggle to stay connected to the Web, think about doing a desktop app - but even then, consider using eg Electron/QTWebKit/similar so you can continue to use HTML.

The only situation I would shy away from using the HTML/CSS/JS approach with new general-purpose PC-centric applications is supporting older hardware - <USER2> like my apps to remain snappy, but sadly even Webkit tends to lag (generally speaking) on anything older than an i3 or so.

<comment><USER26> Yet the same feature can be a pain in the ass as you don't control your upgrade destiny. I know, I know, git orf mah lawn!

But when you see normal folks totally confused because the developer decided to "upgrade" their experience in a way that was totally out of the users hands, it can be cringey.

<comment><USER25> Yeah... that's very true too, I hadn't considered it from that angle.

I will admit that I far prefer software that runs fully locally; if I don't like the direction a particular program has gone, I can either just use an older version.

And I do also find it jarring to open an app and be met with some new layout or design, or discover a new feature buried in a menu that wasn't there before. It would be really nice if app design was at the point where we could go "okay, here's a bunch of new features, click this button to switch over!"...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> Yes, I am thriving with a niche C++/Win32 graphics app. Web apps are a long way from having the responsiveness and control of a desktop app.

Do you really think users will be doing Photoshop and AutoCAD in a browser? No matter if you have a fibre op connection, the lag is always there.

Recently the main player in this domain moved to Web apps. There was an overwhelming protest from its customers, who insisted they prefer the desktop version.

<comment><USER28> > Web apps are a long way from having the responsiveness and control of a > desktop app.

I don't think this is the case. Facebook never needed desktop apps, did they? The web worked great for them.

<comment><USER29> Depends on the audience and the application. As Photoshop and AutoCad are both mentioned, I think that's the benchmark and not something like Facebook that wouldn't benefit as much from running as a desktop client.

On a side-note, didn't Facebook just release a new UWP app and didn't they regret going the HTML5 route to start with (not focusing on native apps)?

<comment><USER28> They were fine for years without any kind of desktop app, and the HTML5 backtracking was just for mobile. I don't think they ever said they regretted being web-only on desktop from the start. In fact I think it is even a big reason for their success - would Facebook have taken off if it had an installer?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> Our startup develops a HTML5 game editor called Construct 2, which is a Windows desktop app (Win32). We've been running about five years successfully with that. I'd say depending on the market it can still be relevant, but I don't know for how much longer - Windows in particular seems to be trying to drag developers away from Win32 and the new Windows Store UWP apps. Note that Windows Phone and "Windows RT" can only run Windows Store UWP apps, with poor support for Win32. MS continue to push UWP hard and I'd expect to see more MS hardware in future with no Win32 support, which is a little worrying, but doesn't seem to be happening fast enough to cause any kind of panic.

I'd add while mobile seems to be the trendy place to start a startup, most productivity apps are still easier and faster to use with a keyboard and mouse. So desktop-first can make sense sometimes.

</comment><comment><USER30> I'm currently working on an AI customer service Desktop/Web app solution. We're a team of two.

Initially, it was going to be only desktop, because we were targeting big enterprises who still rely solely on phone for customer service. So, pretty backward companies. A Desktop app would have been perfect and not too "revolutionary".

But, then, we decided to not limit ourselves to that market alone, and have since made the transition to include web and even mobile solutions.

My advice is to: Stop hesitating. Write code (MVP?). Run private and open betas. Collect feedback. Make predictions. Make decisions. Maybe your market will rejoice over your desktop app and maybe they won't. The point is, you won't find out until you actually test it. If it works then that's great. Now, you can focus on marketing and growth. But if the feedback that you get points that your customers would rather get web, then that's also great. Because, now, you've gained an important insight about your customers, and will have a choice of either to switch to web (if it's a true market need (also from customer feedback)) or to start something new.

TLDR: Based on our market research alone, you CAN definitely make a living off of a desktop application; it depends on your customers, that's why it's paramount that real customers test your app asap. Don't worry about the future too much. If your desktop app is successful and somewhere along the line, customers demand a web app instead, you can always scale and adapt.

</comment><comment><USER31> Oh, the future. The land of what ifs. Listen, you described your market already. Non technical people go to Google and type in facebook.com. A simple desktop app that they can just click will do. Still worried about future proofing it? Put it inside a webview and move on.

<comment><USER32> Off topic - googling facebook.com drives me nuts.

A couple of days ago I went to an administration worker at a university and asked her to help me with getting the vpn to connect to the net via university wi-fi. She told me to google the vpn to download it. I said: well, this is the very problem, I want to connect to the Internet, I cannot google it while I'm offline. People no longer distinguish between the address bar and google search, searching for files on your local drive or looking for them online. It's become one blob of "computer stuff". And you might think that when we moved from command line in DOS to Windows that was creating a new kind "stupid user". There is the next level, certainly.

<comment><USER31> The whole UI/UX has been app-fied. The most common device an average person uses has a touch screen interface. Writing on an address bar is _old_. Google is now their personal assistant and facebook replaced their tv.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> I've published a desktop Windows app before with a freemium strategy. It was developed by a team of 3 after hours.

We didn't make a living out of it because we wanted to keep it as a hobby project but it paid out well enough to be considered a small business.

I don't have any advice on whether _your_ app should be a desktop or web, it all depends on what is the app, who your users are, where are your users using it, what are your competitors, what is easier to develop, etc.

All I can say is that desktop apps can still be profitable in recent years, but I can't say it will be profitable for your project.

</comment><comment><USER34> I have a couple Windows desktop apps (animal husbandry and event management) that have been around for years and still doing quite well. But I think these succeed primarily because they have a nice specific vertical and are particularly well suited for desktops.

For me, a successful desktop application has the following traits:

\-- A nice specific vertical that is deep and complex to process,

\-- Complex entry screens with lots of necessary rules and data validation,

\-- Lots of manual data manipulation during the events,

\-- Substantial benefit from ability to take advantage of desktop level mouse and keyboard actions,

\-- Some complex grid based screens that can be tailored by each user,

\-- Fairly complex reporting after the events.

These requirements are still too much for browsers to handle well. The grid based screens are especially horrible in browsers. And browser apps are still pretty horrible for complex data entry screens that want to be customized by the user.

That said, I'm porting the first to a mixed mode where the engine will be internet based but the primary interface will still be the "normal" download and install desktop model. This is to allow some portions to be used in a browser, but the main application still keep the full desktop power.

FWIW: my original apps were Delphi based, but the language long ago stagnated and had become tedious (comparatively). Since I'd switched to .NET for contract work, I started my rewrite in C#. But but I ended up hating the server deployment crap with .NET and also of got really tired the direction Microsoft is going in general. I've now switched C# for the desktop side and Google's Go language for the web/model portion. I picked Go primarily for the trivial single executable deployment. While I don't really get much enjoyment out of coding in Go, it is eminently practical for this type of work. (Note for Gophers: I don't think Go is bad either ... just sort of there. I do use it quite a bit these day and do get the "fun vs practical" trade-offs the Go team made.)

But the future may be bleak with Microsoft moving to an app store. Why the F do I want Microsoft sitting between me and my customers. It adds no benefit to me and provides no benefit to my customers for a portable or unzip and go desktop application. Plus they, like Apple and Google, want to become effectively the worlds most expensive payment processors.

</comment><comment><USER35> Since this hasn't been posted yet, "Why I'm done making Desktop Applications" by Patrick McKenzie (patio11) is going to be a useful read: [http://www.kalzumeus.com/2009/09/05/desktop-aps-versus- web-a...](http://www.kalzumeus.com/2009/09/05/desktop-aps-versus-web-apps/)

It seems that his customers share a lot of characteristics with your ones.

