Opera is Reborn - <AUTHOR> http://blogs.opera.com/desktop/2017/05/opera-is-reborn/ <comment><USER3> The main driver for innovation and growth of the open web was that it is open. The diversity we got from that was tremendous. Anyone could make a website with whatever content they could think of and people all over the world could access it. There was some kind of "web neutrality" in browsers. They didn't prefer one site over the other. The second big boost came from extendability and customizability of browsers through extensions which gave people even more control over what they would consume. And on top of that, the browers became open source, a big win all around.

Opera is going the other way. They have a closed source browser that directly integrates some specific products into the browser. You can't completely get rid of them, you can't integrate another product in the same way and I'd guess an extension can't mess with these pre-packaged addons. It's nice that you can have a messenger in a sidebar next to your current browsing page. But it's taking control away from users and that's not the way forward in an open web. Why can't this be an extension? Why can't it have a feature that lets me run two tabs side by side so I can choose what products to use there?

In general I think this Opera Reborn is still far behind say Firefox or the official Chrome. Just now you can change the filter lists in their Adblocker something that adblocking extensions could do for years. Now you can change Operas theme, i could make Firefox look like whatever I wanted forever. For all the love that the old Opera deserved, I don't think Opera is the future of web browsing.

<comment><USER4> Vivaldi is a pretty good replacement for old Opera. Its based on the latest chromium (updated within a day or so of downstream updates), and has a lot of the "power user" features Opera had.

<comment><USER5> I've been using Opera Beta for about a year now but with Vivaldi adding some more of the core features that were missing in earlier releases (bookmarks), it's probably worth another look.

<comment><USER6> I tried Vivaldi recently and found it unusable. Much slower than other Chromes (Chrome, Opera), and the "open new tabs adjacent to current" functionality is buggy (something causes the tabs to open in an unrelated location).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> >desktops and laptops, while theoretically more powerful multitasking tools, have been left behind

>Browsing and chatting simultaneously is cumbersome and inefficient now, as you need to switch between tabs when responding to a message

Or, since we all have widescreen monitors (and often multiple monitors) you could just have your messengers in a window next to the browser instead of a sidebar within the browser. Seems like a solution looking for a problem. What good is allowing messengers to reside within your browser other than that it lets the people who are tracking your browsing habits simultaneously spy on your messages?

<comment><USER8> > _Or, since we all have widescreen monitors (and often multiple monitors) you > could just have your messengers in a window next to the browser instead of a > sidebar within the browser._

Except that - unless you're on a tiling WM on Linux - your window manager sucks, and solution like this is barely usable (hard to keep the windows properly aligned, hard to have them simultaneously on the foreground when other windows come into the mix, etc. etd.).

I agree that solutions like that shouldn't be in browsers. But it's cheaper this way for the app vendors...

<comment><USER9> I'm on OSX and it magnetically snaps windows together as they get close. Makes it easy to divide ad hoc.

As for messengers, what would be revolutionary is if you could actually use all these fragmented messengers in a single app.

<comment><USER10> This. So much this.

I want an app that remembers which of the messaging apps each of my friends prefers, and routes messages appropriately.

If I block someone, it blocks them on all the apps I've ever talked to them on.

I think I use over 5 messaging apps (including sms) on a regular basis. Too many.

<comment><USER11> Considering most apps these days are a closed api that sounds terrible to code.

<comment><USER12> Terrible to code? Possibly. Terrible to maintain? Definitely!

Look at Pidgin's struggles.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I'd like to try, but I'd probably not end up using it because it's not open source. I feel silly for rejecting a product based on that, but openness is important to me. Here's for hoping they open source it soon!

<comment> amiga-workbench I don't think you should feel silly for rejecting it for that reason, its a very valid complaint.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> This reminds me of an interesting thing that happened when I uninstalled Opera VPN on my Android. After uninstalling it automatically opened up a browser to one of those "Tell us why you uninstalled" pages that you normally see on the desktop, this shouldn't be possible on Android.

I think they are doing this by having Opera Browser watch for uninstallation of Opera VPN and possibly vice-versa and when one detects the other has been uninstalled it launches the page, clever but annoying.

<comment><USER15> How would this even work? The app cannot listen to system events.

(I also think what you said is against Google ToS)

<comment><USER16> I know that launchers normally detect when the package was installed/uninstalled. That's how they refresh the list of app icons. And launcher is just a regular app with no special permissions. I think some kind of an intent is broadcasted when the list of apps is changed.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Hey opera folks who might be reading this - work on simplifying offline access to web content. I want to be able to maintain ~100 GB of offline data store, full text searchable. Wikipedia, stackexchange\stackoverflow, khan academy, zealdocs and whole bunch of other sources of useful browser renderable web content provide dumps of their data.

And then they end up having to build spl apps and extensions and other garbage that work around and hack cross domain/local file policy, just so the content already on my disk can be read and searched by the browser.

When such a treasure trove of web content is accessible offline the browser can and should be the way to access it.

As the web becomes more and more a corporate sponsored attention sink strong offline support can be a valuable browser feature.

<comment><USER18> There was a time when Opera was not a google chrome skin and offered indexed full page search of local cache of visited page. This was incredibly useful and practical. It also had the option to save the whole web page in a single file.

Sadly this kind of feature disappeared when opera moved to a quarterly profit based strategy.

The kind of feature you want is achievable today but requires a set of tools beyond a web browser and some human work. It's also a bit tedious to maintain up to date.

<comment><USER19> This would be possible with a chrome extension. They can implement their own search engines.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> > Social messengers completely changed our lives, by allowing us to work, > discover new things and communicate at the same time.

Nope.

> One of its novelties is the ability to seamlessly hop between discovering > new content and chatting with friends, or even share online discoveries > while browsing.

Happily I know no one that uses, or will use, this new version of Opera - <USER2> can imagine few things that would disrupt, annoy, and / or reduce my efficiency (or enjoyment) at my computer than being subject to even more random thoughts from the easily distracted.

<comment><USER21> > > Social messengers completely changed our lives, by allowing us to work, > discover new things and communicate at the same time.

> Nope.

Considering how much HN loves Slack (especially when paired with working remotely), I think you and I are in the minority. Some people _can_ chat and work at the same time, apparently.

<comment><USER22> People who don't like being distracted probably don't spend all their time on HN.

<comment><USER21> There's a world of a difference between planned "distractions" (mental breaks) and random interruptions: HN even provides a handy no-procrastination timer.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> I don't dare to use this since Opera got bought by that Chinese consortium of companies I'm not accustomed with. Not sure if I'm overly cautious? I'm thinking of especially Opera Link (which had a recent security breach to boot!). Wouldn't that leave out my passwords to China? And I do want to use some sort of syncing, I'd go crazy without anything there or some iffy third party addon.

It's not even just about a trust issue with Chinese company culture. It's that the Chinese government have ways of getting into even resisting companies at their whim that are judged alright in completely different ways than in Norwegian law. So; even if I trusted Opera Software, even if I trusted this consortium that I don't know, even then...?

<comment><USER24> Let's say, worst-case scenario and this consortium of companies is heavily linked to the Chinese govt. So what? Why would a foreign govt care about me, a citizen in a Western country? For what purpose (other than to maybe sell me stuff)?

It's for this reason I have considered using a Chinese/Russian email service rather than Gmail, at least there is a chance they _won 't_ cooperate with the local authorities if they ever want to clamp down on my ass for some reaosn.

<comment><USER11> Do you own a business? Perhaps have some closed source software product? Many state actors would happily lift it from your inbox and pass it to some local startups.

<comment><USER24> I think most people who either own or work at businesses _hopefully_ would be smart/careful enough to not take this risk (for business purposes I personally would only use open-source software whenever possible, and at least try and encrypt sensitive emails or just use something with E2E like Whatsapp), but people using internet/email for non-commercial purposes (i.e. the majority of users) would probably not care what state actors did.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> Funny for this to happen on the same week I switched my default browser from Firefox to Vivaldi [1]. _That_ is really "Opera reborn", since it's built and owned by the original team of Opera developers - which is probably why it's so good.

[1] [https://vivaldi.com/](https://vivaldi.com/)

</comment><comment><USER26> Why would I want a messenger application embedded in my web browser? What advantage does that have over simply having it as a separate application?

<comment><USER8> If I can have it as a sidebar to the web browser, this actually solves multiple problems, biggest of which is screens themselves.

Someone, somewhen, had that bright idea of popularizing 16:9 and 16:10 screens, which are now de-facto standard, and that leads to _huge_ amounts of screen estate being wasted. Most of the users (i.e. those not using tiling window managers on Linux systems) don't have proper tools to manage screen space, and especially web browsers when maximized waste most of it.

So TLDR; yeah, I could use a messenger tab side by side with rest of the browser tabs, because I have a shit ton of useless screen space with a maximized browser window.

