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My nephew wants to learn programming. What should I recommend? | rmason: There are two languages that would be a good first choice:Ruby with the Ruby On Rails frameworkCFML using the open source Railo with the CF on Wheels frameworkFollow up second language would be javascript |
SVG to PDF on a shared linux server | andrewcooke: You can use Batik - see http://xmlgraphics.apache.org/batik/#uses[edit: and that actually uses http://xmlgraphics.apache.org/fop/] |
Which bank would you recommend for a merchant account? | bishkabob: We're based in the US and use Elavon. We're also members of Costco, so we use this plan: http://www.elavon.com/acquiring/costco/. It's been a while since I've done a price comparison, but (for our needs) Elavon was cheaper than Wells Fargo and others. |
Mass SMS text message services? | drewolanoff: check out our app textPlus:
http://textPlus.comGroup text with conversation. |
Paul Graham Post on disconnecting computer | mbrubeck: http://www.paulgraham.com/distraction.html |
Free for startups, but larger companies pay: where to draw the line? | pedalpete: For private companies, I suspect you may have an issue dealing with pricing your product based on their revenue.If your product is something that multiple employees use, then it is easier to make the definition based on the number of people.You didn't really give us much to go on.
Take a look at how compani... |
How to get started with start-ups? | nreece: I would recommend you a simple three-fold approach:1. Think of an existing Web application that you like a lot2. Think of a feature it's either missing or something that can be simplified in the app3. Build a stripped-down version of the app in your spare time as a side project. Launch, gather feedback & analyt... |
Developer world Mac obsessed? | rodyancy: Apple makes the best hardware. I'm not talking about ram, processor speed, power, blah, blah, blah. I'm talking about the best integrated package, between design, specs, and OS. Apple also makes some of the best software.Developers make software that they want to run on all hardware, especially the best hardw... |
Developer world Mac obsessed? | kowen: I can't speak for anyone other than myself, naturally, but I was a very vocal Linux user until I got my first macbook and didn't have to google X-server error messages every time I did an upgrade. Getting various flavors of linux working was always exciting... and challenging and sometimes extremely frustrating.... |
Developer world Mac obsessed? | caleboller: Like kowen said, it's still a (STABLE) *nix OS, but with a beautiful, functional UI.RE: "Or is it that Mac developers are more vocal about their OS beliefs?"
The question you should be asking is what makes Mac developers so vocal about their OS beliefs? I think the answer you'll find is that they are so... |
How to get started with start-ups? | aditya: The answer depends on if you know what you want to do. If there's an idea you're passionate about, go ahead and build it.If you don't have an idea or need help building it (design, programming, business) - go work for a funded startup that pays market rate, learn as much as you can, save up some cash, network l... |
How to get started with start-ups? | wjr: Start small.Build something you`re passionate about, and go through all the phases: market research > product outline > dev/design > test > release > marketingSee what works, what doesn`t and most important have fun building it.Small projects like:
http://umbrellatoday.com/ or http://bouldr.net
are the best thing... |
How to get started with start-ups? | chrischen: You can join my startup! Flixa.tv. Indie film online distribution startup. Click on my name for email. I'm looking for a technical cofounder. |
How to get started with start-ups? | andyjdavis: Build something/anything and put it on the web. It almost doesn't matter what. Aim for something where you can build a kind of working version in a week or two. Do NOT launch into 6 months of development before making it public as your initial ideas will almost inevitably be wrong.If you get no users, why? ... |
A competitor stole my iPhone app content — what should I do? | Padraig: We worked it out:http://padraig.tumblr.com/post/355936709/resolved |
Please review my site - A Craigslist competitor for rural areas | geoffc: I got the idea for this when I was in a rural farming community in South Africa. The farmers traded all sorts of stuff using the local bulletin board and word of mouth rather than Craigslist. They knew about Craigslist but it did not cover their area effectively. Google maps is the centerpiece of the UI so that... |
Please review my site - A Craigslist competitor for rural areas | papaf: I'm using Opera on 64 bit Linux. Despite my non-standard setup the site is beautiful and slick. I worked out how to use it instantly. Its very impressive. |
Please review my site - A Craigslist competitor for rural areas | yannis: Nice idea. However, staring on the emptiness of a map when you enter, is not such a good idea though. Suggestions: - use geolocation to get visitors id and show a map that
is closer to his area.
