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Critique my concept | ErrantX: Prime candidate for a Facebook app I should say |
Rate My App (Bingo Card Creator, Now With Extra AJAX) | wmblaettler: I've enjoyed your transparency with sales figures for your downloadable app, I hope you continue the service for this new online version.I would like to add that some UI polishing would make this quite nice. More prominent call to action pushing the online version, too. |
Why Python over Ruby? | Wheat: Any popularity in Python over Ruby stems largely from the fact that Python came first.I've heard Python developer's working on a Ruby on Rails application that the problem with Ruby is that approximately equivalent to Python in terms of productivity. They wanted to use Python, but pragmatically you can't make th... |
Why Python over Ruby? | ianb: I think it's mostly about maturity, of the runtime, of the language, and of the community.For example, Ruby has backward incompatibility issues in minor releases that would never be permitted in Python. They had to jump to Python 3 for even fairly small things that wouldn't be accepted in the 2.x line. Even sub... |
Critique this idea | nickcharlton: I think - like most ideas based around rewards the value will be seen in it's worth.As a silly example; 1000 Twitter followers would not have been valuable in 2006, but in 2009 it holds a value. It's the same with HN ratings.An issue there is that new users will feel "at the bottom of the pile", and possi... |
Critique my concept | jlees: I thought the point of dating online was you didn't have to leave the computer?But seriously, isn't it just easier to.. like.. go to one of these events and meet people? You may be better off with a "I need a Plus One" kind of angle - people going to an event who want someone to go with. (I'd guess that's been d... |
Critique my concept | dmg_83: I don't usually enjoy any of the activities I suggest as ideas for "dates" in and of themselves (on the occasion I need to come up with one). I just try and think of something that is cheap, but will not seem like I chose it just because it's cheap.Do you think that people's "what-to-do" dating ideas are an acc... |
Can you help get this web app out of limbo? | asimjalis: I think you should discuss it in a public forum. If someone likes the idea so much they want to steal it, they might just steal you with it, and fund you. Also if someone wanted to steal it what would prevent them from asking you for an alpha pass and then stealing that? |
Can you help get this web app out of limbo? | aberman: How did you build it in the first place?I second the comment below. Release it, and hope that somebody likes it enough to take you to the next level.Ideas are not worth much-- all that matters is execution (your predicament is a case-in-point). If all you bring to the table is the idea, then you should give it... |
Firefox extension for real-time notifications. Where do I start? | e1ven: If users are going to have you webpage open in a tab anyway, I might suggest you take a look at Yip.http://abcdefu.wordpress.com/2009/06/09/introducing-yip-an-u...Rather than requiring a dedicated plugin, Yip uses the methods already in place for sending updates via Fluid or Prism.If you want it to live entirely... |
Selling Web Software to Government? | inerte: I am from Brazil and probably the whole process is different, but here are some of my experiences.- Most of the times a gov doesn't "buy" things directly. They open a bidding, auction, whatever is the english term. They'll put a set of requirements, and let companies bid anonymously...- There's a certain thresh... |
Rewarding Loyalty | Raphael: Reduced ads for registered users. |
What should I do with UberGoose? | joshuarr: http://www.ubergoose.com |
How do you measure fire-in-the-belly? | regycombinator: Since startups are by their natures unpredictable, what level of unpredictability will your candidates realistically tolerate? Requests for deferred compensation, for example, is a tipoff that a candidate has big company expectations that cannot be satisfied by most startups. |
Why Python over Ruby? | me_again: Most of the discussion seems to ignore the "in this space" (scripting existing software packages) part of your question.I submit that Python is more popular in this space because:- many end users will be users of the package first, and programmers very much second. In this case a very gentle learning curve is... |
Best way to redesign an existing webapp? | mahmud: 1) Don't mess with the database. Back it up, remotely.2) It's good to have a semanticly sane code base with all the common pages elements factored out into templates, but it's not a requirement. If it ain't broke.3) Involve the community. Have a poll asking your users what to fix first, and start from there.4) ... |
What should I do with UberGoose? | asimjalis: Neat. The site looks pretty good.What are some examples of things people would categorize?Who would use this? And why? Who is your target market? What age group?Could this work as a FaceBook app? |
Ask HN:How do you become a really good web designer? | revorad: Arun, I'm sure others have asked similar questions here before. So this might help:
http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&client=firefox-a...Good luck! |
Ask HN:How do you become a really good web designer? | alexkearns: The only way you are going to learn is by doing. Set yourself a challenge of creating a website design each week. Your first attempts might not be very good but, soon, you will start producing good work.It is also worth checking out design showcase sites for inspiration. www.webceme.com is my own personal f... |
Ask HN:How do you become a really good web designer? | newacc: the following links will help u a lot - good luck ...http://www.blogdesignblog.com/blog-design/25-must-buy-borrow...http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16603 |
How do you measure fire-in-the-belly? | blasdel: Anyone that rolls their eyes after you use 'mobile' as a collective noun is a good bet. |
Critique this idea | alain94040: I'm one of the founders of FairSoftware and I have been thinking about the problem you describe for 3 years now...You are on the right track, but I would suggest some tweaks.1. Why does FOSS have to be given away for free? The freedom that RMS talks about is in accessing the source code and improving it. In... |
Why Python over Ruby? | Bogdanp: http://xkcd.com/353/ I need no other reason. |
Any ideas as to why Google changed search result margins? | behe101: They also reduced the size of their logo next to the search box. |
Any ideas as to why Google changed search result margins? | jmonegro: I have no idea. If they don't change it soon I'm moving over to bing for keeps. |
Ask HN:How do you become a really good web designer? | rmc00: I've been asking the same questions lately and trying to find the answers. The problem that I've run into is that a lot of designers just feel what is right. It seems very instinctive, which makes it hard for them to pass on knowledge.One designer that I found who seems to know and actively apply principles of g... |
Any ideas as to why Google changed search result margins? | minsight: Since we don't have access to our data, and since it took them a very long time to do this, I'd guess that the reasons are more subtle than we could practically guess. It probably increases their profitability per page by some tiny fraction, which is big money with their volume. |
Any ideas as to why Google changed search result margins? | robin_reala: Well thought out gutters can make a big difference to the readability of a page, but that generally is only a big factor when it comes to pages with lots of data crammed into multiple columns; not something you’d assume would be a problem on a Google results page. My best guess is that (like the aforementi... |
Rewarding Loyalty | ScottWhigham: I think this is something we all need help with. I've done various promos - "We'll give you $x for each friend you refer" as well as "Get a free widget when you refer a friend!" These all had low, low response rates - so low, in fact, that it didn't justify the time spent coding/marketing.I wish I knew th... |
Rewarding Loyalty | fogus: I think for simplicity's sake, the badge mechanism used by StackOverflow is a nice system. That is, it plays to people's desire to be recognized by attaching flare to their account after achieving certain predetermined goals. Not only does it reward the recipient by providing some good feeling, but it encourag... |
What should I do with UberGoose? | asimjalis: Cool. Also it has a nice viral element.Could you just open it up to the world instead of keeping it behind the alpha? What's your fear? What's the worst thing that could happen?Here is why it might be a good idea to open it up. When I went to the site I liked the layout and the appearance but I didn't really... |
Selling a Startup? | michael_dorfman: Step 1: figure out who the potential buyers are. Competitors? Other's in the same industry who could find a network effect? Who would be uniquely able to extract more value out of the site than you were?Step 2: approach them. |
Selling a Startup? | vaksel: Well it really depends on your space:Competitors: as long as you have more than one, and one of them is bigger than you(to afford the $100K).Customers: if some of your customers are big in the industry you serve, one of them might pick you up.Media Companies: look around to see if there is one that lacks a webs... |
Selling a Startup? | cjlars: Bizbuysell.com is another good listing service (the biggest I think), and while they specialize in more traditional businesses, there's plenty of websites for sale there. |
Ask HN:How do you become a really good web designer? | trickjarrett: Here is a rough outline of my thoughts on what do and how to do it to really build your web developer skillset.For the front end, there are really three main components:
- HTML (make sure you learn about DOCTypes and how to make valid websites)- CSS - How to style pages, this is really a core skill these ... |
Selling a Startup? | dunk010: If you're not profitable then given the current state of the economy you're probably barking up the wrong tree. Most of the buying of startups happens in a bull market, so unless you have undeniable potential then there's a large chance that you'll be disappointed. Think of it like this: if you, the founders... |