</comment><comment><USER36> I've made an addon-program for game streamers, one day I decided to go "heck", why not ask some money for a license.

I can't really say I'm making a "living" off of it but for a student I do have a /really/ nice income.

It's a /very/ specific application though. It swims along with the bigger fish like Open Broadcaster Service and xsplit, when they go down, I go down.

<comment><USER37> I'm currrently reading "Don't just roll the dice" which is a really nice and short book about software pricing. It's freely available too at [https://www.red-gate.com/library/dont-just-roll-the-dice](https://www.red- gate.com/library/dont-just-roll-the-dice)

What I want to say to you and the others in the thread is: maybe you can extract more money at a different price point by reading that book.

<comment><USER36> Thanks for the recommendation, will have a look. I'm a little skeptical of price changes though. Partially because of ethics ("Why'd he have to pay 5$ while I have to pay 8$?"), and partially because of my target audience, mainly students and young adults (18-28)

Regardless, it's interesting to look into

<comment><USER38> Here's a cheat: When you raise your price, you can bundle something else in. That will automatically prevent people from asking "Why am I paying more?" It doesn't even have to be that impressive. Spend an hour and write an extra guide, checklist or something like that. Make sure that it's clear to buyers that this add on is new. Done.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> I have been making a good living selling desktop software as a solo developer for the last 11 years. I think reports of the death of desktop software are exaggerated: [https://successfulsoftware.net/2013/10/28/is-desktop- softwar...](https://successfulsoftware.net/2013/10/28/is-desktop-software- dead/)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for replying! Your blog was one of the "triggers" that made me decided to ask if more people have been having success with the solo developer/desktop developer strategy.

I just wish more people shared their experiences on their blogs, because here where I live it is pretty hard to find someone working for themselves..

<comment><USER39> Desktop and web both have their plusses and minuses. Some solutions are a better fit for desktop. The key thing is to do a good job of solving the customer's problem. If you do, they won't care whether it is desktop or web. In fact, plenty of my non-techie customers don't even know the difference.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER40> Fail story: I have SSD + HDD caching for Windows ( [https://diskache.io/](https://diskache.io/) ). But due to lack of marketing skills, and, perhaps, lack of common store for system software for Windows, even free Beta version has been downloaded by like 3.5 people during 3 months of availability.

<comment><USER41> Your link is grey for me, so I've seen it before. If it's been on HN you must have seen more than 3.5 downloads, what are your actual counts?

<comment><USER40> I don't have exact download count, but only 13 people actually launched it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment> d--b There are many ways you can actually not ask yourself that question.

1\. You can package your web app into electron or similar 2\. You can use a portable platform like QT or Xamarin

But more importantly, you should chose the one that will help you conclude that this is a good idea sooner. You'll probably end up rewriting the tool once you get feedback about where it rules and where it sucks.

So I'd say that unless you want to do that side project to learn something new, stick to what you know best (and what you know will work). That'll get you to the point where you can decide whether this is worth pursuing faster.

<comment><AUTHOR> That is the tricky part, is that I know how to make web apps (used to work as backend web developer), desktop apps (did my fair share of them), and can also play a bit with Android (did some small experiments and patches for Cyanogenmod). It seems that I just need to commit to something and work from there..

</comment></comment><comment><USER42> There's a guy called Andy Brice[1] who has been developing and selling desktop software for table seating plans[2] since 2005. He blogs[3] a bit about his experiences and thoughts.

[1] [https://twitter.com/successfulsw](https://twitter.com/successfulsw)

[2] [http://www.perfecttableplan.com/](http://www.perfecttableplan.com/)

[3] [https://successfulsoftware.net/](https://successfulsoftware.net/)

<comment><USER43> He is also on this site - [https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=hermitcrab](https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=hermitcrab)

</comment></comment><comment><USER44> I'm just launching a file manager ([https://fman.io](https://fman.io)). In general I'd say use web / SaaS whenever possible. If you do go with desktop, you may be interested in a blog post I just wrote about the technologies we ended up picking: [https://fman.io/blog/picking-technologies-for-a-desktop- app-...](https://fman.io/blog/picking-technologies-for-a-desktop-app-in-2016).

<comment><USER45> Very good idea, if you can pull off what sublime did to text editors, then take my money :) I'm still using Total Commander, but I definitely see the need for a more focused app that help my directory browsing habits.

Subscribed, rooting for your project.

<comment><USER44> Thanks! :-)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER46> Solo developer of a productivity app for the Mac for quite a number of years now. Yes, desktop apps are still very relevant and at least on the Mac, plenty of people willing to pay good money (unlike, say, the mobile market).

Whether to go desktop or web really depends on the application itself. Don't try and shoehorn it into one or the other. Ultimately, you'll need to find the right niche. Like in most industries, most people will fail (you usually don't hear their stories) and success will most likely not be immediate.

Doing things solo is tough so some general advice:

\- You are going to be wearing many different hats but if you can afford it, contract out what you don't do well (like design, for many programmers). \- You have fewer resources but also a lower bottom line. Don't expand without taking that into account, not just for the moment, but for the long term. It will affect how desperate you get with your revenue model. \- Don't undercharge (especially if you go desktop). As mentioned, people still appreciate the value of desktop software.

Probably a lot more but those are the main ones plus I have support emails to deal with.

<comment><USER47> > Don't undercharge (especially if you go desktop).

This is incredibly important advice! Marketing & actually finding customers is the hardest part of the business, so if you only need a few customers, you'll be way ahead of the pack.

I know someone who is selling a Photoshop Plugin for $100 and seems to be doing okay from it, even though that's more than the price of Photoshop Elements itself! If your product is valuable enough to your customer, they'll pay for it. If they're earning $100/hour & your product saves them even two hours of work, it's a no-brainer.

> ... plus I have support emails to deal with.

Don't forget this when considering your pricing. Some percentage of your customers will always need support, and you need to account for all those 15 minute blocks where you're helping people. If you're selling a $2 app, a single support email wipes out your earnings from several sales.

</comment></comment><comment><USER48> I sell desktop software to individuals (not business / industry) at a cost of $50-$100.

I have tested SAAS but have seen that:

* People trust a desktop app more. * People value a desktop app more as they feel they "own" it and will pay more

YMMV

</comment><comment><USER49> I would suggest a desktop app on the JVM - C# possibly if you have access to that and your customers care - but nail down the upgrade story.

Web Apps immediately invoke an entire side set of knowledge of sysadmin and management that, unless you're comfortable doing that - are a pain.

There are reasons to do web apps, but I don't think ease of operating or development are one of them.

<comment><USER50> > I would suggest a desktop app on the JVM

Is this a joke? Or possibly a comment somehow posted from 8 years ago?

Unless you're doing what Jetbrains do (and ship an embedded JRE) relying on Java is adding a barrier to entry on top of "wtf, java? it's 2016 not 1999".

In my career i've had reason to use a small handful of jvm desktop applications. In every case, it was because there is no good alternative, and they were used _in spite_ of being jvm based - if a non-jvm alternative comes along, it gets an instant boost in any comparison, because it isn't tied to the jvm.

<comment><USER49> No.

I have had good experiences developing JVM apps and then using them. Age of technology has nothing to do prima facie with quality.

If you're interested in shipping a reliable desktop application, you'll take the time to handle the runtime and the associated dependency chain. Similarly to the web, you have to understand your system to do the job well. Unlike the web, you don't immediately confront distributed system operation and maintenance problems.