<comment><USER27> Rotate it 90 degrees. 16:9 then becomes 9:16 which is a dream come true for coding for example.

<comment><USER28> It is not. It is too thin. I have done it.

It is also too thin to read comic books. Wasted space at the bottom.

<comment> Al-Khwarizmi Yep, that's why I always buy 16:10 or 4:3 monitors, which work fine vertically to read PDFs which is my main activity as an academic...

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> Opera's been rebooted more times than the Spider-Man movies at this point.

</comment><comment><USER30> Ok, so I installed it to try it out.

Trying to get the WhatsApp widget running it seems like I must allow access to the camera and the microphone on my computer.

This is ridiculous.

On mobile, this is not needed, and is maybe even fine. When the app is turned off you know it isn't listening or taking pictures.

On a desktop computer there is no such guarantee. On the other hand this applies to all software I'm running. Maybe it's time to put a piece of tape over the camera.

<comment><USER31> does your camera have an LED? It is supposed to be wired up in a way that the camera cannot be powered up without also turning the led on so you know it is active.

<comment><USER30> Sometimes the LED can be turned off even if the camera is on. But that may require some extra sneakyness.

<comment><USER32> There's simple flag you can set now to control most LEDs on Linux.

Eg [http://www.0xf8.org/2009/09/the-shortcomings-of-the-linux- le...](http://www.0xf8.org/2009/09/the-shortcomings-of-the-linux-leds-api/).

FWIW didn't work for my WiFi, had to use an alternative (modprobe.conf maybe?).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> Closed source software owned by the Chinese.

I'm no tinfoil-hat but this combination doesn't really strike as "privacy focused".

</comment><comment><USER34> I wonder why [.* ]baidu.com, [.* ]facebook.com, [.* ]google.com and [.* ]yandex.com are in the default list of exceptions when blocking ads. Any ideas?

<comment><USER35> Money.

<comment><USER34> IIRC Opera has an agreement with Google to make it the default browser. I wonder what they have with Facebook, Baidu and Yandex. Maybe the default browser is region-based.

<comment><USER36> Very much so. Google is less dominant in many markets where Opera is strong, so the bidding between Google and the local search engines is probably tough.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> Did they open the Opera's source? They are still more place for more foss browser.

<comment><USER18> They did not, but someone did it for them: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13417307](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13417307)

</comment></comment><comment><USER38> Opera used to be amazing, a few years ago it had a built in RSS, mail and IRC client, then even later (and right before the acquisition) they were still ahead with their UX by having a "Read Later" section to the browser and allowing you to easily customise and make folders in your "first page".

Now its just a mess and Vivaldi is not much better.

<comment><USER39> opera is not a mess--it is the best of the browsers...i use it as default browser on my desktop...opera is easily better than chrome or firefox...has far far fewer issues and slowdowns and freezes and crashes...opera is a great browser...

</comment></comment><comment> T-A _we bring you Opera Reborn, the first browser to allow messengers to reside within your browser, without the need to install any extensions or apps_

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

<comment><USER40> Vivaldi is doing that out of the box. Just drag and drop messenger.com on to left app bar, then right click and select Show desktop version. Voila!

</comment></comment><comment><USER41> Where to Opera get their money? Building and maintaining a browser seems like an expensive undertaking, and yet despite nobody I know using or even testing their websites on Opera, they've been actively developing and maintaining their browser for years.

<comment><USER42> Opera is licensed as the embedded browser that powers most set-top boxes.

<comment><USER15> And gaming consoles and smart TVs

<comment><USER18> Which gaming consoles ? Nintendo dropped opera a while ago.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER43> So chatting while browsing is the future of desktop browsing? Sounds rather... unambitious.

<comment><USER25> It's also a simple rip-off of what Vivaldi already had, thanks to customisable side panels - which, to be fair, is itself a simple update of what Mozilla had back in the '90s.

If this is the best Opera has to offer today, they won't last long.

</comment></comment><comment><USER44> Are the FB Messenger, WhatsApp, and Telegram integrations official (i.e. known by, approved by, and/or supported by their respective companies)?

Asking because I can't find a reverse-shoutout to Opera on either Facebook's, WhatsApp's, or Telegram's blog. This is not altogether unusual (especially given the recency of the Opera announcement) but it still makes me curious.

<comment><USER45> I believe Opera is simply loading the webapps for these services in a web panel, so it's "official" in that it loads the official UI, but unofficial in that it's not a corporate partnership.

</comment></comment><comment><USER46> How is it possible that Opera got all my saved passwords and sh*t from Chrome?

I did not authorize this during install.

<comment><USER47> You probably clicked Accept and Install. "Import bookmarks and data" is under options in the first screen of the installer and ticked by default.

<comment><USER46> Could be... but the design is such, that almost anyone will do that not knowing what it all means.

<comment><USER48> This could be said about almost any technology.

Just because you did not look at the settings does not mean there was no option. I get this from the elderly all the time, "Well how was I supposed to know to click that menu first?"

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER49> I guess it's time for me to be a crotchety old man again.

Opera lost me when the followed Chrome in the elimination of the menu bar. If they haven't rectified that, I'll stick with Firefox.

<comment><USER50> What is a menu bar offering you that makes or breaks a program for you versus several political, philosophical, ideological, practical, and technical other differences?

<comment><USER49> UI Consistency.

<comment> Al-Khwarizmi You're not alone. Opera lost me for that reason as well (no menubar plus no -even simulated- MDI), and it's also one of the main reasons why I use Otter and not Vivaldi (Vivaldi does have a menu bar, but with non-native behavior).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER51> So the chat program has to be on the left side, what if I want to move it somewhere else?

Perhaps it could reside in a little "window", then it could be moved anywhere! ....wait, this sounds familiar.

/s

</comment><comment><USER52> Pretty sure Opera is part owned by a Chinese consortium now, and to my knowledge their revenue comes from ads and adtech. So not super certain how private it is likely to be...

<comment><USER53> FTFY: Pretty sure Chrome is part owned by an American consortium now, and to my knowledge their revenue comes from ads and adtech. So not super certain how private it is likely to be...

<comment><USER54> That's why I don't use Chrome.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER55> I think this is the 3rd or 4th time Opera has been reborn in recent memory? I actually quite like where they're going with the user experience. But who owns Opera now?

<comment><USER18> A mix of google who owns the engine opera runs on and a consortium of chinese investors called Golden Brick Capital Private Equity Fund I Limited Partnership who bought it from Opera ASA summer 2016 after they were prevented from buying the whole Opera ASA company.

</comment></comment><comment><USER56> Until they open source it I will not be touching Opera, despite some of the features in it I really like. The future is open source, and Opera is not.

</comment><comment><USER57> I really like the concept of bringing i3-style tiling management to the browser space, but why is it specific to messengers? Since most well-designed websites work at any size, couldn't you just have a permanent tab at the side of the screen of, say, twitter, or some browser-based IRC client? Admittedly, I'd probably use facebook messenger as this tab anyway, so my needs are covered, but it seems like a missed opportunity. Obviously more technically- inclined individuals on more technically-inclined OS's have this already with proper tiling window managers but Windows and MacOS users probably don't want that system-wide and the browser would be the perfect place to introduce it.

<comment><USER58> Opera had tiling some 12-15 years ago. By default tabs were just 'maximized' to the full window, and they made it harder and harder to access with subsequent versions. I'm not even sure if it made it to the latest presto release (version 12).

Edit: the Wikipedia page shows tiling in Opera 1.0 in 1995... [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Opera_web_brows...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Opera_web_browser#/media/File:MultiTorg_Opera.png)

I'm with you though. I dumped Opera the moment they became a featureless skin around Chrome. Such a sad event

Operas best days were the early to mid 2000s

<comment><USER18> Just fired up the real opera (v12.16 b1860) I still have around and use occasionally to this day to test this.

Sure enough the tiling feature is there. Right click the tab bar and go to the arrange menu.

<comment><USER59> Vivaldi (by the original Opera people) has tiling.

<comment><USER18> I find vivaldi is not really suited for my several hundreds opened tabs navigation style yet. But I have good hopes for vivaldi and encourage people to try it and even use it as their main browser.

<comment><USER60> > I find vivaldi is not really suited for my several hundreds opened tabs > navigation style yet.

What is the solution you are currently using that you want them to implement?

Is quick commands (F2) + typing the tab name to navigate around not sufficient on Vivaldi?

<comment><USER61> Unfortunately the quick commands window is very slow. It definitely doesn't live up to its name.

I love it, though, and I truly hope performance is something they tackle soon.

<comment><USER60> This may or may not be a problem specific to your own installation though. While I don't have 100+ tabs, I've been using quick commands for everything since I started using Vivaldi without any issues - it is very snappy for me.