- if there are no ads in that region town etc, show a prompt or
two to entice the visitor to do som... |
Please review my site - A Craigslist competitor for rural areas | mahmud: Google maps might be overkill here. Not many people know what it is. |
Ask HN:Review my quick app for the socially awkward | pvg: You probably want to make registration email-free or better, require no registration so people can take a look at it easily.Also, Comic Sans? |
Please review my site - A Craigslist competitor for rural areas | andrewcooke: Hey - this is global! I just placed a note at my address in Santiago, Chile :o) Neat. I wonder if there's some way of switching language depending on the map shown? (everything on the site appears in English for me, but then I think I have my browser configured that way anyway - although Google general... |
Please review my site - A Craigslist competitor for rural areas | simonw: You need a browse interface - I hate it when sites force me to search for something (in this case, I have to type in my location) before I can get a feel for the kind of content on the site. As it was, I tried a couple of searches and couldn't find any content.Even a simple 'five most recently added items' on t... |
Please review my site - A Craigslist competitor for rural areas | Mc_Big_G: The design is simple and fantastic.My suggestions: 1) 150 characters is MUCH too short to sufficiently
describe what you are selling. I would dynamically
increase the size of the description box and/or add
scrolling inside the box to increase the character
limit.
2) The ability t... |
Please review my site - A Craigslist competitor for rural areas | flashingpumpkin: Really like the interface. Will be interesting to see once there's content ... |
Please review my site - A Craigslist competitor for rural areas | kaveri: Very nicely done. I take it this is running on Google App Engine ? (Just a guess, based on the Google Account signup).No need to market it as just for rural locations. In the UK we have Gumtree for example, which is a serious competitor to Craigslist. While I agree to some extent with the idea of Craigslist's s... |
Please review my site - A Craigslist competitor for rural areas | captaincrunch: How is it that it was able to ask me my location? Is there a GEO request header? |
Please review my site - A Craigslist competitor for rural areas | roundsquare: Small nitpick. When I entered Chicago, IL I got a bunch of entries, thats great (using beta site)! But then I tried to click on sporting events and got nothing. Something like "Sporting Events (0)" might be better.Though, if you get enough data, this may not matter. |
Ask HN:Review my quick app for the socially awkward | Tichy: It's just a mostly empty web site with a login form. Not even screenshots. |
Ask HN:Review my quick app for the socially awkward | ErrantX: this seems.... odd.No features, nothing working - just a login screenEDIT: Ah. I see... I missed the last line of instructions |
Ask HN:Review my quick app for the socially awkward | alttab: Good start. A couple things:1) If its a password field, make it a password field. Typing in a password and seeing the text is a little weird.2) When typing "@name likes blah," it becomes obvious when viewing the topics that you use @ as a delimiter and just take whatever is before it for the note, as the note w... |
Predictions for Apple's event tomorrow | amatheus: I think that, with the tablet, apple will try to redefine the computer experience for people less used to computers -- they'll try to make the computer more like the iPhone, make it simpler by dropping features.I think it will maybe run one application at a time, have no hierarchical file system, things like ... |
Ask HN:Review my quick app for the socially awkward | slig: Clickable link: http://www.chaikar.com |
Ask HN:Review my quick app for the socially awkward | spokey: This is quite minimalist but interesting. I think you might get more traction if you spent some time writing up the "methodology" or workflow you're proposing here.That is, if I understand it, I think what you're suggesting is that people use this app to take simple notes on acquaintances (e.g., "wife's name is... |
Please Review my site - Free Anonymous HTML Hosting | Frazzydee: What does anonymous mean? ie. Do you keep a log of IP addresses tied to the content uploaded, and where are the servers located? |
Rate my Startup www.birdpie.com (Updated) | traisav: An amazing website - great design and easy to use.
Incredibly helpful.