And, finally, I'd actually suggest Clojure/seesaw for the mode of desktop GUI development, not Java/Swing. And, of course, the customer doesn't care whether you hand-crafted it with magnetic tweezers or used Node 9 Ember Rock Stars. They just want it to work, and work reliably.

<comment><USER50> I wasn't suggesting java's age is why it produces terrible desktop apps, I was referring to its former "glory days" of common usage - these days it's much less common for desktop apps in my experience.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER51> For more than 3 years now I am making a decend full time income with a desktop cross browser testing application ( [http://www.browseemall.com](http://www.browseemall.com))

It is for a rather small customer group but still works great and is growing modestly.

<comment><AUTHOR> Very interesting case of subscription based desktop application, am I right? How do you manage things such as a person being offline, do you require the person to connect to the internet so that you can manage the subscription? How does your users react? Have you already started with a subscription-based approach?

<comment><USER51> Generally people will need to get online to get the latest version (which is necessary frequently to get newer browser versions). During this time the licence is also checked.

In my experience the customers expect a subscription based pricing especially with an application that required high-frequency updates (I release a new version once or twice a month).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER52> As a developer of both services and also in the past desktop application, I have to say that one big plus with desktop apps is that they do not need a 24/7 NOC operation, that uptime thing is putting a huge strain on founders and resources starting out....

</comment><comment><USER53> As a user, I despise webapps, unless it's for social networking or news (like FB/Twitter/HN/Reddit/Imgur.) Even for social/news I prefer native apps to webapps when available.

I mean look at the native mobile apps for FB and everything; I'm sure the majority of users prefer opening the apps to using the browser, so there _must_ be _something_ going for them.

Webapps NEVER feel as responsive or powerful or fit into the look-and-feel of a platform, compared to native apps.

To me, most of the alleged advantages of webapps just look like the excuses of lazy developers, not to mention also a bit of hypocrisy: Would YOU prefer most of your IDEs and development tools to be webapps, or native apps?

</comment><comment><USER54> I run a web app and am happy with it. Advantages:

\- no update process

\- support is easier, because you don't have to dig in the users specific setup

\- monthly subscription model might be easier to accept for people, if they don't have the feeling of "owning" the software like with traditional desktop apps

\- no multiple platforms (although people want apps, but at least, you don't have to also provide Linux and OS X versions)

Disadvantages:

\- no offline mode (some people want that)

\- some people want the feeling of ownership and privacy

I think as a one-man business, it's easier to maintain a web app than a desktop app.

</comment><comment><USER55> One of my two small companies develop Windows development libraries for use in desktop and server applications and I see the native desktop apps doomed, except if you are targetting the enterprise (best in niche markets) and you know how to sell to enterprises.

Rule of thumb #1: if you can build the same application for the desktop or the web, choose the web. Don't think more. My company does Windows drivers and some other operating system internals stuff that is impossible to offer as a web app and this is the reason I can't follow this rule.

My last suggestion is trying to attach your app to other revenue streams such as trainings, customization, integration with other apps, and any other service that make you escape from selling individual (and probably cheap) units of your product.

<comment><AUTHOR> The application that I want to build is for a niche market (but not for companies), that is why I am in doubt between desktop and web.

One thing that makes me want to stay way from web is that if this thing does not work, I would like people to continue using the application, even if I don't update it anymore. If it runs on a server, I will not be able to stop the server until everyone stops using the application for some time. I know some people kill services without thinking too much, but this is a very small niche and my name is relatively known there..

The other reasons of wanting to stay way from web-only is that then I have to take care myself of everyones' data (think application data, settings, etc.); front-end web developments is a pain for me (too many options, none good) as I'm mainly a backend developer; and then there's the latency problem.

As I think I said above, my application is something like a productivity application, where everyone does his own thing and there's no intrinsic need for "social" or "sharing" things. The only reason I can think for web is discoverability, hence my doubts, if "discoverability" beats everything else (for desktop apps)..

<comment><USER55> How long will it take to develop your desktop application? If it is just a few weeks or very few months go for it and test the market. If it doesn't work after spending some marketing efforts move away. Indeed nobody can predict your success.

Again, I think it is very difficult to attack the desktop market even if you target a niche market for end users. Enteprises uses are a different story.

One more thing if you insist: look at the OSX desktop market too because the dynamics of the end user consumption are different from Windows.

<comment><AUTHOR> > One more thing if you insist: look at the OSX desktop market too because the > dynamics of the end user consumption are different from Windows.

Definitely, even more as I develop primarily on a Mac.. Thanks!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER56> There are still financial desktop applications. Some old school people insist on using them.

<comment><USER57> I can understand some people not wanting to send sensitive financial data across the web.

</comment></comment><comment><USER58> I wrote (C#) desktop apps for several years that did manufacturing QA analytics. We went the desktop route because 1) UI development was faster for us (C# vs. jQuery) and 2) Users wanted to interact with Excel in real time (e.g. export).

My experience when I went to look for a job was that I got about 10 interviews and was turned down for all of them because I didn't know about JavaScript, Distributed systems (e.g. load balancers, HTTP caching), WebSockets, deployment pipelines, web services, etc. Don't get my wrong I spent a lot of time reading about all these types of things but until I built an actual API/website it was hard to answer questions about them.

</comment><comment><USER59> This feels to me like there are a few other questions to ask: \- do your target users have a preference for desktop vs webapp? \- can you achieve everything you want in desktop vs webapp? \- How do similar solutions from competitors deliver? How would you differentiate? \- do you have the skills/time/inclination to provide desktop support when a user can't get your software working with Win XP and a badly written printer driver? \- What's the pricing model you will use with lone users? Sell once, sell once and then try and sell upgrade; subscription?

</comment><comment><USER60> I would pick my app carefully. Things that are specific to desktops like AV, disk cleaners, performance monitors would have staying power. Also word processors for specific constituencies. Scriviner, for instance, is for serious writers and is still supported by its creator. Diagram creators, slide presentation creators, even a database with an easy to use interface would be popular. I personally would love to see an enhanced Activity Monitor for Mac. Something that would have an entry for every process running so I could just click it to figure out what it does.

<comment><USER61> That's the problem with desktop software though -- it's expensive to build and often, there's a solution already out there or will appear in the next release of the OS. For instance in Activity Monitor, you can view every process simply by clicking the View menu, then "All Processes". It will even show them hierarchically. Which then leads to users often picking something that works and rarely switching unless an app fails on them somehow. Contrast this with the web, where we routinely "switch apps" because there's so little cost to install them, keep them up to date, commit to them and save our data in their format, etc. AV software is much less useful these days as systems ship more securely by default. Disk cleaners also have less utility as folks learn of free or built-in options, or buy larger drives than they need...

About all I can say to sum up is, yes, pick your app carefully, but solve a problem you've researched and haven't found an easy solution to, and then ... see if you can build that into a business? :) It'd also be fun to build a meta-app: e.g. gamify learning about OS X, such as the activity monitor. Maybe it could be social, where you get points for being the first to get something set up amongst friends on the same wifi? That sounds like an incredibly niche market though...

</comment></comment><comment><USER62> I posted a link relevant to this conversation a few days ago.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11656443](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11656443)

</comment><comment><USER63> It really depends on the usage of the application. What does it do? What features does it provide? What are the requirements of those features? You may need to consider a hybrid app, that has both a desktop component and a web service. If you can implement one or more of the features as a service, it will allow you to update them more easily. Also, keep in mind that a desktop app limits your install base to an OS, depending on its implementation, while an HTML5 application can be run almost anywhere.