<comment><USER61> Could be. I've noticed it slows down more when you have a lot of bookmarks. Ideally you could choose what type of results quick search would return. I'd be perfectly happy only searching tabs and commands.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER62> Looks nice, but doesn't it look like that Opera is tend to reborn every few years or so ?

Still, I was long time Opera user but so far it didn't feel same after they went for webkit. This seems promising, time to try again.

<comment><USER63> If only they decided that their awesome email client should live in a browser again. I still use Opera 12 solely for emails as their new dedicated email client was lacking a large number of features in comparison.

<comment><USER15> How secure is that?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER64> Slightly offtopic, did entire Opera development moved to Poland? Is that part of new strategy under new owner or was it like that for a long time?

<comment><USER65> The core team in Oslo got laid off after the webkit switch in 2013, not sure how many remained in the other teams. But as far as I know there is nothing but sales and admin left in Norway now.

</comment></comment><comment><USER66> Reborn?! What!

Opera is now a combination of the Epic Privacy Browser and the Vivaldi Browser. They copied Epic's privacy features and in-built VPN/proxy and Vivaldi's social networking sidebars (which incidentally Opera pioneered and Vivaldi's founder is the Opera co-founder).

</comment><comment><USER67> Or even better, they could have made the side-by-side feature work for any web pages at all as a more general layout feature, with some kind of easy access toolbar to allow you to pop them in and out as desired.

I think "Reborn" is a bit of a stretch here.

</comment><comment><USER68> Considering how much I use the web-browser, how desperate for market share and money Opera is, and the fact that opera whatever it's called now is closed source, i would never even install it.

</comment><comment><USER69> Why hardcode WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger instead of allowing multiple tabs showing up at the same time -- two of them could be WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger like a tiling window manager?

</comment><comment> d--b "the future of the browser" and the first 3 features mentioned are "integrated chat", "new color schemes" and "new logos". Uh?

</comment><comment><USER70> > Browsing and chatting simultaneously is cumbersome and inefficient now, as > you need to switch between tabs when responding to a message. We believe > this needs to change.

Then:

>If you use more than one messenger, you can easily switch between them by using our shortcut key for quicker access (⌘ + ⇧ + m on macOS, CTRL + SHIFT + m on Windows and Linux).

So, why would this be any better than switching tabs? One thing about a browser, I usually have my hand on my mouse and not the keyboard.

</comment><comment><USER71> I wouldn't be so cavalier about promoting VPN as a potential way to improve user security...

</comment><comment><USER72> Cool, Opera innovates but Chrome is still the way to go. I want a browser not a social app...

</comment><comment><USER73> Some shady stuff going on in an injected browser.js file: [https://gist.github.com/xbenjii/2048d8edf135b04790be593ee69e...](https://gist.github.com/xbenjii/2048d8edf135b04790be593ee69ec5e0)

<comment><USER74> Not really. All of these are mostly user agent modifications to pretend to be Chrome to make certain sites work, as well as some JavaScript event modification (with a similar purpose).

The only "shady" thing is hiding the Chrome ad on Google's home page, though I guess you can consider that as a convenience once you decide to switch fully to another browser.

I don't know how easy it would be to pull an update for that file however, in which case it could become shady in an instant.

<comment><USER75> Why would they need to update browser.js to do something shady, they can just drop in a brand new binary that does whatever they want it to do and the vast majority of users would be none the wiser.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER76> These moves that Opera now makes remind me a bit of how back in a day WinAmp didn't know how to fend off the competition, so they've started integrating tones of "extra functionality" out of sheer desperation... it never works

</comment><comment><USER77> Chinese browser with access to all my data I visit during surfing? No thanks.

<comment><USER78> American browser with access to all my data I visit during surfing? No thanks.

Especially because I live in America.

</comment></comment><comment><USER79> As a non-techie, this just looks like a closed source Vivaldi clone.

None of the listed features are relevant to me ("Animations", "fresh look and feel", etc.) and my adblock performance is already adequate.

<comment><USER80> Isn't Vivaldi also closed source?

</comment></comment><comment><USER81> I think if Opera had a price that would be a major distinguishing point from the other browsers. Tailor to those users IMHO.

<comment> dorian-graph It used to.

</comment></comment><comment><USER82> Telegram, FB Messenger, Whatsapp... No Slack?

<comment><USER83> presumably, slack didn't pay them.

<comment><USER82> I highly doubt that Telegram paid them either.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER84> great solution to the the problem not exist

</comment><comment><USER85> how does opera makes money now? as per my understanding, pre iOS and android era, opera dealt directly with device manufactures and sold their browser as default on them. Since andriod, how are they even making money now?

</comment><comment><USER86> RockMelt 2?

</comment><comment><USER87> I've used their browser since a year now, because it has better battery saving than Chrome and some other cool features, like detaching video windows, built in VPN. You can now even use all the chrome plugins with another plugin, in Opera.

</comment><comment><USER88> blogs.opera.com throws me a security certificate error on Firefox

</comment><comment><USER89> EasyPrivacy by default means blocked Google Analytics on Opera.

</comment><comment><USER90> Looks like Edge browser with UWP sidebar

<comment><USER91> I bet it can at least create bookmarks to arbitrary URLs though.

[http://imgur.com/FrXs6U6](http://imgur.com/FrXs6U6)

</comment></comment><comment><USER92> I feel some MSN Explorer nostalgia.

</comment><comment><USER93> I was under the impression that the rebirth of Opera Browser was Vivaldi, but it seems I was wrong. Bravo, guys. Nice work.

<comment><USER94> True. For fans of Opera 12.x, Vivaldi is the reborn Opera. Though resource heavy and lacking a few features compared to the original Opera, Vivaldi is now stable enough to be my daily driver.

</comment></comment><comment><USER95> No tabs on the side :( ?

</comment><comment><USER96> Browser for extraverts.

</comment><comment><USER48> On linux desktop can my Opera Tabs be at the top for the screen yet?

No? Oh well, back to chrome.

</comment><comment><USER97> Tragic Fail ;-)

</comment><comment><USER98> they should open the source already

</comment><comment><USER18> Hey this google chrome skin has made some progress since last time I heard about it. It's still light years behind opera 12 and sadly will never regain what it lost.

If you're interested in the actual reborn opera experience, it's vivaldi you're looking for, opera co-founder and many for the original opera team is making vivaldi and though based on blink engine too, hence limited and unable to do exactly what opera used to, it has the same philosophy and vision.

The other alternative is the free software otter[1] browser aiming at recreating the opera 12 experience.

[0]: [http://vivaldi.net/](http://vivaldi.net/) [1]: [https://otter- browser.org/](https://otter-browser.org/)

<comment><USER99> > it's vivaldi

which is, well, another google chrome skin ;)

</comment></comment><comment><USER100> I gave up using Opera for good once it was acquired by the Chinese.

<comment><USER101> Why do people say "the Chinese" as if Chinese people are some scary, out of this world concept or they are some kind of James Bond villain.

<comment><USER23> I don't really blame the Chinese people myself, it's the ways the Chinese government is embedded in their industries whether they want it or not that worry me, especially with a software like a web browser.

<comment><USER18> You could have similar criticism of the US, see patriot act.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Let's end publicly funded Catholic schools - <AUTHOR> https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/toronto/article-lets-end-publicly-funded-catholic-schools/ <comment><USER2> In 6th grade we started learning about the various torture methods used on Catholic saints. There was one particularly enthusiastic lesson where our teacher explained how doctors recently confirmed the intersection of human wrist bones could, as a pair, support the weight of human body and that rope wouldn't be necessary to bind someone to a crucifix.

We learned all sorts of confusing and depraved ideas that made it nearly impossible to concentrate during the non-religious classes. At least that was my experience. It's arguable that these schools should be attended by no one, let alone be publicly funded.

</comment><comment><USER3> Why not no religion at all? Because then we can't have Christmas concerts or Halloween dress up days because though these are all quite commercial, have religious origins and are still observed by many as religious events.

So, we end up with a mess between keeping people happy from every angle at once (where no one is particularly happy) instead of sticking to a logical position that angers some and is a perfectly fine solution for the rational population.

Edit: The down side of my perspective is that mob rule will alter what is ethically acceptable to teach children in the future. Which is a real concern.

Edit: I don't think the schools have any business teaching kids about sex either, let the parents do that. (I don't want to live in a communist dystopia because we forget history)

Edit: (Removed some personal view points.)

</comment><comment><USER4> One of the biggest wins for liberty in the United States courts was Pierce v. Society of Sisters (1925) which struck down the Oregon state 1922 Compulsory Education Act, a law targeting parochial schools. This anti-Catholic law was strongly backed by the Ku Klux Klan and Democrats.

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

The article being discussed does not mention what they mean by funding. Does it equate tax exempt status to funding? Are Catholic schools directly funded by the Canadian government?

