skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
How would you promote your new site?
I have a new site fictionthis.com, which is intended as a social community driven (read web 2.0) site. I am trying to promote it as I think it can be quite interesting, but I am having some trouble doing it, if anyone has some suggestions please reply.
Duplicity provides incremental backups; it doesn't provide snapshotted backups. Snapshotted backups are the "best of both worlds" between full backups and incremental backups -- you get the semantics of full backups (each individual backup can be restored or deleted without touching the other backups) along with the efficiency and performance of incremental backups (if only a few files have changed since your last backup, taking a new backup is very fast).

It may be that duplicity is adequate for your needs, but I did consider it before I started writing tarsnap, and decided that duplicity wasn't good enough for me.
nytimes.com busts out of the frame.
You can do incremental backups using tarsnap if you really want, using the --newer-mtime option (tarsnap can do anything that tar can do); but you don't actually want that. Tarsnap automatically does snapshotted backups (I posted some explanation of the difference a few minutes ago in http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=183213) -- so all you need to do is tell tarsnap that you want to create another backup archive, and it will magically avoid storing multiple copies of the same data.
best decision we have made. YC takes away the distractions and responsibilities of daily life, which allows you to focus on building a product -- all while sharing the experience with great people.
If this is your first startup, then it's definitely worth it.

We weren't 100% sure going in, but coming out can say it was absolutely the right move.
If your business is ad-supported, you'll need hundreds of thousands of uniques per month to start making any money.

Which means that building such product is the easiest and (by far) the cheapest part. Promoting something consumer-oriented, building your brand, attracting those visitors will cost you hundreds of thousand of dollars, millions even.

The rule of "build it and they will come" does not apply to consumer-targeted internet-entertainment business. Media businesses require either lots of luck, or massive investments into PR (and still some luck). Digg, Reddit, TechCrunch, even CNN - they all had some "lucky event", something out of their control, which contributed to their boost in popularity. Technology takes the back seat, unless you have something truly groundbreaking, like Google had.

Sorry to deliver the bad news, but your $50K are irrelevant, find some well-connected people to support you. Reddit wouldn't have happened without Paul's PR machine.
Does anyone else here dislike automated unit testing?

Where I work, we have unit tests that are all hand-coded. Even with that, it takes half an hour to run through the full suite - too long to do on any minor change, but still manageable when preparing a sandbox for checkin.

If we added in automated tests, we would have many times the number of tests, with a corresponding increase in the time taken to make them run. If you can't run unit tests quickly, their value is reduced.

I personally feel that a well-designed test framework should test all of the common use cases, some obvious edge cases, and should be easily adaptable so that when bugs are found, you can readily create a unit test that reproduces the bug, preventing regression.

I'm curious as to how others here decide which unit tests to write.
No complaints. We heartily recommend it. (Virtualmin winter 07)

I believe the three months was worth the equity, and we're still able to call on them when we need some advice or an introduction. My only hesitation in recommending YC to any relatively inexperienced entrepreneur would come from the increasing size of the programs...but I'm a serious introvert and I don't like crowds, so I might be judging the impact it has incorrectly.

But, it's hard to argue that YC doesn't have a very real positive impact on the companies it funds. The success rate, given how early they invest, is quite high so far, and the biggest successes are yet to come.
Ask YC: How do you deal with external urls?
Yesterday our team had a lengthy discussion/debate on whether to let users navigate to new pages within an existing tab/window OR open new tabs/windows for external urls. We weren't able to come to a consensus. Hence this question!

The Social News feature we are building for the niche market contains external urls. And we also have other features in the pipeline, that may or may not have external urls. Hence the dilemma!

What do you guys think about this classic web usability problem?
Cory Doctorow: Think Like a Dandelion
At 1st Twitter seems so stupid, but time and users have shown otherwise! It's a substitute txt messenger, a way to instantly survey the crowd, a journal of your life and great for researchers, marketers/branders, as well for emergencies!
> it's proprietary and unstandardized, unlike email or phone numbers where it doesn't matter as much what network you are on, you can still make and receive messages.