<comment><AUTHOR> For my application there's no intrinsic need for "social" or "sharing" features. It's supposed to be a productivity application where each user does his/her own thing. The target user are mostly non-technical people which probably will not have the need for have it on more than one device, so "sync" of data between devices may not be a relevant for them..

If I go the desktop way, I will probably use Qt (PyQt5) so there's some degree of freedom for cross-platform.

</comment></comment><comment><USER64> I've considered creating an app with node.js and electron to turn my current soundcloud archiving script into a desktop app. It makes taking essentially all of someone's soundcloud and archives everything with proper ID3 tags, also tracks updates to your playlists and likes.

Initially I built this to archive indy music and prevent losing tracks that people removed from their soundcloud pages.

This project would require some major legal hurdles, which is why I've never really built it as a proper desktop app.

</comment><comment><USER65> I don't make a living, but I'd like to think I'm close (3-5x would get me there)

Anyhow, my strategy was to make both the web app and the desktop app.

The web app is free, which drives users to the site, a small percentage of which buy the desktop app. The strategy works well, in the sense that I can run everything on autopilot for a few months at a time if I need to.

On the other hand, I sometimes feel like the relative profits are kind of low for the number of users that I have.

<comment><USER66> Programs like Nativefier allow you to quite easily (within reach of not-so- technical users) create desktop apps out of web apps. Unless your desktop app provides significant OS or other-app integration or additional features, you may want to reconsider your strategy.

<comment><USER65> It does - that is the case for the upsell. :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER67> Try making it with Electron [http://electron.atom.io/](http://electron.atom.io/)

Then if you decide later you want it to be a web app its not that big of a job to convert it.

I have worked on a surprising number of desktop apps over the years, including Visual Studio and Internet Explorer. But even before that, a lot of businesses rely on desktop applications for a lot of their internal applications.

</comment><comment><USER68> I've been developing Horcrux Email Backup[1] over the years. The application had to be desktop by the nature of it. I'm not a living out of it but it is a very good side income. Given the fact that I live in a third world country helps too.

[1] [http://thehorcrux.com/](http://thehorcrux.com/)

<comment><USER69> Very nice programme, that saves a lot of bacon. Please keep it maintained, I beg you.

</comment></comment><comment><USER70> I have a plugin for Outlook - [http://appointmentreminder.info/outlook- calendar](http://appointmentreminder.info/outlook-calendar)

Desktop apps make you think a lot more about the release cycle and minimizing potential errors before releasing.

</comment><comment><USER7> I do, but I use a SAAS sales model. I think trying to use a one and done sales model is hard these days.

</comment><comment><USER71> Anyone here from the omnigroup? I'd love to hear some behind the scenes from those guys!

</comment><comment><USER72> Obviously people still are, or else commercial desktop software would no longer exist/be maintained. Not being snarky, just saying it's a non-question (and that our company certainly is a "we do" response to your post).

<comment><USER73> I believe OP would like to know about solo operations or very small teams, side-project-sized operations.

</comment></comment><comment><USER74> videogames are mostly standalone and viable, as are OS (less-and-less), and apparently steve gibson makes a pretty nice living off of spinrite which is a hard drive maintenance and recovery tool. Which I suspect gives insight on the viability of the standalone software space. Needing extreme performance and inately interfacing with the computer's hardware. As a maxim, if you can put it on the web without sacrificing anything significant, you probably should.

<comment><USER75> There are a few things that make me value the desktop over the web, as a user. First, no surprising interface changes. If I install a new version and dislike it, I can go back to the previous one. Second, if it doesn't need a network connection by its very nature, it'll work fine without one, removing a point of failure. Third, local data storage with optional cloud synch is the best of both worlds. Fourth, a polished native program will have more predictable timing than a similarly-polished web app.

Both have their place. I'll go to a web app for asynchronous communication (e-mail, forums, social media), for one-time reference or reference to things that change often (wikis, imdb), and things that I intend to use for a short amount of time, or which wouldn't be worthwhile to download and install on a couple machines.

Putting things on the web has always felt to me like a compromise of usability and predictability in favor of convenience of access[0]. I like storing my data locally until such time as I explicitly decide to store it online. I like knowing that I can continue using the software, regardless of the fate of the developer.

[0] Given internet connectivity and continued operation of the company providing the software

</comment></comment><comment><USER76> I suppose not many people do, but probably many people did in the early 90s. In 5 years people will ask this question about mobile apps too.

</comment><comment><USER77> I know grc.com spinrite still runs on DOS and his last release was easily 5-6 years ago and it seems to be still selling well !

</comment><comment><USER78> Build it with web technologies, and if you need to ship a desktop app, package it with electron.

<comment><USER69> I remember the guy who just decided to keep Windows 3.11 on a Celeron laptop, because it was awesome fast on that hardware (still perceivably faster than your Win 10 notebook perhaps), and he just worked couple of years that way, until some SSL problems forced him to leave Win 3.11. But business applications were ok for him in that environment. The very idea of a desktop app is that it should be able to deliver value completely offline, imho.

</comment></comment><comment><USER79> I interned for this company 6 years ago. Still kicking because it's so good.

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

</comment><comment><USER80> Look at the top desktop apps out there - they are browsers</comment>


My job is to watch dreams die - <AUTHOR> http://www.reddit.com/r/reddit.com/comments/k3zrz/by_request_from_the_jobs_thread_why_my_job_is_to/

<comment><USER2> I've been following the housing bust.

In 2009, I remember reading a resignation later by a guy who made his "F __* you money" betting for a housing collapse. He blasted the big banks, ivy leaguers, and old boys network.

I bought complex derivatives (SRS, SKF) but lost betting against the market.

I read <http://calculatedriskblog.com> for a while and educated myself about the macro factors in the markets.

Through "calculated risk", I learned of Jim the Realtor <http://www.bubbleinfo.com/> who videos (vacant) casualties of the housing collapse. Seeing it made it real for me.

Over time, I've realized that the further from reality that decisions are being made, the more likely we are to make destructive decisions.

When soldiers kill people with drone aircraft in video game-like conditions, it removes the reality from something that would be extremely traumatizing when done with bare hands.

In our wonderfully complex world, we sow complexity, and reap disaster. Im not sure what the answer is, but there is something terribly wrong when destruction is more profitable than creation.

<comment><USER3> _... from something that would be extremely traumatizing when done with bare hands._

The military acknowledges how traumatizing this could be.

From section 7.4 in this doc ([http://library.enlisted.info/field- manuals/series-2/FM21_150...](http://library.enlisted.info/field- manuals/series-2/FM21_150/CH7.PDF)):

 _Killing a sentry is completely different than killing an enemy soldier while engaged in a firefight. It is a cold and calculated attack on a specific target. After observing a sentry for hours, watching him eat or look at his wife's photo, an attachment is made between the stalker and the sentry. Nonetheless, the stalker must accomplish his task efficiently and brutally. At such close quarters, the soldier literally feels the sentry fight for his life. The sights, sounds, and smells of this act are imprinted in the soldier's mind; it is an intensely personal experience. A soldier who has removed a sentry should be observed for signs of unusual behavior for four to seven days after the act._

<comment><USER4> I hope that's not a genuine field manual. It's poorly written and quite superstitious:

      > However, it is important not to stare at the enemy
      > because he may sense the stalker's presence
      > through a sixth sense.

<comment><USER5> Really? You've never felt somebody looking at you?

You can try an experiment, look at somebody intently for a while -- see if they don't look back at you.

<comment><USER6> This does happen, but I think it's more likely with our mind scanning our vision feed 24/7 for eye contact, the whole of it, unfocused areas. Determining if "someone is looking at me" was rather important for survival.