The article does equate Christian culture with all others and concludes "In a society that claims to treat everyone equally regardless of background, this is impossible to defend."

.. why does western civ have this ideal of "treating everyone equally"? What will happen to this ideal once you eliminate the foundations? Maybe that is the goal?

</comment><comment><USER5> Paywalled, anybody got a bypass?

<comment><USER6> [https://dpaste.de/nUKs](https://dpaste.de/nUKs)

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Is there research showing that graduates of Catholic schools are less educated in core academic subjects, are less likely to attend college, less likely to get a good job, or more likely to break the law? Those are the main outcomes the public cares about. In the absence of evidence that Catholic schools are underperforming, the state should not try to usurp the choices of parents.

<comment><USER8> Would you be this open to religiously themed education if there were numbers that pointed to Islam-based schools leading to better jobs? Or if someone came up with an atheist school that went out of its way to deny any deities and they outperformed the Catholic schools? Should we shut down the Catholic schools and just follow the numbers?

I guess my point is that most people don't want the federal government advancing any religions that aren't their own (and for whatever reason people are pretty relaxed about this concern when it comes to their own religion).

<comment><USER7> As long as the school teachers secular subjects well, I am ok with it having a religious orientation, whether its Christian, Jewish, Muslim, or something else.</comment></comment></comment>


Ethereum Will Bypass Bitcoin in Market Cap Says Union Square's Fred Wilson - <AUTHOR> http://www.trustnodes.com/2017/05/18/ethereum-will-bypass-bitcoin-market-cap-says-union-squares-fred-wilson <comment><USER2> And Market Cap is an indicator of what exactly? I am pro-crypto but this whole obsession with Market Cap is rather self-defeating.

<comment><USER3> Number of merchants accepting is an important thing to consider.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> surpass, not bypass.</comment>


New Quantum Theory Could Explain the Flow of Time - <AUTHOR> http://www.wired.com/2014/04/quantum-theory-flow-time/

<comment><USER2> Dupe of [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7601969](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7601969).</comment>


Reverse engineering the binary data format for Star Wars: Yoda Stories - <AUTHOR> http://www.zachtronics.com/yoda-stories/ <comment><USER2> _I 'm not sure why there's a sports car in the game's tileset_

I have a suspicion -- it's from one of Mark Hamill's more-regrettable roles. What a great Easter Egg! (unless it's actually part of the game somewhere)

[http://fffmp.fffmoviepostersc.netdna-cdn.com/wp- content/uplo...](http://fffmp.fffmoviepostersc.netdna-cdn.com/wp- content/uploads/3922.jpg)

<comment><AUTHOR> Holy crap, that's absolutely the same car. I'll update the writeup with your discovery. Thanks!

<comment><USER3> I guess the two tiles are really unused, aren't they? If they are, that's great stuff for the _The Cutting Room Floor_ wiki ([http://tcrf.net](http://tcrf.net))! Don't get lost on there as it's somewhat like TV Tropes.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> This put a big ol' smile on my face. I remember Yoda Stories (there was a similar game, Indiana Jones and his Desktop Adventures, same engine?)

Very thorough RE of the data format. Posts like this are why I still come to HN!

<comment><USER5> Yeah the author mentions that it was probably a later version of the same engine: _The VERS identifier clearly starts a "version" section, which contains the following four bytes: 0x00, 0x02, 0x00, 0x00. My guess is that this is version 2.0 of the file format, as Yoda Stories was actually the successor to an Indiana Jones game that appears to use the same engine,_

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Every time I think "hey, I have this funky DAT file that I need data from. I bet I could reverse engineer it." And then I open the file and my eyes glaze over. Then I read a headline like this, and I think, "Hey, maybe this will help." And then I realize... nope, still way over my head.

Sigh.

</comment><comment><USER7> 10/10 good article.

I wonder if something remotely similar is possible with todays games. With all the custom data formats and compression algorithms being used.

<comment><AUTHOR> Absolutely! Are there any games you'd like to see in particular?

<comment><USER7> Nothing in particular.

I love reading RE posts but I don't plan on making any mods to any games in the near future. Therefore I don't want to specify any 'targets' for your efforts unless I'm willing to extend them :)

I was talking about something big and sophisticated, like Crysis or Battlefield (from the top of my head). I'm under the impression they have something more than uncompressed bitmaps and 8bpp resolution but I've never done anything like this to be certain.

Thanks! Keep up the good work.

<comment> jon-wood The CryEngine documentation would be a good start for Crysis [http://docs.cryengine.com/display/SDKDOC1/Home](http://docs.cryengine.com/display/SDKDOC1/Home). Battlefield would require some reverse engineering since it runs on Frostbite, which EA's internal game engine, and not publicly available.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> The four bytes of ID followed by four bytes of size is an old and somewhat standard technique: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interchange_File_Format](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interchange_File_Format)

</comment><comment><USER9> The author also created SpaceChem, which is one of the best programming/engineering games out there. For just programming games, I'd call it my second all time favorite just behind Robot Odyssey, an ancient Apple ][ game.

This gives some great context to where SpaceChem came from. Thanks Zach!

<comment><USER10> SpaceChem is included in the current Humble Bundle, with still 10 hours remaining, FWIW.

<comment><USER11> Sweet! Thanks for the tip. looks like EFF just got another donation for $6.54 USD, and thank you Zach for donating your software for charity!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I want to pick up more skills like this. I've just done something similiar at work to break in to some event recorder files we could only view as the application provided no utility for exporting the data into CSV (among many other limitations). I was pretty lucky and fluked a lot of it, mainly by just identifying a pattern and messing with the hex values of a file then viewing what it did in the viewer application provided.

I'd love to expand my skills and try this out on a number of other projects. Is there some good starting material which can push me in the right direction?

</comment><comment><USER13> Great article, brings back hex hacking, I remember doing the same with Virtua Tennis for the PC, then someone else wrote up an article after doing the same thing.

[http://www.gamefaqs.com/pc/557900-virtua- tennis/faqs/19110](http://www.gamefaqs.com/pc/557900-virtua-tennis/faqs/19110)

I think I made a little tool to unlock all the options and enabling players you couldn't otherwise get IIRC.

</comment><comment><USER14> Great article. Thanks for being so rigorous with the step-by-step process and for annotating your thoughts on each step, it's very instructive.

<comment><USER15> That's the difficult part about documenting CTFs and reverse engineering tasks. In the past I tried to do it afterwards but it's a bit clunky. Now I try to do it at the same time, like a journal, and it's getting better (still not as good as OP :))

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> This is a really well written article; full of great, reusable tricks and techniques in reverse engineering. Clear screenshots, humorous yet technical content, neat results. Hats off to you, sir, keep up the good work and I look forward to reading more of your tutorials.

</comment><comment><USER16> This looks to me like the file is in something like the IFF format: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interchange_File_Format](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interchange_File_Format)

</comment><comment><USER17> Gameplay video: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AQhFSf-- yUI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AQhFSf--yUI)

</comment><comment><USER18> Thank you for that write up, it's very detailed and showed your thought process extremely well.

</comment><comment><USER19> Love it. Any pointers for an easier old (or new) game to have a go at pulling apart like this?

<comment><USER20> I'd definitely check out Halo 2. The modding community was massive. In fact, modding Halo 2 was what introduced me to programming :)

The maps have a very basic encryption(checksum). Map signers are all over the internet if you don't feel like doing the work yourself. There's also many high level tools to play with the maps. I remember taking an a vehicle from one level and placing it in another was a trivial process. Youtube has a plethora of videos where modders show off what they could do

<comment><USER19> For anyone else looking - Halo 2 is hard to get legitimately now. eBay copies are looking like upwards of $90AUD!

<comment><USER21> That must be an Australian issue because on eBay and in local stores, it is still $10ish.

<comment><USER19> I'm not sure - [http://www.ebay.com.au/sch/Video-Games- Consoles-/1249/i.html...](http://www.ebay.com.au/sch/Video-Games- Consoles-/1249/i.html?_from=R40&_nkw=halo+2+pc&LH_PrefLoc=2&rt=nc&LH_BIN=1)

Amazon has a (used?) copy for ~$17 - AFAICT it requires online activation so this may not work well.

<comment><USER20> I was referencing the xbox version of the game. If I remember correctly, the pc version of the game actually allowed cheaters, which takes all the fun out of it IMO

Im sure you could find an old xbox and the game for less than $90AUD. Or, you could buy an xbox, flash the disk drive, download a halo .iso and burn it to a verbatim disk. Thats what I usually do

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Can you upload those sprites?

<comment><USER23> [http://i.imgur.com/tcFHs14.png](http://i.imgur.com/tcFHs14.png)

<comment><USER3> I found Waldo! Just kidding, but I found Indiana Jones. I also doubt, that the sprites on the left side of him, are part of this Star Wars game.