Thanks Dynamic50! |
Good books for starting functional programming? | ThinkWriteMute: Learn You A Haskell and Learn You Some Erlang |
Marketing Books for Developers? | MrMatt: Not sure about books, but read Creating Passionate Users by Kathy Sierra and Dan Russell: http://headrush.typepad.com/ |
Good books for starting functional programming? | stonemetal: I found SICP a little tough, I would either fall asleep in the easy stuff or skip so far ahead that I would be in over my head. I rather enjoyed Real World Haskell. |
Marketing Books for Developers? | tyohn: I recommend: "Management: Tasks, Responsibilities, Practices" by Peter Drucker, "Positioning: The Battle for Your Mind", by Al Ries, Jack Trout and "Re-imagine! Business Excellence in a Disruptive Age" by Tom Peters. They aren't all strictly marketing books but they are awesome as well as informative. |
Marketing Books for Developers? | javery: I would start with the Purple Cow and Free Prize Inside by Godin, they are high level but they talk about that fact that you need to make your product exceptional instead of pouring money into marketing.I would also check out Inbound Marketing by Halligan and Shah, I just got it and started it but so far it loo... |
Please review my mini startup - Web to PDF Converter | csomar: Useful for people who want to convert a webpage documentation to a PDF when no there's no download option.However, you didn't made the PDF engine yourself, and also there's another service alike, so what's the point from your service?It's a mini-app and not a mini startup!!! |
Marketing Books for Developers? | endlessvoid94: "Positioning" by Ries and Trout: http://www.amazon.com/Positioning-Battle-Your-Al-Ries/dp/007...It was THE marketing book of the 80s, and it's still extremely relevant today. It's quick read, too. |
Please review my mini startup - Web to PDF Converter | ilamont: This is great. I've attempted to make PDFs of the website I run using OS X's print to PDF function, which always screws up the background color, placement of certain boxes, comments, etc., regardless of the browser. Your service actually created PDFs that look just like the original AND are text searchable.Wha... |
Marketing Books for Developers? | tortilla: Not exactly a book, okay, a blog:http://www.copyblogger.com/ |
Marketing Books for Developers? | bhousel: Steve Blank's 4 Steps to the Epiphany is a must read for all developers and entrepreneurs. Lots of great info about creating a marketing plan that fits your product and your customers. http://www.amazon.com/Four-Steps-Epiphany-Steven-Blank/dp/09... |
Marketing Books for Developers? | mos1: Influence - The Psychology of Persuasion by Cialdini.http://www.amazon.com/Influence-Psychology-Persuasion-Busine...The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing - Violate Them at Your Own Risk!http://www.amazon.com/22-Immutable-Laws-Marketing-Violate/dp...Don't Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to We Usability, by Ste... |
Please review my site - A Craigslist competitor for rural areas | joshf: It is like Craigslist, if Craigslist actually cared at all about usability and UI! |
Please review my mini startup - Web to PDF Converter | reds: Very useful. Could you set it to spider the first X # of pages and put it all into one PDF? |
Good books for starting functional programming? | b-man: Try HTDP, Concrete Abstractions or Concepts, Techniques, and Models of Computer Programming.The * Schemer books are cool too. |
Please review my mini startup - Web to PDF Converter | CoryMathews: Great site, Love the idea and super simple interface to figure out.1 Major problem.. it does not work in Opera. |
Please review my mini startup - Web to PDF Converter | lsb: You didn't even fix the (known) wkhtmltopdf bug that all the fonts turn into DjVu Sans. What value have you added? |
Marketing Books for Developers? | solost: I recommend Crossing the Chasm. It is older but still relevan especially if you still find marketing a technology start up challenging.http://www.amazon.com/Crossing-Chasm-Marketing-High-Tech-Mai... |
Please review my mini startup - Web to PDF Converter | Mark_B: My work's internet firewall just picked up the "side benefit" of your site and blocked it for the following reason:Your request was denied because of its content categorization: "Proxy Avoidance" |
Please review my mini startup - Web to PDF Converter | flog: The HTML markup is atrocious and you just seem to be pawning the work off to another existing web service which does exactly the same thing you do (http://pdfmyurl.com/)?Am I missing something? |
Please review my mini startup - Web to PDF Converter | coffee: Looks like query strings fail, when dumping in a google search I pdf's the main Google page, not the search result:http://www.google.com/#hl=en&source=hp&q=cast+iron+c... |
Please review my mini startup - Web to PDF Converter | NathanKP: I'm afraid that I didn't find it very accurate for my own URL: http://experimentgarden.blogspot.comThe letter spacing in one of the lines was about 10-15 pixels between each letter. Also it messed up the header. |
Please review my mini startup - Web to PDF Converter | justinchen: Right now if the webpage is too wide it just cuts off. Is there any way you can resize it to fit? |
Please review my mini startup - Web to PDF Converter | devicenull: CutePDF (virtual printer that "prints" to a PDF) is usually one of the first things I install to any computer. In my opinion that is an easier solution then going to a website to print another website. |
Marketing Books for Developers? | lanceweatherby: The Green Banana Papers, Marketing Secrets For Technology Entrepreneurs is a good quick read that offers practical advice on what to do. http://bit.ly/GreenBananaPapers |
Marketing Books for Developers? | Alex3917: All Marketers are Liars, Permission Marketing, Crossing the Chasm, Positioning, 4 steps to the epiphanyThat's probably enough for a while. And if you haven't already read Getting Real then read that too. |
Please review my mini startup - Web to PDF Converter | iamdave: It's been said already: we've got plenty of these services. What we really need is a site that does this in reverse on the fly/from a URL so we don't have to wait for PDF downloads just to view a schedule of bus routes. |
Please review my mini startup - Web to PDF Converter | envitar: I like it - may not be the expert user as others though! |
please review my apps search engine: AppsVu | peterhi: Doesn't handle no results very well, it crashes.Doesn't find apps that exist such as 'kira kira' |
Please review my mini startup - Web to PDF Converter | Jim_Neath: Out of curiosity, how do you plan on monetising this? |
please review my apps search engine: AppsVu | pclark: oops: http://iphone.appsvu.com/broadersheet :) |
Please review my mini startup - Web to PDF Converter | il: The term "startup" has been misused so widely I think it's lost all meaning.