That's the thing that bugs me about Twitter.. It's essentially just another walled garden. But that aside, maybe the model is cool, and a good way to follow friends and acquaintances. So is anyone creating open/unwalled pub-sub software that anyone can use on any server for a similar purpose?
TuneWiki’s iPhone-Like Media Player for Android
In general, the safe choice is to open a link in the same window. I can use the middle mouse button to open the link in a new tab if I want, or I can just click on it, read the contents, and press Back. If you make the link always open in a new tab/window, my options are more limited, and I have to close the tab/window when I'm done, then hunt through my tabs to find your site again and continue reading.

I say "in general", because there might be specific use cases where a new tab/window makes more sense. Maybe you expect the user to want to keep both windows on the screen, or maybe you expect the user to spend a lot of time or drill down deep on the external page. It's hard to say without knowing more, but for a regular social news site, my personal preference is for same window.
I hate it when links force a new browser window or a new tab. Users are smart enough to hold down shift or control when they click to get a new window or tab, aren't they? Why not have an option people can choose to have external links open in a different window or tab?
Usability-wise, it seems fine. I'm not sure how useful it is, though. What's the value of sifting through six different sets of search results, as opposed to just using Google? If I don't see what I'm looking for on the first page of Google results, I'm more likely to click through to the second or third (or sixth) page than I am to switch to a different search engine, even if the switch is as simple as changing tabs.
History's Worst Software Bugs
Social News is one of the features as I mentioned and for some users it might qualify as just a Social News site based on the way they adopt it but for others the Social News feature might be one of the features they will end up using. Our problem is how do we identify the least common denominator without having to do extensive A/B testing?
Here's how we do it.

http://domain.opendns.com/thejack.humboldt.edu

With the icon... and some text.
Umm, this is a loan. I assume you'll need to pay it back whether or not you succeed?

If you're the sole bread winner for your family, then potentially accumulating a ton of debt is not something to be done lightly.

Test your idea, whatever it may be, before taking the loan.
My site's still pretty small but I've got 1800 registered users, an upper limit of around 300 active ones, and 10 to 15 using the site at peak times.
Never open windows in a new window. Users know how to click the back button if they want to come back to your site they will. I also believe its not part of WC3 validation.
Never open a new window automatically - let the user middle-click.
I'd say only do it if you are targeting an unsophisticated audience. Computer savvy users can handle their windows themselves, but a lot of people can't.
Yeah I get it, Steve Jobs is our savior. If only he would get his way, we would all get free iPods AND free music.

I think Apple probably had to introduce DRM to be able to make a deal with the music industry. At least I remember Steve Jobs proclaiming that DRM is bad later on - he could simply have changed his opinion in alignment with customer wishes, though. But to think that they would love to give us the music for free goes a bit too far.

Also, afaik the "DRM-free" music on iTunes still has DRM: it is signed with your name. So you can copy it freely on your own devices, but you can not sell it on ebay. The ebay factor is something I still don't see factored into the prices for online music (it should be cheaper than CDs, because I can sell a CD once I get tired of it).
worth it. Check the 1/(1-x) equation (where x is percent equity given away and the result is the percentage of additional value that must be provided to make giving up that equity make sense) usually with YC this is 1/(1-.06) which is ~6.4%. YC easily provides that value. (jamie - snaptalent - winter 08)
New iPhone SDK & Firmware released
what's an "mm"? mega millions? :D
Robot Learning Through Imitation: Teaching a Robot to Cook
Do it.