I'd love more information on that myself.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> There's a Hollywood blockbuster waiting to be made out of a story like this (as noted in some of the Reddit comments). Something along the lines of Fight Club (grimy house scenes, top-notch monologue) or Lord of War/Up in the Air (someone doing a toxic job but good at it).

<comment><USER8> If you want a fictional account, rather than a documentary like the excellent _Inside Job_ , I think a black comedy in the style of _Dr. Strangelove_ might be more appropriate.

<comment><USER9> _Thank you for Smoking_ might be a little closer?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Both interesting and depressing. No matter who you think should ultimately take the blame for the housing crash, it's easy to forget how many people other than just the homeowners are affected by this crap.

<comment><USER11> The irony, of course, is that people's economic hardships are creating jobs. Which means there's enough money in foreclosures alone to warrant having an employee to evaluate the extent of foreclosures. It's sickening.

<comment><USER12> Broken window fallacy. Jobs aren't really being created. The people in question are doing the economy a service by facilitating the correct valuations of these assets, so their jobs are bringing value to the economy, but it's value they shouldn't have had to bring in the first place. The net impact on the amount of wealth in society is still hugely negative, as is the "jobs" impact.

(These people are the cleanup crew, in the "broken window fallacy" story they are the ones making the new windows and installing them. They _aren't_ the ones who broke the window.)

<comment><USER11> I don't quite understand the fallacy. If there is a spike in broken windows -- more than the cleanup crew can handle -- new people need to be hired. How is this not creating new jobs?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Looking at a beautiful albeit narrow slice of something can hurt you (even though it feels good) because you fail to see the larger picture (which may not be so pretty). It introduces a bias that may lead you to incorrect conclusions and bad decisions. Enjoy the craft, but be wary.

</comment><comment><USER14> Nearly read "My dream is to watch Jobs die". I am far too tired to read HN right now.

</comment><comment><USER15> this was very emotional article. very sad indeed. isnt it weird that all front page articles on reddit are overtly emotional? it seems that plain groundbreaking research papers will never make it to the frontpage...

<comment><USER16> You realize that reddit is one of the most visited sites on the Internet now, right? It's not the little lisp-hackers, YC-funded, nerd-centric community that it started as, and it will never be that again. 19M uniques tends to alter things.

<comment><USER17> Your reddit experience is as good as the sub-reddits you follow.

Subscribe to sub-reddits of your interest and you will only see stories from those sub-reddits on your front page. Stick with the default options and you only see the top stories from default selected sub-reddits.

In a way its like twitter and facebook, the quality of tweets and wall posts you will see are only as good as the people you decide to follow.

<comment><USER18> To be honest, most people subscribe and wants to be subscribed to /r/reddit.com, where this was posted.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> It thought it will be a post by a VC.

</comment><comment><USER20> Since i m not going to read it, can somebody please post a tl;dr here: <http://tldrplz.com> ?

</shameless-plug>

<comment><USER20> Bury it all you want, i have sympathy for the evicted, not this sleazy redditor. Posts like these are the reason i removed 'reddit.com' from my reddits.

<comment><USER21> Your sympathy extends to plugging your website and you're calling him sleazy?

<comment><USER20> i expected this thread would be dead soon

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> First world problems....

</comment><comment><USER23> Tom Waits should put a melody on that.

</comment><comment><USER24> And the influx of redditors on HN is complete.

</comment><comment><USER25> Interesting, but hacker news? Come on... if I wanted general news, then I'd go to Reddit.

<comment><USER26> "On-Topic: Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes more than hacking and startups. If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the answer might be: anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity." <http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html>

<comment><USER27> This is way more of a 'tugs at the heartstrings' type of thing than gratifying intellectual curiosity.

Did anyone not really understand that it's rough for people to lose their houses?

<comment><USER28> No, its that, to a lot of us, this is a new part of the story that we've never heard before.

<comment><USER27> May I suggest picking up a newspaper from time to time? The Economist (which is actually a magazine that calls itself a newspaper) is pretty good too, although they don't tend to do the human interest type of things as much as real newspapers do.

If you haven't noticed foreclosure rates and done some thinking about what that meant in human terms, you were simply not paying attention, to put it very directly. (And maybe you have good reasons; you live in Singapore or something and don't care much about the US housing market)

<comment><USER28> I'll pass on reading paper news and wasting time flipping through things that don't interest me just to get a good story every once in a while.

Id rather consume news via sites like HN where I get interesting stories all the time and get to chat about it with the community.

<comment><USER27> > Id rather consume news via sites like HN

Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon. ... If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off-topic.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Final Word on U.S. Law Isn't: Supreme Court Keeps Editing - <AUTHOR> http://nytimes.com/2014/05/25/us/final-word-on-us-law-isnt-supreme-court-keeps-editing.html?src=twr&_r=1 <comment><USER2> The article does not imho agree with the title. By it's own admittance, the "final word" is indeed final:

> There are two exceptions to the general practice of quietly slipping changes > into opinions. One happens only after the decisions are published in final > form

Maybe the bigger problem is that people are relying "prerelase" documents to be authoritative, when they actually aren't.

<comment><USER3> If the final word doesn't come out until 5 years after the decision is announced, what are they supposed to do in the interim? Especially considering that these opinions are used in colleges teaching law and are referenced in textbooks. They can't just pretend the opinion didn't happen for 5 years.

<comment><USER4> "Especially considering that these opinions are used in colleges teaching law and are referenced in textbooks."

Somewhat similar to what happens in medicine though or other disciplines. You learn something in school which isn't always the final say on the subject matter.

Law is something that requires you to be constantly up to date.

<comment><USER5> It'd be easier to keep up to date if changes were flagged instead of a secret process that requires you to manually compare printed books with pdfs.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> This seems like a disgrace. Someone should teach them Git.

<comment><USER7> I don't know why you were downvoted. Version control would be hugely useful for all lawmakers -- those in parliament/senates too.

The UK Parliament actually has a slightly crazy system of using different coloured marker pens to indicate different revisions at different stages (1st reading, 2nd reading, Commons, Lords etc.). They need version control.

<comment><USER8> I'm friends with a former state senator, and suggested this to her. She laughed at me and said that's the last thing lawmakers want. They like being able to sneak little bits into bills when no one's looking. She used to start reading bills in the back, because that's where the graft would get thrown in, usually written in some really obscure manner.

So to get this to happen I think we would first need some kind of version control so easy and compelling that the general public starts using it everywhere, and then maybe we can build enough public pressure to make the legislators use it.

(On the other hand I don't see any reason why judges would be against it for court decisions.)

<comment><USER7> Making law _is_ programming. The CPU is a bit fuzzy, but that's about the only difference. We should absolutely make lawmakers use and learn real version control.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> So.... its hard to be a lawyer.

The Supreme Court has always reversed earlier rulings and changed its opinion with the times. In 1928 (Olmstead v. United States), the Supreme Court ruled that wiretaps did NOT violate the 4th and 5th Amendment. (The argument was that you didn't own the telephone lines, so there was no expectation of privacy). This was more or less confirmed in Goldman v. United States (1942).

It wasn't until 1967 (Katz v. United States) that Wiretaps were declared "search" that required a warrant.

None of these changes were due to Congressional Action. They were all due to Supreme Court cases. And this is why Lawyers are paid a lot of bucks... because its their job to keep up with not only Congressional law, but with Supreme Court rulings (interpretations of law), which can change on the whims of the Supreme Court Justices.