An unmonetized webapp is NOT a startup or mini-startup. |
Marketing Books for Developers? | il: Read some of the old direct response stuff from the last century. You'll surprised at how many similarities there are between direct mail and online.
-Claude Hopkins
-Robert Collier
-David Ogilvy
-Gene Schwartz
and others. |
please review my apps search engine: AppsVu | mos1: Quality of search results wasn't very high.Quantity of ads on page was quite high.Presentation made it difficult to skim the results. |
please review my apps search engine: AppsVu | tjoozeylabs: Honestly I would rather spend my time developing apps rather than a site that shows peoples apps that have been developed already. |
please review my apps search engine: AppsVu | Jim_Neath: Looks odd when viewed on a large screen.I'd personal make it 100% width or at least center it. |
How do I get Gmail to display 2 different accounts on one page? | pvg: Forward from one to the other. Use filters, labels, colours to make the messages visually distinct, by source, if you need to. |
Please review my mini startup - Web to PDF Converter | crocowhile: I think the only way this can be useful is if you code a bookmarklet. The only thing I normally print as PDF from the web are receipts and confirmations. |
Please review my site - A Craigslist competitor for rural areas | m311ton: I don't quite get it. I arrived at the site and didn't know what to do. You might want to add some visual clues that better explain what the user should do. Good start though I think you could do well with this, even focusing on more than just rural areas. |
please review my apps search engine: AppsVu | jfarmer: Remove the ads. Your goal should be to become the standard way people search for apps. Once you do that the business model is obvious (thanks, Google!): app developers pay for ads on the search result page.First, focus on search quality (precision/recall). Your results right now are awful. http://iphone.app... |
What is Facebook "Un Named App"? | meilin: www.kicksaike1.com sells Nike Air Force 1, <a href="http://www.kicksnike1.com/>Nike Shoes</a>, Top quality Nike Air force ones and <a href="http://www.kicksnike1.com/>Nike Air Force 1 sneakers</a>, Nike Air Force 1 special! |
Thoughts on CMS business | icey: Unfinished software in a crowded space? Sounds pretty risky to me. Are you getting a smoking deal on it? |
What is Facebook "Un Named App"? | jmount: Another take: http://geekdrop.com/content/facebook-spybot-how-to-remove |
How to get started with start-ups? | sugarcode: One option you have is to look at portfolio companies for the major VC's to see if they are looking for developers and are tackling problems that are interesting to you. Some examples:http://jobs.sequoiacap.com/
http://www.usvp.com/
http://jobs.kpcb.com/This would get your foot in the door of the "world of ... |
Please review my mini startup - Web to PDF Converter | robk: Were it not for the nofollows on the links, I'd guess this was a shill just to get a link on a site that would later be turned into an all-ads site, or a PDF affiliate site. There seem to be quite a few PDF software affiliate programs if you Google "PDF affiliate." |
Thoughts on CMS business | yannis: What is involved with the 10%? Is it a PHP/MySQL? Sounds risky to me mainly from a time point of view. Can you give us a bit more info on why the backend is such a great deal? I mean you can easily get that with open source such as Drupal. |
Book recommendations on strong AI | markan: You might find this list helpful: http://markan.net/agilinks.html |
Please review my app spillbound.com | dan_sim: I like design but it's not something that I would personaly use. Great work! |
Marketing Books for Developers? | dbreunig: Would anyone be interested in organizing a meetup with a panel of tech marketers to answer questions or share case-studies with hackers? Could be a fun event. Let me know and I'll dredge up some talent from my home here in the ad industry... |
Thoughts on CMS business | synnik: My first startup was a CMS product in 1998. At the time, it was a terrific space, and we did well.But by 2002, the space was filled, because CMS software just isn't that difficult to write. The factor that made it a viable business in 1998 was that most sites were still static HTML. A DB-driven site with dynami... |
Marketing Books for Developers? | systemtrigger: I dug Made to Stick. http://madetostick.com |