Worst case scenario, you'll learn a lesson or two the hard way. But they're going to be some pretty great lessons, and you're going to meet some pretty great people along the way. (MightyQuiz, winter 08)
MM is actually just millions ... it's a weird Roman numeral thing.
He should be ok, the editors are relatively benevolent.
I haven't met any YC company that had regrets. Its not really the kind of experience one can regret.
No, mm is the internationally recognised scientific unit for millimetres. A mega-million would be denoted by a single capital M. Of course, this raises the question of the use double capital M.
Sounds like you've got great test coverage, but the length of time it takes to run them is diluting their value, making you reluctant to run them as often and concerned about adding more.

Maybe you could offload/parallelize the test runs -- eg to a on-demand virtual hosting -- so as to minimize test run time as an issue?
MM in roman numerals would be 2000
MM in Roman numerals is 2000. Perhaps the double M is to distinguish between mille (1,000) and million (1,000,000). Cue discussion about short and long form billions and use of dots and commas as numeric seperators.
Well, it depends what you are searching for it may not be the right tool for every job, but neither is google. There are certainly situations where multiple engines are useful. Try out the craigslist group for an example, or the Library group.
Which is why I suggested a "guideline", instead of a hard-and-fast rule. I'm not trying to remove programmer judgment from the equation; I'm just suggesting that there are some guiding principles that can be offered (and can be said to be more than simply matters of personal preference.)
1) Well, whats new is the ability to create your own groups, and add any search engine you want. I have seen some sites that are similar but never specifically for search.

2) I do find the site useful, and imagine others will to. Granted the iframe tag is not exactly new technology, however I don't think good ideas necessarily need to re-invent the internet. As for the $6 no comment...
A nice piece. I'm not sure why some people find the notion that the object model is usually different from the database model so difficult to understand or accept. I've seen more than one project tie itself in knots trying to write application code directly off the database model of the domain, rather than creating an appropriate object model.
Several exceptions to this.

For example, links received in email, if you view the email via a webmail client gmail for instance, and click on the link, it will open in a new window.

I think it depends on the % of users that will want to go back to your app after looking at the link. And with ajax type apps, the back button just doesn't cut it.
This is very intriguing... haven't seen these downmod scores since the teenwag sockpuppets.
A meta-suggestion: avoid lengthy discussions about such issues. Pick one option quickly, then run experiments to test whether the alternative improves your relevant metrics. Some issues are too small to invest time in trying to find 'consensus' without hard data.

On the issue directly: the web default is to open links in the same window. Opening new windows is in Jakob Nielsen's list of the top ten very worst web design mistakes†. (It's #9 as of his 2007 update.) So skip the discussion, go with that, and later run some tests comparing stay-in-page with open-new-window on whatever metric is important to you. (Page views? Non-annoyed users? Return visits? etc.)

† http://www.useit.com/alertbox/9605.html
This is an over-rated post telling us about a problem that only exists in the ignorant.
It's cut from the same cloth as all the misinformed "Twitter's Dropping Rails!" posts
and I'd expect better from the voters on HN.

Cross Platform Software Distribution is a challenge for any language/technology. I guess the upvotes for this submission do not imply readers here agree with the viewpoint on Ruby given in the article, but rather think it is an interesting topic worth discussing. (I might be completely wrong in this assumption)

I am an active user of Ruby, and agree with you that the author is making over generalized sweeping statements such as:
"yet it's the standard, recommended practice in the Rails community, because it makes it easy to "guarantee" behaviour in a given environment"

There is no silver bullet for software distribution in any particular language. One has to be smart and pragmatic enough to weigh in the pros and cons of static linking/vendoring in their particular case, and then take a wise decision on it.
When the fall is all that’s left
I think that this is somewhat dependent on the sort of site you're looking at. Total user engagement and usage patterns are going to be different on a news site is going to be different than on a social networking site.