Rewarding Loyalty | pasbesoin: I think the premise is a bit wrong. You build loyalty; rewarding it is a byproduct of building it.Back in the early days of Starbucks in Chicago, regulars were recognized by the staff. There'd be some chitchat. Apparently, cost accounting was not yet so anal retentive, and a staff member would occasionall... |
Firefox Collaborative Browsing Plugin - Good idea? | kolya3: I worked for a startup 4 years ago that started off with this very premise: enabling users to buy tickets to events in real time. The company very quickly changed focus to just being a ticket search engine, due to the assumption that the money was in helping people find the best price not shopping with their fr... |
Any Los Angeles hackers interested in a meetup? | kyro: Hey, there's a socal yc group on Facebook - 'socal.yc'. We're hoping to have a meetup some time as well. |
I have yet to do the one thing I wish before I die | SwellJoe: Unless you have other responsibilities that you haven't mentioned, like, say, a wife and children, there's no reason you shouldn't do exactly what you want to do with your life.Money, beyond subsistence, isn't really correlated with increased happiness, as numerous studies have shown. Just make sure you alwa... |
I have yet to do the one thing I wish before I die | aneesh: Test the waters with MIT OCW (http://ocw.mit.edu) and Academic Earth (http://academicearth.org) for lots of lectures & problem sets, and then make the jump if you feel that'll make you happy. |
I have yet to do the one thing I wish before I die | nanijoe: You really ought to closely examine your own motives for wanting a math degree. Having said that we usually end up regretting the things we did not do more than the things we actually did.. go for it, and if you don't like it, you can always find another job. |
I have yet to do the one thing I wish before I die | gyom: short version : If you do it full-time, don't sign up for an undergrad program to get a diploma. Get good advice (from the department) for the courses that you want to take and go for those. Don't be a fool signing up for Measure Theory before you're comfortable with calculus, though.long version :The best reason... |
I have yet to do the one thing I wish before I die | ksvs: Seems like it might be worth separating the goals "learn math" and "get degree." Presumably it's the former you want. And if so, might there not be people good enough nearby that you could hire as private tutors? If there's a university nearby there should be: grad students. |
I have yet to do the one thing I wish before I die | johnnybgoode: So you want:1) to study math
2) a degree in mathI understand #1. Why #2? |
I have yet to do the one thing I wish before I die | pj: hmm... you shouldn't because you have expectations? Do you? You say, "The thing i want to do"... why do you want to do it? What do you expect to get out of it. what is it that you really want? More knowledge? more earning potential? to be around people interested in learning? Analyze what it really is that ... |
I have yet to do the one thing I wish before I die | travisjeffery: Plan and simple do it man, pursue your goal and don't ask anyone else if you're doing it right and enjoy the journey.I'm a Math and Computer Science major and I love it. |
I have yet to do the one thing I wish before I die | ojbyrne: Find a job somewhere where there are part-time programs? |
I have yet to do the one thing I wish before I die | herdrick: If you're not married, why not? What better way to expend yourself, to spend your life?Do you have another bachelor's degree? If so, you might be able to get credit towards the masters (though perhaps credits are moot if the degree is carefully structured) when taking the undergrad math classes. |
I have yet to do the one thing I wish before I die | frossie: There is enormous satisfaction in doing something you enjoy. I agree that if you have no commitments to others (like kids) there is nothing wrong with pursuing your ambitions by ditching your lifestyle.However I should add that there are some really first-rate distance learning programmes (in particular by Can... |
I have yet to do the one thing I wish before I die | Tichy: If possible, try to think about areas of maths that interest you most and find a university that does that kind of research. |
I have yet to do the one thing I wish before I die | geezer: I know exactly how you feel.I am 29, married, no kids. I finished my undergrad in CS when I was 22. I worked as a systems software developer until last year when I quit my job and went for Masters in Statistics. I have 2 more courses left to take to get the degree.I am no fan of academia, but I came back to sch... |
I have yet to do the one thing I wish before I die | arghnoname: One thing to keep in mind if you want to get a degree in math is you might want to get through the more introductory level courses at a community college. I've done this, and in my case anyway, there hasn't been a noticeable difference, and introductory mathematics being fairly old and standard, these thing... |