Edit:

I did the same for the Indiana Jones game: [https://i.imgur.com/c1kKfV7.png](https://i.imgur.com/c1kKfV7.png)

(thanks ImageMagick's convert and montage)

Edit 2:

Well, they're part of the game according to [http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Star_Wars:_Yoda_Stories](http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Star_Wars:_Yoda_Stories):

>Indiana Jones is featured as an easter egg in a mission, as a sequel to a mission in Desktop Adventures. His similarity to Han Solo is remarked upon.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> [https://www.synalysis.net](https://www.synalysis.net) is a program specifically for reversing binary files.

</comment><comment><USER25> That was such a great game.

<comment><USER26> I'm stretching my memory a little but I think there was an Indiana Jones game using what I vaguely recognised at the time as the same engine, which I have equally fond memories of!

<comment><USER27> [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indiana_Jones_and_His_Desktop_A...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indiana_Jones_and_His_Desktop_Adventures) is what you're looking for.

I'll have to see later if the same tricks apply to both games!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> the site is taken down!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

</comment><comment><USER29> Thanks! :)

</comment><comment> V01D-eXe Can someone please write a C/C++/Go/Rust version as I am C# Illiterate .

<comment><USER30> If I may be so blunt, I suggest you help yourself. You will no longer be 'C# illiterate' when you have.

I'm having difficulty understanding in what way C# is difficult to read for someone who can write in the languages that you mentioned.

<comment><USER31> Must be a troll or a comment on the wrong thread. I know neither language, have no clue about programming and have no trouble understanding the logic in the code snippets.

<comment><USER32> It is frustrating to see tools like this written with C#, because most C# developers have no mind to cross-platform compatibility. Often they'll build the UI using the Microsoft-specific frameworks, which Mono doesn't support. .NET programs also don't often run well in Wine, leaving me with a ton of work to do to get it running on Linux.

It's not really the language that's the problem so much as the incredibly proprietary environment in which it's used.

<comment><USER33> This code should work as is using Mono.

But the complaint was weird in the first place?

<comment><USER32> > This code should work as is using Mono.

Sure, this one does, but nearly any .NET program with a GUI won't. It's very frustrating to run into useful programs that I can't run, and most often applications that fit that description are written in a .NET language.

> But the complaint was weird in the first place?

Yeah, true. There's nothing hard about reading C#, just running it.

<comment><USER33> You make it sound as if there were no portable (or 'non-windows') C# applications. Stuff I care about:

[http://banshee.fm/](http://banshee.fm/)

[https://wiki.gnome.org/Apps/Tomboy](https://wiki.gnome.org/Apps/Tomboy)

[http://f-spot.org/](http://f-spot.org/)

[http://keepass.info/](http://keepass.info/)

<comment><USER32> At least in the game-hacking-with-a-GUI space, there very nearly aren't any.

<comment><USER34> Wow, you're really narrowing this down now. OK, there aren't many tools in the portable C# game-hacking-with-a-GUI space. Why is that such a great issue, and why is it relevant to this article?

<comment><USER32> It's just annoying, as someone who likes to dabble in that space. There's a lot of good, interesting work done and it's frustrating that it's done using a proprietary technology I can't use when there are tons of other options.

This article is about game hacking using C# and never addressed the issue of portability, because game hackers who use C# never think about portability. That was my point.

<comment><USER34> Maybe it doesn't address the "issue" of portability because it in fact is a portable program. Maybe it doesn't address portability because it's an article about reverse engineering a game. Maybe it doesn't address portability because the code is meant to illustrate his process rather than for others to port it. I still don't see how your criticism is relevant at all.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


NASA data API - <AUTHOR> https://data.nasa.gov/developer

<comment><USER3> So excited for this. If anyone wants to start experimenting with this data set in cool and open ways, I will personally fund your small micro experiments.

NASA's APOD is so awesome and that's just a picture, imagine all the potential fantastic content that's now available and what you could do with it.

<comment><USER4> That would be great how can i contact you ?

<comment><USER3> I will put up a call for proposals on Experiment.com (I am the founder), don't expect me to commit a lot, but between friends and colleagues, I'm thinking we could review many proposals and get a few exciting projects off the ground. This is a great excuse for me to get around to doing this, and doing it in a transparent and democratic way.

edit - here's the link for more info: [http://blog.experiment.com/post/117058351892/rfp-nasa- open-d...](http://blog.experiment.com/post/117058351892/rfp-nasa-open-data)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Is there a compilation of applications and experiments using each API?

The classical example of cool stuff you can do with this kind of API is the world wind map:

[http://earth.nullschool.net/](http://earth.nullschool.net/)

<comment><USER6> That's awesome! Thanks for sharing.

</comment></comment><comment> chris-metcalf Chris Metcalf here, Developer Evangelist from Socrata ([http://dev.socrata.com](http://dev.socrata.com)), the company that provides the platform that hosts the catalog and some of the open data APIs they're providing. I'm glad to answer whatever questions I can here.

<comment><USER7> Are you working with the new chief Data Scientist and his team to set this up?

Are the tools you're developing just for US government data or are you also branching out into state and international governments?

<comment> chris-metcalf We worked with a team from across NASA to build it, including the Ames Research Center and other groups.

At Socrata we work with all levels of governments, including cities, states, federal agencies, and even international governments around the world: [http://www.socrata.com/customer-stories/](http://www.socrata.com/customer- stories/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Looks like they need to work on better error controls. They left DEBUG=True which produces debug stack traces on exceptions.

[https://api.data.gov/nasa/planetary/earth/assets?lon=100.75&...](https://api.data.gov/nasa/planetary/earth/assets?lon=100.75&lat=1.5&begin=2014-02-010&api_key=DEMO_KEY)

</comment><comment><USER9> And look at that, it's https. Excellent. (reference to the poorly-thought-out rant at [https://github.com/WhiteHouse/https/issues/107](https://github.com/WhiteHouse/https/issues/107))

<comment><USER10> open.whitehouse.gov is HTTPS :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> I am the developer that left the stack trace on returned exceptions. This is part of my Presidential Innovation Fellowship project at NASA. Yes, we work with the Chief Data Scientist, who is a wonderful and brilliant guy. Yes, we work with state and local governments, too - where "we" is civic tech in the US government (18F, USDS, PIF, among others). I'd love help on these APIs. First step: submit issues on the docs (github.com/nasa/api-docs).

<comment><USER8> Hey good job. Did you leave the stack trace on purpose or by accident?

<comment><USER11> a mix? maybe? i'm sort of swamped. i wish i could open this up to get some help. but i can't yet.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Not only is this API availability great, the short descriptions of what each one does are outstanding. So many 'try our API' pages are written in developer-ese that tells you up front about the mechanics of interacting with it but fail to explain what sort of things you could do with it. Documentation is much more than just a command reference!

</comment><comment><USER7> This is great. I have tried to access NASA's open data before. It was quite scattered and non-intuitive. Even the USGS also has a nice data API as well. BLS and DOE not so much.

</comment><comment><USER13> I read this as "NSA data API" and it took me a full 5 seconds of staring, eyebrows raised, at the astronaut to realise my mistake.

<comment><USER14> I bet it exists internally :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> If you're lazy like me and want to fiddle around without reading docs, here are code + spreadsheet snippets for 2 endpoints:

\- Landsat8 Satellite Images: [https://api.blockspring.com/pkpp1233/nasa- earth-image#use-in...](https://api.blockspring.com/pkpp1233/nasa-earth- image#use-in-code).

\- Local Temperature Anomalies: [https://api.blockspring.com/pkpp1233/earth- temperature-anoma...](https://api.blockspring.com/pkpp1233/earth-temperature- anomalies#use-in-code).

What a neat API. Cheers!

</comment><comment><USER16> Bah - I managed to get a few landsat images through the earth API. I was going to construct a timelapse of new orleans through the 2005 floods. But when I specify I date I'm always getting an exception - Exception: No imagery for specified date.

It would be nice if there was some more info on what the datasets actually are - such as when they where created etc. It would also be nice for this to have some more detailed logs - such as the date of images that are actually returned if it's an approximation of the date you've specified.

<comment><USER11> fair. try the assets endpoint ([http://nasa.github.io/api- docs/#assets](http://nasa.github.io/api-docs/#assets)). but i'll work on this. add an issue here: [https://github.com/nasa/api- docs](https://github.com/nasa/api-docs)

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> Wow, predict the sky looks pretty neat: [http://predictthesky.org/](http://predictthesky.org/)

Too bad it doesn't seem to actually work.

<comment><USER18> I had an aw shucks moment too! api.predictthesky.org doesn't resolve, and there is nothing on the API GitHub repo. The landing page says 2013 so I'm wondering if this got abandoned. Would have been really neat to play with.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> This is wonderful. We will be using/hosting some of these datasets on Tuva (tuvalabs.com) for educators and learners in K-12, Higher-Ed, and beyond.