Marketing Books for Developers? | redsymbol: In early 2009, I got sick and tired of my incompetence with sales and marketing, and decided to learn. So I set out to learn, even if it meant sacrificing coding for a while.Marketing (and its cousin, sales) has many facets, perhaps surprisingly many, with significant differences among them. Just like comp... |
Please review my app spillbound.com | Vindexus: "Share secrets that launch and expire."I'd probably reword that. I wasn't sure what "launch" meant. At first I thought it was submitted to news sites and blogs and twitter automatically.The UI is pretty good though.Question: How do I see a list of secrets?Right now all I can do is create my own secret, I can'... |
Marketing Books for Developers? | JangoSteve: Not a marketing book per se, but probably the book that has had the most profound effect on my marketing efforts (and the way I communicate in general) is Made to Stick by Chip and Dan Heath.Another good book I'd recommend is Hot Button Marketing by Barry Feig.I've read quite a few others, but none that rea... |
Will you buy an iPad? | osipov: No. Wait and see until the next generation. |
Marketing Books for Developers? | limist: One of the best high-level but still applied and applicable books on marketing I've found is "Zag: The Number One Strategy of High-Performance Brands" by Marty Neumeier.The author writes well, gives usable structure and advice, and walks you through his 17 step process to develop your marketing strategy, from t... |
Please review my mini startup - Web to PDF Converter | JangoSteve: --edit--I didn't realize this service is just repackaging an existing service, so perhaps the following feedback should be directed to the people doing the actual service.--end edit--Aside from the point that I'm not sure how this constitutes a startup in any way (taken with a grain of salt; "there's no way... |
Will you buy an iPad? | earl: So buy one anyway. Use it for a month. Worst case is you sell it on craigslist for $50 less than you paid and your expenses are the $50 discount and $30 for the unlimited, no contract, data fee. |
Please review my mini startup - Web to PDF Converter | CWuestefeld: What's with this insatiable desire to build PDF converters and video converters these days? Isn't the market sufficiently saturated with both?It may be that both of these are easy to build solutions for, because they're well-defined and not too technically challenging (given the tools available). But that ... |
iPad & "YCRFS 5: Development on Handhelds" | wmf: What if you edit locally and run in the cloud? Why not double down on that lock-in? |
Please review my site - A Craigslist competitor for rural areas | jdunck: Distribution is your main problem. How do people know about you? Find a way to piggy back or bootstrap or get word-of-mouth.See also:
http://cdixon.org/2009/08/25/six-strategies-for-overcoming-c... |
Cases where software patents have prevented progress? | drallison: I would direct the student to the working Paper by James Besser and Eric Maskin, Sequential Innovation, Patents, and Imitation, which builds an economic argument against software patents. It and other relevant papers on software patents are available at
http://www.researchoninnovation.org/. |
How do I get Gmail to display 2 different accounts on one page? | Travis: Couple of different options. There is a FF addon called gmail addon that makes it easy to switch. You could do the "forwarding" route which resends the email to your master account. You can add accounts to your gmail account, which will fetch via IMAP/POP3 all the emails from one to the other. However, the ... |
iPad facts thread ? | wmf: Just read Apple's Web site. I don't see the point of duplicating that information on HN. |
iPad & "YCRFS 5: Development on Handhelds" | gills: The ergonomics are still going to be horrible crouching over that thing for hours on end. It may be possible but it sounds painful. |
Statistics for Programmers | lambda: I tried asking this question on Stack Overflow a couple weeks ago. I got some good answers, though I don't feel like I got one really definitive answer. Anyhow, I'd recommend reading through that thread to see if anything leaps out at you.http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2039904/what-statistics-s... |
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