I have yet to do the one thing I wish before I die | jlees: Well, I gave up my lifestyle and lived in poverty* to do a degree in maths and hated it - switched to computer science after the first year. Theoretical computer science turns me on way more than pure maths. But it firmly sounds as if you want to do it and you're willing to do it, and at 41, you've had enough li... |
I have yet to do the one thing I wish before I die | blacktastic: Why a degree?Because of all topics/areas of study, I've found math to be the most difficult to self-study. I've made some progress on my own, but having a professor/teacher and marked stepping stones in a program is best for me. I'm definitely an autodidact, but I know my limitations.What is my motivatio... |
Where is the best place to sell a domain name | chris123: Hey Pelle,You might also check out forums, such as http://domainstate.com and http://www.sitepoint.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=98.Also, http://dnjournal.com is worth a look, and possibly contact the guy who writes that, Ron Jackson, and the other guy, Richard Meyer.Funny you should mention domain names toda... |
Where is the best place to sell a domain name | jacquesm: moniker ?Pitfalls ? Yes, you could get a lot less than what you need.The best way to sell a domain is to have someone that wants it when you have it, an auction is only successful if there are multiple people that want it so it is better to go for the auctions that are well published and that have sold domain... |
Firefox Collaborative Browsing Plugin - Good idea? | growt: I often use Stumbleupon to quickly send links to a friend (but thats not sharing like you describe it).
I think such a plugin would be usefull, but I'm not shure if it could support a business (if that's what you have in mind). |
Where is the best place to sell a domain name | hellweaver666: There's some real hardcore domainers online at www.acorndomains.co.uk they have their own for sale section. You may get some action there... |
Review My App - mychipper.com | roam: Clickable: http://mychipper.com/I like it. Nice and clean, the charts are exactly what I'd need and the options to view daily and monthly reports are good. Maybe it's a bit too minimal: use a bit of a gradient on buttons, use alternate background colors for the expense list; get a bit of color in there. And I'd c... |
Review My App - mychipper.com | riklomas: I like the simplicity of your app, it's nicely done, love the logo especially! I would suggest a few things though:# Drop the bouncy effects on the summary hover as they're just distracting# Show more than just 3 recent entries, if I'm writing a list of expenses, I need to see what I've already put in# Maybe ... |
Review My App - mychipper.com | antidaily: "reason" seems like a strange entry name. item/service seems more appropriate. |
Review My App - mychipper.com | chaosprophet: The first thing that struck me was the clean, simple interface. The demo is quite nice, and viewing expenses as graphs is quite handy. Since you are aiming at making it extremely simple to use, I suggest you combine all those 4 text boxes (reason, amount, note and date) into one text and use a date time a... |
Review My App - mychipper.com | philjr: It's rounding my cash up / down to the nearest euro/dollar. Now while I could multiply by 100 to put in 751 instead of 7.51 ... I think it'd be great not to. Maybe that's the engineer in me :) |
Review My App - mychipper.com | jeroen: I started writing down some critique, but I think I can summarise: polish it. UI elements are not aligned, buttons don't work and "mm" doesn't seem like a valid entry for the month-field.Oh, and more information about your product and less asking for information (phone nr?) might make people more inclined to re... |
Review My App - mychipper.com | Stahir: Very good interface, idea, style, and flow.As for the purpose of the website, I believe it is a bit painstaking to sit and enter all the values in as anyone would on excel. This is just a better looking excel.Reason why I am saying this is that you need to help improve on the idea, perhaps have a goal chart, wh... |
Review My App - mychipper.com | asimjalis: I got a PHP error when I went to the home pageA PHP Error was encountered
Severity: Notice
Message: Undefined variable: timezone
Filename: geoip/timezone.php
Line Number: 941Otherwise it looks great. |
Alternative to Authorize.net? | jacquesm: vxsbill.com
jettis.com
epoch.comthere must be lots more... |
Alternative to Authorize.net? | aristus: I like TrustCommerce; simple, solid API and no bullshit. Also their "vault" is great for storing CC info. It's a holiday weekend in the US so don't expect miracles, though. Setting up a new payment gateway takes time. For a quick fix it's better to use PayPal until you get something better set up. |
Where is the best place to sell a domain name | bgnm2000: I've sold domains for $1K+ on Sedo - I liked their service a lot |
Review My App - mychipper.com | nbhat: Make it social. Let people compare their spending habits with other people who are in the same income category or same spending budget.