</comment><comment><USER20> Gist in node.js for getting a list of fly-bys of satellite (apparently every 16 days) for a lat/lon combination and then downloading the images for inspection. Tweak the 'dim' for zoom level.

[https://gist.github.com/alexellis/0bb982253f3619e29f18](https://gist.github.com/alexellis/0bb982253f3619e29f18)

</comment><comment><USER21> This is awesome! I'm currently working through a machine learning project for one of my classes, and I was using flight data (which is also super interesting), but the inner astronomer in me is pushing for me to scrap everything I've done and pick a dataset from here.

But, even if I don't, I foresee many experiments with this data. Awesome.

<comment><USER11> i'm hoping to publish astronomy images here, just like the earth imagery - <USER2> that you can run your algorithms to detect light blobs, etc.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> I wonder how hard it would be to put this stuff into Kerbal Space Program and update the solar system in realtime...

</comment><comment><USER23> Finally! A trusted/standard API for APOD.. Will make the code of my hobbyist Android App so much cleaner.

</comment><comment><USER24> Nice! Endless learning tools & games to come out of this one

</comment><comment><USER25> This is fantastic news! I was waiting for that to happen :)

</comment><comment><USER26> Can somebody put together a quick tutorial on how to get from this API to charts generated in ipython?

</comment><comment><USER27> Glad to see this.

</comment><comment><USER28> At first glance I thought this read "NSA data API".

Knew it was too good to be true. Still very cool nonetheless. The Landsat 8 data is very neat specifically.

<comment><USER8> > At first glance I thought this read "NSA data API". If they gobble > everything up on the internet, then I suppose their data API is the > internet.</comment></comment>


WordPress is secure, until you combine it with people - <AUTHOR> http://jasonlefkowitz.net/2013/05/wordpress-is-secure-until-you-combine-it-with-people/

<comment><USER2> His first proposal, that WordPress installs should update themselves, makes sense.

His second proposal, that WordPress should show users a click-through warning when installing themes and plugins, doesn't make sense. The experience from e.g. SSL errors in web browsers, is that most people will just click through and ignore the warning.

Instead of making it _difficult to install_ themes+plugins, make it _difficult to write insecure_ themes+plugins.</comment>


A Non-Technical Guide to the Technical Interview - <AUTHOR> http://flow.moe/tech-interviews/ <comment><AUTHOR> Author here! I wrote this after going through some dozens of tech interviews in college, for both internships and full time positions. I'd love to hear any interview tips or feedback you have!</comment>


Patent troll asks judge to turn off FaceTime and iMessages - <AUTHOR> http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2016/05/patent-troll-that-beat-apple-now-wants-judge-to-block-facetime-imessages/ <comment><USER3> > _' Apple "argued that VirnetX is improperly trying to secure an overly broad > injunction so that it can be used to extract a massive licensing fee," > Law360 reported.'_

That's the usual dance. Normally, a non-practicing patent owner such as VirnetX would FAR prefer to have the infringement continue, and thus get a bigger payday, than to have the court order the defendant (Apple) to stop the infringement. So, the patent owner pushes hard for just such a shut-down order, to try to bulldoze the defendant into settling. Outside observers would be forgiven for thinking that there's a certain element of "playing chicken" involved. To a first approximation, this seems to be pretty much what happened in the _NTP v. Blackberry_ case ten years ago. [0] [1]

[0] [http://money.cnn.com/2006/02/24/technology/blackberry/](http://money.cnn.com/2006/02/24/technology/blackberry/)

[1] [http://money.cnn.com/2006/03/03/technology/rimm_ntp/](http://money.cnn.com/2006/03/03/technology/rimm_ntp/)

<comment><USER4> And now I'm wondering what the repercussions of Apple actually shutting down FaceTime and iMessage with a notice saying "This feature is unavailable due to a lawsuit filed by VirnetX, Inc."

I don't think they'd actually do it. It would probably be kinda stupid to do. But it's fun to imagine.

<comment><USER5> Could VirnetX sue for defamation if Apple specifically said that?

<comment><USER6> You can sue for anything, so yes, but in this thought experiment they would lose the lawsuit. In order for a defamation/libel lawsuit to be successful, the statement must be untrue.

<comment><USER7> Further, if it was found that they were executing this suit vexactiously, they might be liable for anti-SLAPP damages.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> The even shadier part of this is that VirnetX comes out of SAIC - shady US govt. contractor (with a healthy private military contractor arm...). The tech was probably funded out of taxpayer dollars, that they are using to (arguably already) unethically profit off of.

</comment><comment><USER9> Maybe OT but I found this blog post by VirnetX while reading further into this issue:

[https://www.virnetx.com/patent-trolls-ask-jason- bourne/](https://www.virnetx.com/patent-trolls-ask-jason-bourne/)

<comment><USER10> VirnetX's version of 'imessage' was released May 2015.

Apple's imessage was released October 2011.

Yet they're suing because Apple infringed on their vague communication encryption patents from the early 2000s.

There should be massive fines for patent trolls to deter this kind of behavior. Patenting abstract ideas with no viable product should not be allowed.

<comment><USER11> Haven't you heard? Abstract ideas aren't patentable--the Supreme Court cleared everything up in the Alice decision!

/sarcasm

<comment><USER12> Thank you for the sarcasm tag! I honestly use that on the internet lately because 63% of everything is sarcasm and then it's just a whole ridiculous mess of misunderstanding.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I don't see any chance at all that a company could actually get an injunction against iMessage based on a few patents like this. The judge will expect the parties to negotiate in good faith and come to a settlement. Apple will have to pay "a lot of money".

Could Apple not find prior art and invalidate the patent? Apparently not.

I assume a software patent in particular does not give VirnetX an absolute right to shut down a product for which it is just a small component.

I do think patent awards for component functionality do not get adjusted downward enough based on the relatively small weight of the subject matter on the overall product. When one piece of software can be covered by thousands of parents, violating a single parent should, most of the time, cost less than a small fraction of the overall value of the product.

<comment><USER14> I wonder how patents like this are even valid.

IMHO The patent laws should be amended to require entities to both "articulate a solution" and "add value" to make the patent valid.

For ARM (described in other posts as a NPE) their patent licenses are bundled with a low-power processor core design that provides a solution to licensees requirements. The core design adds value to the basic technology covered by the patent.

The VirnetX patents shouldn't be valid as they merely describe an element of a design, and not a particular means of implementation. This may fall under Sec. 112(f) "Means-plus-function" [0], but getting the patents invalidated is not easy.

The EFF have tried to bust "stupid patents" [1] somewhat successfully. Please donate to support this worthy cause.

[0] [http://www.uspto.gov/web/offices/pac/mpep/s2181.html](http://www.uspto.gov/web/offices/pac/mpep/s2181.html)

[1] [https://www.eff.org/about/staff/daniel- nazer](https://www.eff.org/about/staff/daniel-nazer)

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> Here is how we can start killing patent trolls vernetx stock is trading at 4.89 and has a total marketcap of $252M[0]. When the list a massive portfolio (e.g. a huge weapons cache which is then publicly purchaseable) all major companies and a fund set up by the ETF or a responsible steward, buy enough to control the company. This would technically fund a patent troll, however, you could limit the attack vector to a payout less than even a single win in court would be given the apple lawsuit was >600M minus all the law fees.

There is conceiveably at least 1 other company with comprable shitty patents that is public, so a bidding war race to the bottom would incentize prices down instead of up if possible.

It could also be possible (in a much more gray possibly worse) way, actively drum up interest for a patent trolls IPO from the alliance funds, and then not invest in the fund, but release open source patents sourced from a different provier inavlidating there ability to sue in the market, with the alliance fund promising anyone using [ rediculously standard tech ] would have their full support in leveraging the open source patents and fighting legal fees associated with someone trying to invalidate the open source patents. this could disincentize bad behaviour.

It is pretty rediculous a company that is less than 2 years old can win a settlement for fucking twice it's market cap. I don';t think the market/law could limit age/market cap as startups would get killed if bigger people poach there stuff, but maybe some requirement to file suit of needing a working product or service using the technology and maybe some combo of years in the market / market cap, plus (which I think is critical) the public company must be owned by some reasonably large but not insane number. e.g. if you quietly ipo your shell and then you and your horrible 10-20 stakeholders foot the legal bill, then you shouldn't be allowed to sue, but if hundreds/thousands ++ are buying it, then it is likely actually a real or semi legit company.

[0][https://www.google.com/finance?cid=663422](https://www.google.com/finance?cid=663422)

<comment><USER16> It's actually a good idea if they get a foundational patent on something with no other alternative and fees higher than the troll is worth. In this case, they've... probably for buddies at DOD/NSA that fund them... created patents on encrypted messaging that they're using to sue everyone in a way that weakens security if dodged and still legal in U.S.. Plus the judgments cost a fortune.