In any case, on a fledgling social media (i.e. focus on sharing/remixing audio/video/images) that I built for a client, the current user registration is just shy of 2,000. The number of users who have posted anything is ~700. The number of users who have posted in the last 30 days is ~350. The number of users who have posted 3 or more items in the last 30 days is ~100. The number of users who have commented on a post in the last 30 days is ~150.
Heh, I just realized I never answered the concurrency issue. The all-time peak for concurrent users was about 45. More typical is 15. However, there is a live audio stream associated with the site which probably tends to encourage more concurrency.
So sick. The scale of that is incredible. Facebook and MySpace don't make that much together in a year...

And somehow this company is only worth $2B?
I wonder what Rockstar would do with a persistent GTA universe a-la WOW.
Simple logic: Steve Jobs is god, therefore Apple can't be evil. Hence the fault must lie with the other guys.
brackup?
This is why learning a new programming language is good. As is learning anything that forces a different way of doing things.

Interesting that the article mentions changing "which thumb is up." When I was a kid a decided to switch from right thumb up to left, and now it's the only way I do it, and the opposite feels awkward. So on many lateral dominance tests I show up as left-handed, but I'm fully right-handed.

I also never knew "kaizen" was so much of a technique than a word that just means "improve for the better," nor do I recall it being used specifically as a name of a technique. Not so sure if the article really had to introduce a foreign language to seem more mystical: this is age old wisdom.
God, I don't think I'd ever leave the house, that would be much better than real life.
Ask YC: Would you rather have 1,000 True Fans, or 1,000,000 casual users?
So we've probably all read over Kevin Kelly's idea of 1,000 True Fans - I'm putting up a link to one of his posts on the subject here:

http://www.kk.org/thetechnium/archives/2008/04/the_reality_of.php

So, the question to you all: would you like to have only 1,000 'True Fans' of 1,000,000 'casual users'?

I'm calling the fans those who would pay to use your site, maybe once a year or once every couple of years, and communicate directly with you about your business. The more passive 'casual users' would use your service for free and communicate very little with you, if at all, about your business.
Twitter frees Blogs from all unimportant and trivial stuff like "i arrived at SF", "i unpacked my new iPhone", "i'm back from vacation" etc. and thus separates personal stuff from the actual topics of a Blog.
Ask YC: What do you use for automated testing?
I found Sahi (http://www.sahi.co.in) for this purpose. I wonder if there is something better around...
brackup?

I'm not sure exactly what you're asking here... but I'll try to answer some of the questions which you might be trying to ask. :-)

Yes, I am aware of brackup. Yes, brackup appears to do snapshotted backups. No, tarsnap is not brackup. Yes, there are some similarities in the implementations. Yes, I believe that tarsnap is superior to brackup; there are several reasons for this, including being better at recognizing unmodified data within modified files. There are also several other points where I believe that tarsnap is likely to be superior to brackup, but I haven't read enough of the brackup code to be certain exactly how brackup does everything.

If that doesn't answer your question... could you elaborate a little bit about what you'd like to know? (Maybe two words instead of one...)
From the source, man:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usury#New_Testament

As I pointed out again and again, they accept it today for convenience.
Don't override the default - even if it seems broken it may be required for compatibility. To paraphrase Tim Berners-Lee, fix your client, not the web.
How about splitting your tests into a fast smoke test and a long test suite? You could run the smoke test before checking in. You could set up a continuous build system that would build with your latest changes, launch the long-running test suite, and email you the results.
Whoo! More people proving Greenspun's Tenth Rule.
Ten year olds - yes. A few years older - I'm not so sure. Take the extreme case: should someone able to vote have to? (There are 18-year olds in school, that's what I mean.)
Ask HN: an interesting promotion tool for startups?
Reminds me at the million-dollar-homepage... Could this be a useful inexpensive tool to get traffic?
"The few organizations that enjoy long-term success are those that make unit testing part of their daily workflow."