Ask questions who is the end user? Is it a person who wants to cut down on the costs or is it person who is trying to stick to his monthly budget? If so how is the user going t... |
Where is the best place to sell a domain name | serkan: The best place to sell domain names online, in my opinion, is http:/sell.your.nameThe website is designed for only domain name auctions and the best part is for a limited of time, there is no listing fee and no final value fee.They are doing very secure domain name transfers between buyer and seller with their ... |
Alternative to Authorize.net? | lrm242: Braintree has been good to work with so far. Haven't launched yet, but during the research & dev process they've been great. |
Review My App - mychipper.com | hellweaver666: seems nice so far... question though, I just signed up - why do you "require" my date of birth and sex for an expense tracking tool? |
This bot has been pounding my server all night.. anyone else? | jacquesm: iptables ?just get rid of it. I have a script that tails my logs standard to detect bots that do not respect the robots.txt file and walls them off. On a bad day there are a few hundred of them. Periodically I flush the tables to get rid of old entries so the load caused by the filter does not become too high... |
Alternative to Authorize.net? | jonknee: I know there are a lot of haters, but I've had no problem integrating with PayPal's PayFlow Pro. It's not PayPal, it's a regular payment gateway. They bought the business from Verisign a while back.I'm not involved on the business end so I'm not sure what the rates are, but the API is easy to integrate with an... |
Review My App - mychipper.com | hellweaver666: I don't get the GTalk thing... I've made friends with your bot, asked for 'help' got the instructions yet I get no feedback from the bot or any kind of reflection on my account that I've submitted anything.If it worked, the GTalk integration would be really handy for me as I have Gmail open quite a lot. |
I have yet to do the one thing I wish before I die | Ixiaus: I say go for it, don't let perceived comfort hold you back! Once summer is over, I will be Urban Camping full time and working out of a library building my startup.Two days out of the week I am dedicating to my self-education (for which I have pursued over the last four years with much fun).It's an investment, ... |
Alternative to Authorize.net? | vaksel: panicking because of random events doesn't do anyone any good. it's not like any alternative will guarantee that it doesn't happen to them either |
Review My App - mychipper.com | richesh: Good job, overall I like it. I understand your audience and the need to do this in a simple format. Mint & Wesabe are US focused and don't cater to your audience. One thought is to make this available to other audiences - e.g. Chinese, African, etc. Because similar needs exist in those places and all you would... |
Alternative to Authorize.net? | emilam: authorize.net was bought a few years back and there has been few changes to it. Some of the original developers on the authorize.net team have started mtrex. It is a similar service, but things seem to fit together better. I guess the second time around they know what they are doing. |
Alternative to Authorize.net? | merrick33: We switched to braintree from paypal at the beginning of the year - they are the most responsive payment provider I have ever dealt with. Our customer service that answers non technical questions also helped me troubleshoot some api issues I was having. |
Review My App - mychipper.com | annextourist: First up, thanks for sharing your app with Hacker News tallasif. It takes courage to bring something you made to a place where people will give honest and direct feedback.I think you've succeeded in making an app that does one small thing simply. Congrats. Simple isn't always easy.I have a usability conce... |
Objecting to stories being killed | jgrahamc: I found the story very interesting, but I agree with the removal of this story. It wasn't Hacker News, it was an interesting story about Michael Jackson. I would have been very happy to read that story on Reddit. |
This bot has been pounding my server all night.. anyone else? | apinstein: Nutch is evil. It's a bot-making tool. I set up my sites to block all Nutch UA's via mod_rewrite. |