<comment><USER10> I've always seen the Supreme Court as a farce. The very fact that laws are decided upon without consensus is troubling to think about. If these justices are the most authoritative judges of constitutional matters and disagree with each other on fundamental rulings shows the subjectivity and flaws of the legal system.

The law is not a democracy, and a 5-4 ruling is the greatest absurdity of this system. Presumably, if another political party was in power for an appointment, the decision may be the exact opposite. If the constitution is so treasured as a framework constraining the powers of the state and guarding the rights of citizens, why is consensus not the only standard for which decisions are made on constitutional matters?

<comment><USER9>
        If the constitution is so treasured as a framework constraining the powers of the state and guarding the rights of citizens, why is consensus not the only standard for which decisions are made on constitutional matters?

The Supreme Court gains its powers from the Constitution. Its like you've never even read the Constitution. Article III. If you don't like the Supreme Court, then you don't like the Constitution. Period.

No offense, but your words sound hugely ignorant of the meaning of the word "Constitution", or the theory of law under which it works.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> We should be demanding that modern revision control tools are put in place everywhere they're appropriate. This case is a poster child for it, but even more so it should be standard in the legislative process to have commit authors and changelogs. Every citizen should have ridiculously easy access to the current laws and regulations they are bound by, along with who wrote those laws and who lobbied/campaign funded them to write those laws. This is especially true given the fact that ignorance of the law is not an acceptable excuse for breaking it.

</comment><comment><USER12> Is it really that difficult to get plain text versions and diff them?

<comment><USER13> The article suggests that the final versions are only available in hardback printed form.

<comment><USER14> The bound volumes are the authoritative reference in case of discrepancies between the digital and bound versions, but digital versions are available in PDF form: [http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/boundvolumes.aspx](http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/boundvolumes.aspx).

<comment><USER13> The article says that in several instances the older, I corrected version of decisions are on the Web site, so I presume that these are the files that are the problematic ones.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Well, now I'm curious. I hope some attentive lawyers are working on a "revision log".</comment>


What the IDF Taught Me About Becoming an Entrepreneur - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/how-to-build-killer-products/what-the-idf-taught-me-about-becoming-an-entrepreneur-a46a4016d786

<comment><USER2> This reads more like propaganda for the IDF</comment>


Global Center for Advanced Studies - <AUTHOR> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_Center_for_Advanced_Studies <comment><AUTHOR> See also the Chicago Theological Seminary [1]; this article by Adam Rang of E-Residency [2] on "Virtual Institutes"; and this old NSF initiative [3] on "Science Across Virtual Institutes". (Just thinking on global/distributed alternatives to traditional institutes of advanced study / research institutes...)

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

[2] [https://medium.com/e-residency-blog/could-virtual- institutes...](https://medium.com/e-residency-blog/could-virtual-institutes- boost-academic-research-117ddb036828)

[3] [https://www.nsf.gov/news/news_summ.jsp?cntn_id=121825](https://www.nsf.gov/news/news_summ.jsp?cntn_id=121825)</comment>


Show HN: compare your reading - <AUTHOR> http://eruditenow.com

<comment><AUTHOR> Any feedback, criticism (positive or negative) would be greatly appreciated. Feel free to ask me any questions regarding how I did it.</comment>


stuckunstuck (twitter as gateway) - <AUTHOR> http://stuckunstuck.com/statuses/list <comment><AUTHOR> noticed it this morning from twitter, chris massina (<http://twitter.com/factoryjoe).> In effect the site filters directed twitter messages to two (N possible) categories. In this case "stuck" and "unstuck". So you get 2 lists of messages by persons on what they are currently stuck (stuck) on and not stuck on (unstuck).

HOW: Uses twitter to send information to a third party site. Categorises the message you send to twitter to stuckunstuck by using 2 further twitter accounts (stuck & unstuck accounts ~ <http://twitter.com/stuck> & <http://twitter.com/unstuck)> and directs messages sent to these accounts to the SUS site.

</comment><comment><USER2> Yes, but why?</comment>


College Degrees Used to Make Families Wealthier. That's No Longer True - <AUTHOR> https://www.worth.com/college-degrees-used-to-make-families-wealthier-thats-no-longer-true/ <comment><USER2> There used to be some wealth in my extended family and traditionally a huge emphasis on the immense importance of getting a degree. That wealth is gone, spent on useless degrees and vacation homes. This generation, the degreed work in the businesses started by the drop-outs.

<comment><USER3> > useless degrees and vacation homes

Strange to lump those together before considering them separately.

How many businesses did the dropouts start? How many dropouts didn't start busineses?

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I'm in this age group and have lots of debt. I'm also an entrepreneur that can't attend accelerators or forgo a salary for a couple years because of said debt. It feels like startups are for rich people.

<comment><USER5> I'm in the same situation. Went down to Latin America where it's cheap to live. Been bootstrapping for a year and closing in on launch. It can be done solo, but you have to be ready to go for broke. It's sad but you are 100% right, this is a game that regular people are locked out of unless you are willing to do extreme things.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Colleges and banks have figured out how to eat the earnings bonus: excessive tuition, student loans to cover excessive tuition, and interest on said student loans.

Kind of like landlords who own a high foot traffic location, rent it out for overpriced coffee stands, and eat up nearly all the revenue as rent while the business operator barely breaks even.

Or the technology-related productivity bonus being eaten by employers and the healthcare industry.

</comment><comment><USER7> No longer true for nonwhite people born in the 80s. And the source data does not directly implicate student loan debt as the culprit.</comment>


Graphcool Framework - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/graphcool/graphcool <comment><USER2> what tool is used for generating the document for this project? I saw markdown files, but I can't recognize the static site renderer it uses, if any.</comment>


Ask HN: Sales Engineering jobs in Austin, TX? - <AUTHOR>

For the past 3 years, I've been working as a Pre/Post Sales Engineer for an enterprise software company. My primary responsibilities involve setting up software demonstrations for prospective clients and addressing any technical objections that may come up during the sales cycle. I essentially bridge the chasm between technical people and non-technical people. I've found that there's a lot of demand for this skill-set and people who have it are very rare.<p>I feel like the time has come to take advantage of this, but I don't know how to do that other than browse job postings on Monster (which seems like a giant waste of time). I ultimately want to move to Austin, TX. What is HN's recommendation for connecting with tech companies there? <comment><USER2> I would personally: Sign up for startup digest austin, email a coordinator at Capital Factory Austin & potentially cold email 5-10 companies there and then let it go from there. Look at AngelList (angel.co/austin/jobs), StartupHire (www.startuphire.com). Also check out Austin venture's portfolio careers site. If you're looking to be a Sales Engineer at a startup - it will be a bit later stage as early stage generally only need strictly engineers or sales folks (eg: hunter salesman). Good luck

<comment><AUTHOR> Wow, thank you so much! I'm very grateful.

<comment><USER2> You're welcome - good luck.</comment></comment></comment>


A step-by-step guide for your company's Git master to main migration - <AUTHOR> https://blog.b12.io/migrating-your-default-git-branch-to-main-a0fb706e3668 <comment><USER2> I personally don't care about this change (name your branches whatever the fuck you want), but I do care about flawed arguments.

> The terms we pick for our tools matter, and our current default branch name > of master is problematic. The word master is too closely related to the word > slave

I've heard this argument now several times and I'm still confused.

There are several definitions for the word master. The one that seems most appropo for source code management is:

> an original movie, recording, or document from which copies can be made

I don't see how that one carries any kind of connotation of slavery.