I wish the author would elaborate on that statement. I want supporting evidence, even if it's anecdotal.
I had a fifth grade teacher who insisted that you didn't need to ask to go the bathroom. She said we were all responsible enough to just do it and there was no need to interrupt the class. Nothing bad ever happened.
$3.2 Billion WiMax Deal Goes Through.  Take Cover.
Twitter Downtown: As Bad As Everyone Says It Is
Community Software Solutions For Personalised Comparison Shopping
Rupiz Media, a prominent web development and SEM agency, flourishing under the aegis of Rupiz Infotech, a global intenet conglomerate with its offshoots in versatile verticals of e-finance, marketing, retail and many more. Operational for the past 3 years in the UK, Rupiz Media has developed more than 100 novel Web applications for a variety of e-businesses. In fact this new-found fusion of comparison sites and community feature is yet another outcome of their very own innovative streak.
In practice we run a subset of tests during development, but the current rule is that we should never checkin code that hasn't passed ALL of the unit tests. The idea being that each person is responsable for their own modifications passing all tests. If you check-in, and then get shifted onto another high priority task, and a later run of the unit tests discovers that a funky side effect from your changes breaks the unit tests, you are no longer available to fix the problem. Someone else has to do it, allowing you to escape responsability for your error. At least, that's the theory management here ascribes to...
This is probably the direction that we need to be taking. Another requirement that we have is that the code compiles without warnings for about 20 different target platforms. This takes hours, and we are currently writing a tool to parallelise those builds - we're hoping for a 20x speed increase. Maybe a similar approach could be achieved for running tests...
http://plugin.searchyc.com/
> usage patterns

Session duration will greatly influence concurrent usage. If people use your service for less than five minutes per day then 100 daily users would mostly have the system to themselves. This means that you could have thousands of registered users and grossly inefficient code without load issues.

Stop fretting about your hardware and get thousands of registered users.
Exactly. Spending more than five seconds on this (before you have data), and even worse, involving more than one person, is a recipe for fail.

People just love to argue about silly shit like this.

Homework assignment for everyone who felt compelled to chime in with their well-reasoned opinions:

http://www.bikeshed.com/
I think it would be tough to get 1M casual users without getting a lot of true fans.
In fact it could be an excellent strategy to "plant" bits like that in your documents and hope that some smart ass will find them. I'll probably do that from now on :)
As a UK business who are setting up 'the next google' what you say is painfully becoming obvious. The people with the money see us as 'too risky', basically they are really stupid.
We've had to become super sales guys just to get them to even listen to us or even read the Executive Summary!
It's a strange and bizarre journey. Great to read what you have said, it confirms what we thought.
I suppose the strategy is to focus more on Angel Investors - something we need to look at more now. www.ibodnet.com
TwittEarth
Does Take-Two has such a week at least once a year? Perhaps - yes..
Modular Innovation gets a Weave
Thanks guys much appreciated - the key thing has got to be getting through the spam filter
Wine’s Pleasures: Are They All in Your Head?
I quite liked the guidelines in that blog post. I don't do exactly that myself, but as rules of thumb they aint bad! But like a few folk have pointed out, it's about personal style, background and context.

One thing I like to do is use naming of Packages & Namespaces to tell a story about the system. So, you can look at the packages and understand what the important aspects to the system are.

Example:

- Spidering
- Feeds
- Pages
- Control

- Indexing
- Strategy
- Scheduling
- Lucene

Also, when you return to a code base years later, you can scan the namespace story to get a reminder of the key areas of the system.
Care to show the website that generated over $10K in ad revenue?
All the News That Fits (do what you're great at)
Intelligence Sayings from Brand Killer Robots!
Why oh why are we still depending on optical character recognition to tell people and computers apart? There are so many visual things people can do well and computers can't. Just look at KittenAuth! Granted, you need something with pretty bad odds for random guessing, but it seems to me people aren't thinking outside the box enough on this one.
Good for them. But I think in this situation MS typically swoops in and makes a deal with the customer (and even if it's an unprofitable arrangement, why not keep the other guy from gaining revenue and headlines?).