Objecting to stories being killed | pj: Aren't submissions killed through flagging? It's the community that kills posts, rather than the moderators. I haven't looked at the code, but I think it's something that is automatic. Some clarification on that?Preface: I love meta-conversation. It's like introspection and from introspection, there is growth...... |
Objecting to stories being killed | xenophanes: "I concur with the value of keeping meta-discussion on HN to a minimum, but" decided to post a thread of pure meta-discussion. Are you sure you concur with that value? |
Objecting to stories being killed | colins_pride: When 10% of HN really likes a submission, it goes to the frontpage. Then if 10% of HN really dislikes it, the submission gets killed.That some stories then get un-deaded is testimony to the faultiness of the system. |
Objecting to stories being killed | pg: If a story has enough flags, that alone will kill it, without moderator intervention. I just added a point threshold to prevent this happening to stories that have received a significant number of votes. |
Alternative to Authorize.net? | thesubjective: imeem.com used cybersource (authorize.net) for micro-transactions awhile back and the API was pretty straight forward. Support was very responsive. International payments is a whole other game. |
Objecting to stories being killed | occam: There's also politically correct censorship going on, amazingly. This morning I submitted this: http://isteve.blogspot.com/2009/07/medias-bias-toward-englis... . It was dead on arrival, marked [dead] immediately, presumably because that blogger is "divisive" and "racially insensitive". Please read that and ju... |
This bot has been pounding my server all night.. anyone else? | eli: mod_security for the win. I think its "Core" ruleset blocks Nutch by default. |
I have yet to do the one thing I wish before I die | iterationx: I wish I had got a degree in Math, College will give you structure and force discipline. You can get fit on your own at the gym, but if you go to boot camp its much easier. 1 vote for college! |
Alternative to Authorize.net? | jonah: I have experience with Auth.net and generally have been happy with them.That being said, I also like VeriFone's offerings - very powerful and their rates are really good.I've also used PayPal's Website Payments Pro and Payflow Pro - good experiences there as well. |
Alternative to Authorize.net? | pmikal: Auth is nothing more than a gateway, ie, hosted software. There are numerous gateway software available which you can run yourself and connect directly to your merchant acquirer.Many might want to consider Chase Paymentech, the largest acquirer, whom you can directly connect with. Paypal runs their credit and p... |
I have yet to do the one thing I wish before I die | blacktastic: I want to thank you all for the encouragement. I did not expect it. I thought people would say I'm too old and it is too late. |
How would you fix healthcare? | sarvesh: Option 1 although good it probably won't fly well. The first step to cleaning up the existing mess it to stop rewarding doctors based on the number procedure they apply on a patient to cure them in medicare. That is probably the most insane healthcare practice and I don't think it is done anywhere else in the ... |
Alternative to Authorize.net? | systemtrigger: I am considering amazon fps for a project mostly because I'm using several other aws services and am comfortable hacking with those. I haven't had a merchant account before so I wonder with fps what advantages I'd be missing over authorize.net, braintree or paypal. |
Review My App - mychipper.com | schindyguy: I'm not sure if anyone else mentioned this, but I think the "Chipper now on Mobile" and "Chipper now on Gtalk" is a great feature but I only realized what it did after I clicked on it. You should make the user understand that now "you can submit expenses to your mychipper account with Gtalk and Mobile SMS".... |
How would you fix healthcare? | russell: I have had to deal with third world programmers. I am not particularly interested in entrusting my life to the medical equivalent. US students are free to go to their med schools but prefer US schools because the quality of the education is so much higher.The US has excellent health care, but there are two p... |
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