Hacker News Reader

bazookaaaon Ask HN: anyone using the new MacBook Air as your main development machine?

If I'm able to use a Dell mini 10v as my primary web and Xcode development machine, I'm positive you'd be just fine on an Air. ;)

bazookaaaon One Night Of Sleep Not Enough To Make Up Deficit

Interesting... I just started a biphasic sleep schedule (4.5 hours of sleep from 1:00 to 5:30, and then 1.5 hours of sleep from 19:00 to 20:30) but now I'm wondering if the cost will outweigh the benefits.

bazookaaaon Normalize Android: Turning off HTC Sense UI on the HTC EVO 4G, Incredible, etc.

I have, and I hate it. Here is a good article I share the same thoughts with: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1330600

bazookaaaon Normalize Android: Turning off HTC Sense UI on the HTC EVO 4G, Incredible, etc.

Seriously? Thank you for letting me know; I was going to get an Evo on the 4th but not after learning this. I'm glad I didn't find this out after purchasing.

bazookaaaon What it feels like to fail

Thank you! That's amazing about your TOEFL vs. Lenguajero revenue. My site is http://soshiku.com and my submission to HN is http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=315281 (submitted ~19 months ago, yikes).

bazookaaaon What it feels like to fail

I've been feeling the same way about my startup, which has almost 17,000 users but only a small amount of them are paying customers (launched a paid plan a few months ago). I keep wanting to ask myself how much longer I should give it to see if it reaches profitability, or should I just shut it down? Anyway, right now I'm creating a survey for the paying users to be able to tell what they like/don't like about the paid plan. I also plan on doing a referral program that benefits both parties (I did get both of those ideas from a slideshow about a startup and their freemium model, forgot which). Keep those ideas in mind if you ever plan on introducing any paid plans and good luck.

bazookaaaon Google Closure: How not to write JavaScript

Oh, sorry about that. I thought HN would've directed me to a duplicate while submitting.

bazookaaaon Vimium - the hacker's browser

Wow, this is amazing and I'm now using Chrome fulltime. Anything to not have to use the Dell mini 10v's trackpad with OS X. ;)

bazookaaaon Ask HN: A subscription/recurring billing service that just works. Any ideas?

I highly recommend http://spreedly.com. Has a great API and recurring billing is built-in so you don't need to pay extra for it on PayPal or Authorize.

bazookaaaon Ask HN: What programming language are you currently learning?

Objective-C. Quite a big jump from Ruby. :)

bazookaaaon Announcing Patron: a Ruby HTTP client library

I don't see any difference with this and HTTParty (besides having to install libcurl).

bazookaaaon Ask HN: Review my mini-app. Easily validate all the (X)HTML pages in a website.

An extremely useful tool. Thank you so much.

bazookaaaon Palm Pre Review

Yep, and don't forget: Sprint themselves are contemplating dropping the mail-in rebate in favor of an instant one (according to Gizmodo).

bazookaaaon Ruby style guide

This is the second time in the past few days I've been told to use two spaces instead of tabs. Can anyone provide any insight as to what difference this makes?

bazookaaaon [dead]

The popular (and free) thing to do is to use SMS gateways (such as sending an email to <number>@txt.att.net). See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SMS_gateways

And in the future: http://searchyc.com

bazookaaaon Beyond the API: Why Companies Should Have a Presence on All Major Platforms

I'm tempted to add an API to my web app, and create cool little things such as an AIR app, Facebook app, widgets for iGoogle, et al. even though there's been little demand for an API. I'm wondering if creating all these things would extend the reach of my site, or should I not bother.

bazookaaaon If programming languages were religions

"Ruby - A mixture of different languages and ideas that was beaten together into something that might be identified as a language."

Is that really true? I've never heard anything like that about Ruby. It does, however, sound very much like PHP. From the PHP FAQs:

"Much of [PHP's] syntax is borrowed from C, Java and Perl with a couple of unique PHP-specific features thrown in."

bazookaaaon Ask HN: what tunes are you working to at the moment?

Crystal Castles. And Yelle, thanks to Garry Tan.

bazookaaaon Soshiku is having a Winter Raffle

Hi everyone. I asked you guys to review Soshiku when it launched (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=315281) and I'd like to thank you guys for all the positive reviews. Thanks to Hacker News and popular blogs such as Mashable and Lifehacker (and not to mention word-of-mouth), it has been gaining in popularity every single day. It isn't over yet; I have some big plans for the near future. I thought you'd like to know about our Winter Raffle, which will help raise funds and in turn, give out some cool prizes. Thanks everyone!

bazookaaaon Ask HN: Review my webapp.

Came here to mention those two points. Excellent job. FYI though, the big image above the sign up and tour buttons didn't appear until I disabled Safari AdBlock.

bazookaaaon Ask HN: What besides Craigslist is a good way to find an apartment in the Bay Area?

I just moved to Seattle using Craigslist. That's how I found Stanford (http://www.stanfordatuw.com/). Pretty cheap and in an awesome location in the U-district. Good luck.

bazookaaaon Ask HN: My host has me over a barrel. I've placed myself in a pickle. How to handle?

http://articles.slicehost.com. A godsend.

bazookaaaon Ask YC: Please review my first startup, Soshiku

Thanks for the feedback. I'll make the tour multi-page. Strange that it doesn't work in Chrome but works fine in Safari. Sure wish I had a PC so I can debug in both Chrome and IE!

bazookaaaon Ask YC: Please review my first startup, Soshiku

You're right, I should have used "web app" instead. There are ads (which doesn't hurt to have), but I'm thinking of other means of monetization. Thanks for the feedback.

bazookaaaon Ask YC: Please review my first startup, Soshiku

I'm just using an email gateway now, so carriers are limited. Hopefully that will change in the future.

bazookaaaon Ask YC: Please review my first startup, Soshiku

That's why I made it so users can add assignments via email or SMS. So when they're in class, for example, they can add it from their phone and not to have to worry about it.

bazookaaaon Ask YC: Please review my first startup, Soshiku

Sort of. It's derived from the word "soshiki" which means "organization" (I hope it's the verb kind of organization). I saw the word a long time ago, and in my head somewhere along the way, before I made the site, I turned it into "soshiku". I do like that better.

bazookaaaon Ask YC: Please review my first startup, Soshiku

Thank you for all the wonderful comments.

Zacharye, that certainly was my goal. :)

Aston, yes I'll fix that right away.

Siong, thanks for the suggestions. You can (mostly) do all of that by adding partners to your account, and then using the discussion pane on the assignment page. And for "peer pressure", a users' total grade does show on their public profile.

About monetization: for now I'm focusing on just unobtrusive AdSense ads, but I'm definitely brainstorming about the future.

Jbenz, yes it's 100% free and I plan on keeping it that way. Should I replace "But that's just the tip of the iceberg." with "And it's totally free." with, say, a yellow highlight?

bazookaaaon 15 Quick Ways to Shrink Page Load Times

If you don't have a wide international audience, don't worry about using a CDN.

bazookaaaon Are we in a bubble? This company got over 8 million in funding

Wait, what? When I heard about Redux way back when (http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/01/28/redux-discovers-friends...), it was for discovering new friends, which seemed like a good idea. But now it's this? Why the change [in the wrong direction]?