I've heard a similar line of reasoning for blacklist/whitelist because "our culture has a connotation of black = bad, white = good" ignoring that that connotation isn't racial and is cross-cultural. Black sheep are undesirable because you can't dye their wool. The term blackball is referring to a historical voting practice that had nothing to do with race (and likely where blacklist comes from with whitelist naturally coming many years later).

Can someone please provide a logically valid argument here based on facts? I'm eager to educate myself.

<comment><USER3> I understand your frustration. But the only fact that matters is that marginalized people face various levels of racism every day. This naming issue is a small, unintentional matter–I don't believe _anyone_ is saying otherwise. But some people don't get a chance to dive into etymology before making the connection with slavery.

I'm thinking renaming isn't so much the important bit, but it is an easy first step: what real, impactful changes can we as technologists make happen next?

<comment><USER2> How are you measuring impact?

My concern with this is it's easy to write off as virtue signaling. Right now is a moment where you can get people who wouldn't agree with you on board with deep important structural changes. Going after something like this feels like just a waste of energy and distracts from those problems, especially when you're wrong on the facts

<comment><USER4> > How are you measuring impact?

And they'd say "why not do this change if it makes a feel people feel better".

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> > The word master is too closely related to the word slave, a practice that > goes against B12's values.

Isn't this is a bit of over correction? Check out the synonyms of the word 'master' [https://www.thesaurus.com/browse/master](https://www.thesaurus.com/browse/master). It has lot of other meanings which does not mean 'master-slave'.

Also by this weird logic, the company mastercard should change their name.

<comment><USER6> Apparently git copied the 'master' name from bitkeeper, where it was used in conjunction with 'slave' branches: [https://mail.gnome.org/archives/desktop- devel-list/2019-May/...](https://mail.gnome.org/archives/desktop-devel- list/2019-May/msg00066.html)

<comment><USER7> That's not true.

Follow this link to the Twitter thread where the guy (Pete Baudris) who picked the term as used in Git, explains his reasoning.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23533096](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23533096)

<comment><USER8> That makes sense, but master recordings also have the concept of slave reels [1]. He probably wasn't aware of it, heck I only found out about it a few days ago

[1] [https://www.sweetwater.com/insync/slave- reel/](https://www.sweetwater.com/insync/slave-reel/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> This is racism of low expectations. The notion of a master copy isn't offensive. Master/slave is. Please assume that black Americans are as intelligent as anyone else and can tell the difference. There's no need to change the master branch to something else.

</comment><comment><USER10> From the post:

> "..., removing the problematic term master."

What about my Master of Science degree? Must that be renamed too?

The only thing that is problematic here is the virtue signalling. Please make it stop.

<comment><USER11> Of course!! Following the logic here, if we have Masters of Science we obligatory have Slaves of Science too.

<comment><USER4> Which must be the bachelors of science then.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> This article would have been significantly better without the pervasive virtue signaling.

> this helpful writeup from the IETF

This isn't correct. The linked document is a draft _submitted_ to the IETF, and as far as I know, there is 0 actual affiliation with the IETF itself.

</comment><comment><USER13> If the terms master/slave are so offensive is the actual slavery also offensive to you? If it is, what are you doing to stop the slave trade in Libya?

If nothing, then all you're doing is empty virtue signaling.

</comment><comment><USER14> Should we remove slavery from the history books? It's very offensive.

Just asking questions.

<comment><USER9> I rewrite history with git all the time.

<comment><USER4> Don't force push it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> "A step-by-step guide on how to revert your civilization from color-blind progress-loving one to witch-hunting ideologue-driven bloviating and virtue signaling one".

</comment><comment><USER11> Plot twist: in martial arts, black belts are masters and white belts are the dumbasses.

We need to change it too, right? There shouldn't exist a martial art master AND the highest levels should be black&white belts.

This is getting insane.

</comment><comment><USER16> O tempora, o mores!

</comment><comment><USER17> I'm so glad that US police brutality is now sorted out. Thanks Adam.</comment>


Software good practices applied to the car industry - <AUTHOR> http://nukomeet.com/blog/2012/software_good_practices_applied_car_industry/

<comment><USER2> Many modern software practices, under the banner of "agile", come _from_ the car industry: [http://www.radupoenaru.com/agile-roots-toyota-production- sys...](http://www.radupoenaru.com/agile-roots-toyota-production-system/)

<comment><USER3> Which, in turn, originated from the work done by American statistician, and professor, Edwards Deming, who helped rebuild Japan after WWII: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W._Edwards_Deming>

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Wonder how they achieved a 5-star "crash test equivalency" on roof crush and rollover on a car that doesn't have a roof?

And what is "crash test equivalency?" I'm guessing it means it wasn't actually crash tested.</comment>


Cisco Intern Poised to Become Viral Rap Star [video] - <AUTHOR> http://mashable.com/2010/06/28/cisco-intern-rap/

<comment><USER2> Made me smile a few times. Especially the ergonomic desk chair part</comment>


Karma Widget: Display Your YC (and other) Karma - <AUTHOR> http://duckduckgo.com/karma.html

<comment><USER2> A good example of a novel minor marketing effort for your start-up. An excellent idea. Putting together something small like the Karma Widget is an enjoyable diversion to boot. We all need those once in a while.

<comment><USER3> The real kicker here is that he's giving people incentive to group together all their profiles across the web, allowing Duck Duck Go to search people better than anyone else.

That's genius!

<comment><AUTHOR> This gives me a bit too much foresight credit. Honestly, I got the idea for these widgets after seeing one too many comments like this one: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=379936>. I agree with that thread that your YC karma isn't too useful on other sites, but then I realized it would be useful to display on your own sites.

So I got to building it... I quickly realized that there is karma on other sites, and it might be cool to aggregate. Then I realized I could possibly generate some new Duck Duck Go users this way. Then I realized (by someone indirectly pointing it out to me), that there are SEO implications when deploying widgets.

But I didn't think (until your comment) about improving search by aggregating profile information :). Just to be clear wrt privacy, we're not currently storing any IP info or the aggregate usernames in the DB, and have no plans to do so: <http://duckduckgo.com/privacy.html>

<comment><USER4> Such karma across many platforms and that is verified by trusted contacts(your friends) will prove in general to be extremely powerful for semantic/social services!

For example an idea of mine is to create a Rotten Tomatoes meets Twitter. Instead of indexing/compiling trusted press/bloggers I want a web-service/site that reads, understands and compiles all the reviews on Twitter about each movie. Right now I have to search tons and tons of Twitter search pages, as opposed to a web-service doing this automatically and presenting it in a simple UI. This same idea can be applied to tons of topics..restuarants, hotels, etc, etc....

One issue with this idea is it can be gamed easily, but not if this service only reads, understands and compiles from trusted/verified sources (karma being a good way to achieve this).

Might be abstract, but 1st time writing this idea/thought out!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> You are not your job. You are not your online profiles. You are not your YC karma. But hey, that shouldn't stop you from displaying it...

Sister "Profiles" Widget: <http://duckduckgo.com/profiles.html>

Live examples: <http://www.gabrielweinberg.com/>

<comment><USER5> Oh noes! There's no easy way to get from the widget page to your main page. Maybe you should link the top image to '/'?

<comment><AUTHOR> Good call. Done.

<comment><USER5> Well done, sir. (P.S. I'm not my fucking khakis. :-)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> If people would just stop caring about meaningless numbers displayed next to your username, the world would be a better place. Specifically, the world of community-moderated sites wouldn't have to put up with crap submissions that exist solely to gather up-votes.

<comment><USER7> What makes you think that karma is meaningless? I find it meaningful.