I recommend big companies buy out the firms with foundational patents like this from back in the day. They already do in big-company acquisitions with patent portfolio being a big reason. Just an extension of that. Any other patent trolls they should squash. Plus these wherever they can. Buying is last resort.

<comment><USER17> > I recommend big companies buy out the firms with foundational patents like > this from back in the day.

Would that be Nortel / Rockster Consortium approach? Sadly, big companies will be tempted to 'monetize' the patents and/or use them as a competitive advantage: and both are enforced via litigation. I supposed being sued by a big tech company rather than a patent troll is better?

The worst case is when a tech company buys patents, sells them to an NPE and then sics it on competitors, it's a good thing that'll _never_ happen.

<comment><USER16> The ones being sued were deploying end-to-end secure messaging in widespread use. It would indeed be better if they had the patents and only sued other big players.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> What are the actual patents? I never see them explicitly listed anywhere.

<comment><USER19> As listed in the article:

[https://www.google.com/patents/US6502135](https://www.google.com/patents/US6502135)

[https://www.google.com/patents/US7418504](https://www.google.com/patents/US7418504)

[https://www.google.com/patents/US7490151](https://www.google.com/patents/US7490151)

[https://www.google.com/patents/US7921211](https://www.google.com/patents/US7921211)

<comment><USER20> Could someone who knows about network engineering give a quick summary on whether the claims make any sense? I do mostly front-end and to me they look like "that's just how the Internet works".

<comment><USER18> It almost looks like DNSSEC is patented here... :P

<comment><USER16> Good call. It's broad enough to catch DNSSEC in a suit. I double up on claim to buy this company given its patents are on Internet foundations. Too risky to leave to trolling.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Maybe I'm really uninformed or haven't been paying attention, but I was really surprised to see that a patent troll is traded on the NYSE: [https://www.nyse.com/quote/XASE:VHC/company](https://www.nyse.com/quote/XASE:VHC/company)

Is that normal?

<comment><USER22> What is a patent troll really? In VirnetX's case, last time I checked most (all?) of their patents were created in house.

There are numerous publicly traded stocks of companies that are mainly patent holding entities: Acacia (ACTG), Finjan (FNJN), Inventergy (INVT), MARA, Wi- lan (WILN), Hopto (HPTO), etc...

But where does the whole troll definition end - many mid-large corporations have patents that they do not practice or not embodied in any product - <USER2> aren't they trolls too? even if they haven't explicitly threatened legal action with those patents - competitors view those patents as implicit threats. So why not label them as trolls too? At the end of the day, every patent holder can be considered a troll in some way - so the definition of a troll really comes down to: patent troll = patent holder.

<comment><USER23> straw man argument is made of straw.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> There is a really simple solution to patent trolls: make every patent follow the guidelines for "Petition to Make Special". In other words: "use it or lose it". PTMS was created to expedite patents based on the assumption that it would be too costly to make an invention without patent protection.

For example is my patent: [https://patents.google.com/patent/US5341429A/en?q=transforma...](https://patents.google.com/patent/US5341429A/en?q=transformation&q=ephemeral+material) which has about 500+ citations. After the dot bomb, the company went out of business. That patent was not picked up by a troll. Why? Not sure, but perhaps the PTMS made it less useful for litigation.

</comment><comment><USER25> Why not just revolutionize patent laws? Make it only applicable if the patent is used for a real product available on the market. That would make patent trolling unattractive.

</comment><comment><USER26> As many people as there are who use these services, I wonder if it would cause such a public outrage if they were turned off that congress would actually do something about the broken patent system in the U.S.

</comment><comment><USER27> At this point the patent troll problem is so severe that I think any new law needs to not only fix the problem, but _retroactively_ assess punitive damages to all patent troll companies. It should be relatively easy to prove which companies were created only to litigate (e.g. they have few employees and produce no products related to the patents that they own). The fines should be absolutely massive; to hell with these people.

<comment><USER28> You want to be careful with the "produce no products" bit - you'd stomp on entities like ARM that don't actually fabricate chips, but create and license designs.

Problem is, coming up with a definition of "patent troll" that's 100% objective and can reliably differentiate between a benevolent NPE like ARM and a group of snakes like VirnetX is tricky. Too strict and you'll have some awful false positives. Too vague and you're reduced to arguing it in court, something prohibitively expensive.

<comment><USER22> > Problem is, coming up with a definition of "patent troll" that's 100% > objective and can reliably differentiate between a benevolent NPE like ARM

From what I can tell, ARM started 30+ years ago and sold physical chips. I am missing when they morphed into mainly selling chip designs - and how were they able to make such a transition without the publicity of lawsuits.

<comment><USER14> ARM were not really a chip company. The parent, Acorn Computers, produced the BBC Micro. They didn't sell the physical chips as a product.

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

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> This is a public company troll just buy up all their stock and toss them in the nearest dumpster.

<comment><USER30> Wouldn't that be their biggest payday ever? They'd go out with a massive pile of cash ahead of real patent reform that would otherwise tank their market cap. I've got to think that that's Plan B for every patent troll, and that it wouldn't be a disappointing outcome to them.

<comment><USER31> Yeah, even assuming you bought the majority share and sued the executive team for mismanaging the company, you'd have to prove they weren't focusing on profits. Which they essentially are.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> It is actually interesting to see a patent troll suing patent troll.

<comment><USER33> Downvotes? There have been proven incidences where Apple sued other companies (and even non-competing businesses) offensively for frivolous and ludicrous patents. Just because it's a loved company here, doesn't negate that fact (Sure, the degree of 'trolling' differs).

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> I would normally have sympathy for Apple due to the voracity of this patent troll, but Apple once demanded that Samsung pay them a $40+ per phone licensing fee. Karma sure is a bitch.

</comment><comment><USER35> The term patent troll is used without regard to any facts in the media these days, and I fear that is doing harm to the patent system.

The patent system was designed to foster innovation. If you invent something, you get protection for your intellectual property. It's not a requirement that you produce a product. You could realize that you don't have the resources right out of the gate and choose to license your invention to someone that does. The days of submarine patents are over.

There are some entities that actually are patent trolls - companies that collect patents for litigation purposes - but just because a lawsuit happens doesn't mean that the plaintiff is a patent troll.

<comment><USER36> 1) In what way is it "doing harm" to the patent system? Usually, when people are vague about a harm, it is either because there is none, or it is some sort of vague "causing people to not respect [thing]" or some such. I suspect you mean the latter due to complaining about "the media". I, ahem, have very little respect for that viewpoint. I do understand the arguments respect for legal institutions being necessary for them to function, but respect is two- way - act disrespectfully enough, and nothing is going to save you. Perhaps more importantly, it is the patent trolls are the ones doing the damage, not "the media".

2) This patent troll is an NPE, which is usually (along with, you know, suing) the defining trait of patent trolldom. Why are you reciting grade-school nostrums about the Noble Idea of IP protection in general when responding to news about a particular entity in a particular case, who is quite clearly a troll? If I'm missing something, do clue me in.

3) If I'm misreading you, please do clarify. Being specific about harm, to whom, exactly, you're referring when bashing "the media", and perhaps why an extremely simplistic defense of patents seemed needed here would all be edifying.

<comment><USER35> > This patent troll is an NPE, which is usually (along with, you know, suing) > the defining trait of patent trolldom.

Look at Goodyear. He was an NPE. He invented vulcanized rubber. Never saw a dime. They even stole his name and built a company around it. He didn't have the resources to sue.

Look at Robert Kearns. He was an NPE. He sued. It destroyed his life.

There's no special qualification to come up with an idea. Patenting is a painful process. But it's a way to protect yourself. Just because people are involved in a lawsuit doesn't say or mean anything.

Regardless, this company is not an NPE. They have a working implementation of their secure messaging patent that is available on the app store.

> In what way is it "doing harm" to the patent system?

It's doing harm by framing inventors as villains rather than innovators. You've judged this company based on no other information than that they are referred to as patent trolls in an online article. If it's that easy for a large company to quell innovators, then the purpose of patents in the first place - to foster innovation - is gone.

\--- Regardless the verbiage is frequently inappropriate and certainly in this instance.</comment></comment></comment>


Why is Stripe hiring a Recruiting Engineer? - <AUTHOR>

Does it sound like a fancy name for "HR Manager" or "Internal HR Sofware Developer" just to me? A separate "recruitment engineer" will always be detached from the core product development, he won't be able to understand the actual daily problems and challenges present in the core team, he won't understand its spirit.
Yes, you may want to build an internal application to improve the recruitment process, sure - there is always plenty of room here for a change. But does it need a separate engineer? Wouldn't it be a great side project for a few people from the core team? And who would like to become a "recruitment engineer" building some side application of second importance in a company building world-class product?
Stripe, you are brilliant as a service (BaaS), why so? <comment><USER2> So, as a member of the core team who these days spends most of my time working on recruiting, I can attest that the role you describe is very much not what we're hiring for. A recruiting engineer isn't necessarily someone who works only in the narrow recruiting box (our engineers get to work on the pieces of Stripe they prefer, but most of us have a primary focus). Instead, it's someone who is excited about solving recruiting, making it as efficient and effective as possible, and wants to spend a lot of their time doing so.