Sometimes I read a troll-like post, and check out the user that wrote it. If they have 3000 karma, it is likely that I am missing their point, and need to think some more. If they have -10 karma, then they are probably just a troll.

I know it's "bad" to judge someone by a number... but we do it because it is usually helpful.

<comment><USER6> What you describe is the intended, valid use of the metric. What I am complaining about is people who care on a personal level about what their own karma is, and who do things _just to inflate that number_. Facebook/Myspace "friends" whom you don't actually know? "Vote up if *" posts? Lolcat or comic or whatever posts? I know HN is (mostly) blissfully free of these things, but they are a direct consequence of the karma system.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Great way to get new people to go your site!

It's lots of small stuff like this that gets people to go to your site.

Very clever way to spread your presence to other sites!

</comment><comment><USER9> Suggested additions: Facebook friends and feedburner subscribers.

<comment><AUTHOR> Noted. Thought about both, but didn't see an easy way to integrate, so put off. Anyone know of any easy way? Feedburner seems only to serve images of the #, and FB seems to require auth.

<comment><AUTHOR> Here's the way for Feedburner: [http://api.feedburner.com/awareness/1.0/GetFeedData?uri=Hack...](http://api.feedburner.com/awareness/1.0/GetFeedData?uri=HackerWatrCoolr)

<comment><AUTHOR> Unfortunately, this returns 0 for most feeds right now, and is apparently a known bug: [http://groups.google.com/group/feedburner-for- developers/bro...](http://groups.google.com/group/feedburner-for- developers/browse_thread/thread/d296004b9b019747/d88eabdd03b61f4e?lnk=gst&q=awareness#d88eabdd03b61f4e)

I will add Feedburner when they fix this (I hope soon).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Added it to my new site hosted on GAE <http://www.danworth.com>

</comment><comment><USER11> I was just working on simple widget that showed my last few comments with links back to HN. Although I'm having mixed feelings about using it on my homepage.

<comment><USER12> Makes me think... maybe its time BackType came up with a widget... yes? Might save you the trouble.

www.backtype.com

Of course it won't help with your predicament, but it will be easier in case you do decide to display your HN comments.

<comment><USER13> Hey Raju, we do have widgets :) and you can definitely use it to display HN comments (although not karma): <http://www.backtype.com/widgets>

<comment><USER12> Woops! Sorry. My bad. Should have looked harder before commenting. My apologies.

<comment><USER13> No worries, they're a bit hard to find.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Facebook is such a noticeable absence. It'll be nice when they are open. Not that I'm holding my breath.

</comment><comment><USER15> It works for me for YC but not for reddit.

<comment><AUTHOR> reddit username?

<comment><AUTHOR> lazyant, duh...

reddit timed out on your initial request. Tried it again, and it worked. Maybe I can find a way to use their so-called "secret api"...

<comment><USER15> Hi,

Thanks for looking into this and good guess on the username ;-). It's still showing '0' though, in case that helps.

<comment><AUTHOR> Refresh--the JS is probably cached (set for a day). I see 210 in the DB.

<comment><USER15> yep, it's working. Nice tool.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> karma, the new celebrity status symbol.

</comment><comment><USER17> Smart idea!

</comment><comment><USER18> All of you high karma folks around:

'Karma' is a quite recent invention, in fact it dates only a few years back. Everything growing so fast is always exposed to dissolve in even less time...

<comment><USER19> Err no.

Slashdot had karma-points long before they shifted to simply "Good" or "Excellent" and stuff like that.

<comment><USER18> How 'old' is internet itself? Not more than the mentioned 'few' years.

Really important (and great) things grow slowly and die slowly.</comment></comment></comment>


DEF CON 24 Badge Challenge - <AUTHOR> http://co9.io/post/148716614744/defcon-24-badge-challenge <comment><USER2> Huge respect to co9 for playing a great game this year. They really went all out, and deserved the win. I'm extremely proud of the progress my team made throughout DEFCON, and we were still always a solid 10 - 15 hours behind them.

This year, co9 actually took the social engineering game to a new level, and registered vanity domains, like [http://assimilate.today](http://assimilate.today). They hid puzzles on them that tied into 1o57's game, then they'd leak the domains to other teams playing, and trick them into spending hours solving puzzles that had no solution.

In the case of assimilate.today, I spent hours decoding it to different phone numbers, pointing everywhere from Bermuda to Thailand, and probably woke up a few dozen innocent people with phone calls.

If you like puzzles, riddles, or cryptography, I highly recommend the DEF CON badge challenge. It isn't for everyone, but it's one of the closest things I've found to a real life rendition of an old point and click adventure game.

<comment><USER3> I'm glad you had a fun experience. I hope your team comes back next year for Mystery Challenge!

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Reading these just totally boggles my mind.

Example:

 _This page contained various hand signals instructing a painting of a dog. Someone on our team quickly recognized these as Curwen Hand Signs and it is referencing Close Encounters of the Third Kind._

In what possible world is someone encoding a message in an obscure (even if taught in 5th grade) musical notation hand signal format and then a team just happens to have someone that knows that? Rare breed indeed.

<comment><USER5> That sort of thing sounds pretty ordinary for an MIT Mystery Hunt puzzle.

It's remarkable all the sorts of crazy things a large collection of puzzle loving people know collectively.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> I'm not reading the article or comments, to stay pure, but I just wanted you all to know I'm like halfway done making my skull badge into a web server.

<comment><USER7> hahaha! That's awesome! I'd love to read a blog post about it when you're done if you're willing to write one up :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> This writeup is insane (and congrats!).

How long does it take Lo57 to make these challenges?

<comment><USER9> Thanks. Come play next year!

Watch the DEFCON 20 documentary. 1o57 says his challenge is to make is hard enough for a 3 day event, but still be inclusive for n00bs.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rVwaIe6CiHw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rVwaIe6CiHw)

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Was there anything on the electronic badge? I like that the challenge didn't require bringing a ton of not-at-all-TSA-friendly EE equipment, but is there a good link to what was up with the badge beyond it being an Intel Quark?

<comment><USER9> It was a bit odd that the badge did not have any significant connection to the challenge this year. In past years, there was enciphered text that was viewable either with the correct button presses, or by dumping the ROMs, which was used as parts of a needed OTP. It was also a new-to-DC x86 processor.

It did output strings of text on a serial pin (GPOI01 ? if memory serves). I was (wrongly) guessing that the badge would have been like a chip-and-pin credit card, requiring certain inputs to get proper outputs. Again I was overthinking!

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> The DC badge is generally pretty cool, though I seem to be on a cycle where I go for the non-electronic years.

Last year was my first time actually being in the DC program and not just an attendee. I got a rudimentary version of Hacker Jeopardy running directly on an old parallax-based badge (DC20 and 22 I think) and demo'ed it to lots of people with a couple buddies of mine. It was a good time!! Unfortunately I think a lot of people were under the impression the badge was connected to a computer; we should have made it more clear the badge was running the whole show.

</comment><comment><USER12> Reading about this reminded me of Cicada 3301 from a few years ago. Did anyone ever find out the purpose/meaning of those puzzles?

Edit: It looks like there were new puzzles in 2015 and 2016! So this thing is still ongoing...

<comment><USER2> I can't speak for Cicada, but I have friends who got their start in the intelligence community from similar sets of puzzles. They'd solve a bunch of random crypto / reversing problems they found online, and end up receiving invitations to interview for IC jobs.

It wouldn't surprise me if Cicada were something similar, but I have nothing to base that assumption on but anecdote.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Reading the recaps for these is always so fun. I hope this continues to get more ridiculous every year. Congrats to co9. Very well done, and a nice recap to boot.</comment>