There are a lot of problems in hiring that people have traditionally regarded as unsolveable, and try to solve by throwing more people at them. It's not just a matter of building a webapp to schedule candidates. It's about defining and tracking metrics around the effectiveness of our recruiting process. It's about building tools and platforms for identifying people we'd like to work with. (There are entire startups devoted to some of these challenges, cf Interviewstreet.)

Anyway, I think that above all, anyone working in recruiting at Stripe needs to be part of the "core team". You're completely correct that someone working in recruiting who is not part of the core team just wouldn't work out well. But it's quite possible to be in this role and also be core.

</comment><comment><USER3> Perhaps in the same manner that Hackruiter (<http://www.hackruiter.com/>) works, except it's cheaper if you can get someone to do it internally.

</comment><comment><USER4> Recruitment engineer probably also means product evangelist. Someone who can sell the product and be technically competent enough to sell potential hires on why it would be interesting to join.</comment>


PageLever (YC S11) Releases PageLever Now - Realtime Facebook Analytics - <AUTHOR> http://mashable.com/2012/11/01/facebook-analytics-real-time/

<comment><USER2> This looks really cool. I don't use Facebook much, and didn't know they make all this data available. But what prevents Facebook from implementing this functionality themselves?

<comment><USER3> There is no technical barrier stopping facebook from doing this, however Facebook stands to gain much much more in promoting an ecosystem for companies such as ourselves to exist. They traditionally haven't encroached on this space.

<comment><USER4> Have we learned nothing from Twitter. FB's ad revenue model is still in its infancy, so I wouldn't assume any part of _their_ ecosystem is safe.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I don't think I've read a Mashable article about a startup in a long while. Really interesting company though, Google won't compete with this and it's a huge market. Facebook is the internet to a large percentage of the population.

</comment><comment><USER6> My first thought was they need to charge more than $99/month. People who need this kind of realtime data would pay for it. Great job

</comment><comment><USER7> Really cool to see these kind of social analytics programs - but how do you compete with Google?

<comment><USER8> Not sure what you mean here.

Do you mean when will we offer G+ analytics, or confusing us with website analytics? (we measure social media)

<comment><USER9> It seems the confusion comes from this part of the article:

> "Google started providing real-time analytics to page managers last > September."

This makes it sound like Google has real-time _facebook page_ analytics tools, but that isn't the case. Google started providing real-time analytics for _websites_ using its analytics platform. Not Facebook analytics.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Congrats dudes. This looks awesome!</comment>


RequestMappingInfoHandlerMethodMappingNamingStrategy - <AUTHOR> https://docs.spring.io/spring/docs/current/javadoc-api/org/springframework/web/servlet/mvc/method/RequestMappingInfoHandlerMethodMappingNamingStrategy.html <comment><USER2> I didn't know why ycombinator is not responsive anymore until I saw this title :(

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> This is nuts.</comment>


Introducing the free Microsoft R Client - <AUTHOR> http://blog.revolutionanalytics.com/2016/07/microsoft-r-client.html <comment><USER2> I am no closed to understanding what this is. Everything listed here is already part of Microsoft R Open and the client is just standard RGui: [https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-r/install-r- clien...](https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-r/install-r-client- windows)

<comment><USER3> The rx algorithms are not part of MSFT R Open, but they are severely restricted in this, so I kinda fail to see the point of having it. Perhaps someone from the team can chime in and explain the reasoning behind this?

<comment><USER4> I'm guessing it is primarily aimed at getting people used to the interfaces/differences/quirks of using RevoR scaler functions.

Will it do so? I dunno. I'm a fan of simplification. If it's resource limited I'd argue there more motivation in just sticking with the popular base R implementations and not over complicate things or tie your self to a proprietary product. Sas also offers a kind of "free" version cut down/restrictive, and I don't find I use that much either, because the restrictions (virtual machine, non-EG interface) make me rarely ever want to use it.

Both companies have the challenge of how to keep themselves relevant and reach people to teach their wares in a world where they similarly try to restrict access to their products. Revor has some advantage in this sphere, given the availability and use of regular r,but there are implementation quirks and rough edges around the fact that they're trying to get R to do some things it really wasn't designed to do from the ground up.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Christ almighty, why not just use SAS at that point. Ross Ihaka was so disappointed by Revolution's value-subtracted offerings that he disowned the entire R project.

<comment><USER6> Isn't SAS better than R?

<comment><USER7> I used SAS in graduate school and I don't ever want to touch it again.

<comment><USER8> To be fair I use R every day and cannot wait for Julia or Python to catch up so I can abandon the monstrosity.

<comment><USER5> You may be waiting for a while. The thing that R has going for it is documentation. The thing it has going against it is the monstrosity of the language implementation.

Julia is nice if you're coming from Matlab. And it sure as hell is more efficient than R or Python. But the libraries just aren't there yet. I went to implement dropout regularization a while back (a year or two ago?) and there were just so many things that I take for granted in R and Python that were completely missing. I mean, yeah it's fun to write your own SGD implementation... Once... Per lifetime...

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> Microsoft offers full featured and unrestricted developer edition or Revolution R through their Dev Essentials program.

(don't change it MSFT, please!)

</comment><comment><USER9> In case you use Visual Studio and want to write some R code, VS now has a free+oss plug-in for it:

RTVS v0.4 video overview: [https://youtu.be/k1_6XLyhHbo](https://youtu.be/k1_6XLyhHbo)

Docs: [http://microsoft.github.io/RTVS-docs/](http://microsoft.github.io/RTVS- docs/)

</comment><comment><USER10> Reading the article, rx* feels to me like embrace and extend, or am I misguided?

</comment><comment><USER11> Microsoft was at the 2016 UseR conference, they're presentation 'How Microsoft uses R presentation' was a complete sales pitch.

<comment><USER3> Uhm... it is meant to be? Oracle and Teradata did the same thing. They paid for it.

<comment><USER11> The session was supposed to be how they use it not how other companies can use it by paying for it

<comment><USER3> The session was called "R at Microsoft", not "How Microsoft uses R". You just had the wrong expectations.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: How was the Seattle YC meetup? - <AUTHOR>

Curious to know how it went, format, topics discussed, people you met, etc... <comment><USER2> I thought it was great. The format was very ad hoc, with people just standing around and talking. Definitely one of the better networking events I've been to. I talked to a number of YC alums and local entrepreneurs, got good feedback on a few startup ideas, and some advice on grad school. Not to mention free beer. I'll definitely have to start going to more startup/hacker events here in Seattle.

</comment><comment><USER3> From Tony Wright, a YC alum:

"Probably over 100 people came to the YC meetup in Seattle. Crazy success. Note to self: Hackers suck at RSVP'ing." <http://twitter.com/webwright/status/9666575618>

I couldn't make it, unfortunately.

</comment><comment><USER4> It was very worthwhile for me. The feedback I got on startup ideas was motivating.

It'd be great if others that attended could post here as well, if only to help me remember all the names!</comment>


Rails may be the wrong choice for your startup. - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/on-startups/9e00ebeaa932

<comment><USER2> Comparing the age of Rails to Java and PHP seems awkward, even more so since Ruby, PHP and Java all appeared in the same year - 1995.

Apart from that Rails and a handful of other frameworks that get you started quickly are a sane choice in the beginning.</comment>


Yelp buys Qype  - <AUTHOR> http://officialblog.yelp.com/2012/10/welcoming-qype-to-the-team.html

<comment><USER2> Yelp had started to pull away from Qype in the UK in 2011.

[http://www.google.com/trends/explore#q=qype%2C%20yelp&ge...](http://www.google.com/trends/explore#q=qype%2C%20yelp&geo=GB&cmpt=q)

<comment><USER3> In Germany on the other hand...

[http://www.google.com/trends/explore#q=qype%2C%20yelp&ge...](http://www.google.com/trends/explore#q=qype%2C%20yelp&geo=DE&cmpt=q)

<comment><USER4> Yelp screwed up by failing to expand its coverage outside the US for years. Qype isn't even very good, but for a long time they were the only thing around.

That means all the cool restaurants in Berlin have Qype stickers outside. And even I, a big fan of Yelp in the US in the mid-2000s, wasn't really aware that they had very slowly gone international over the past few years.</comment></comment></comment>