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benparsons

59 karma · joined February 4, 2013

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benparsons··on Automattic invests in Matrix
Real-time decentralisation is the headline. Matrix allows you to host your own server, federate messages in real-time between servers, and still benefit from end-to-end encryption between multiple client devices.

Good place to get started reading: https://matrix.org/docs/guides/introduction

benparsons··on Automattic invests in Matrix
libpurple bridging support is being achieved through matrix-bifröst (https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-bifrost), this is via node-purple.
benparsons··on WebThings Gateway Goes Global
What changed your view on HA? I was about to get started with it...
benparsons··on The Horror of Microsoft Teams
That isn't true at all - Matrix has a rich and growing ecosystem of chat clients. For Slack clones, you're well stocked, but the links given to you by the parent shows there is much more out there.
benparsons··on How Discord Went Mainstream
When did you last try Riot? Version 1.0 was released last month, and in general Riot performance has improved a lot in the last ~year.
benparsons··on How Discord Went Mainstream
There is a new and much more actively maintained WeeChat plugin, take a look: https://matrix.org/docs/projects/client/weechat-matrix
benparsons··on France Enters the Matrix
Thanks for pointing this out - the website is updated now to include poljar's work. (We did feature it on the blog but important to keep the projects list updated too!)

There are several competing Python libraries, those you mentioned plus https://github.com/tulir/mautrix-python. We'll do a round-up and review of the options soon.

benparsons··on Slack closes account of an Iranian user living in Canada
Riot is currently undergoing a lot of UX work, the results look really promising. Take a look in January for an update.

Disclaimer: I work on Matrix (should have made that clear in the parent comment too)

benparsons··on Slack closes account of an Iranian user living in Canada
Self-hosted, decentralised solutions such as Matrix (https://matrix.org) are available, and allow you to keep control of your own access and data.
benparsons··on Decentralised, Real-Time, Interoperable Communication with Matrix
There is support in Mozilla Thunderbird - but as a chat mode, rather than email as you might be expecting. You can enable it by changing the value of "chat.prpls.prpl-matrix.disable" to false in the advanced config editor. Still, since it really just enables a chat client, another Matrix client might be better suited.
benparsons··on Decentralised, Real-Time, Interoperable Communication with Matrix
Email is a good analogy - this is even alluded to in the project FAQ: https://matrix.org/docs/guides/faq#how-is-this-like-e-mail%3...
benparsons··on Why do Americans write the month before the day?
tldr: "dunno"
benparsons··on The next generation of Instapaper
I have no particular loyalty to Instapaper, but their major feature over Pocket, for me, is sending a compilation to kindle as an ebook (Kindle sees it as a magazine, complete with TOC.) People have been asking for this feature from Pocket for a while now (http://help.getpocket.com/customer/portal/questions/286894-k...), but without much encouragement that it will appear.
benparsons··on Bing doesn't support SSL
I don't understand - that's never resulted in an error for me.
benparsons··on Is Polite Disagreement Becoming Grounds For Removal From A Flight?
Per-route monopolies. It is clear what was meant.
benparsons··on Things a text editor must do
All I've taken from this page of comments is that HN users have no sense of humour.

Any attack on Vim or Emacs is blasphemy and must be resisted!! No, calm down.

benparsons··on EA refuses to refund user for SimCity, threatens account ban
1993? Probably fair to say a lot has changed in the last 20 years! I don't really follow EA closely, but even so they have a poor image (of what it's like internally.) Google "EA spouse" for a start, the resulting material presents them in a very poor light, even in the (poor) context of the games industry.
benparsons··on What's in a Side Project?
Since this is the current most recent post it doesn't matter yet, but the correct URL is http://founderdating.com/whats-in-a-side-project/. A mod should change the submitted URL.
benparsons··on How PHP's foreach works
Can you provide an example of this?
benparsons··on Sexism In Tech: We’re Not Making It Up
This post until the problem is at least acknowledged, let alone addressed. Took me a long time to realise the problem was real ("it's a meritocracy, everyone is welcome in tech!"), and now I can't stand to look at the comments in threads like this http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5279118 without cringing.
benparsons··on Who really wants a self-driving car?
This article reads like notes for a stand-up comedy bit.

"Will my car be smart enough to follow the guy with shopping bag and car keys in his hand to his car and wait for his space or will it just park in the nearest (and most expensive) garage

But, hey, while all these geniuses are working on making cars smarter, how about maybe forgetting the self-parking idea and coming up with cars that [can tell] my kids in the back seat to pipe down if the decibel level gets too high"

benparsons··on An anonymous VC criticizes Quora
Starts out discussing Quora but veers quickly offtopic into a right-wing rant about political correctness, marxism and feminists.

Going to take this with a pinch of salt.

benparsons··on Bitcoins can now be used to pay for Domino’s Pizza
For interest, this has already been around: http://hackedgadgets.com/2008/06/09/order-dominos-pizza-via-...
benparsons··on IntelliJ IDEA 12 Wins Jolt Award for Coding Tools 2013
I have never used IDEA, but if it is even a fraction as good as ReSharper then it is still amazing. After being introduced to it I feel so handicapped without it when using plain Visual Studio.
benparsons··on [dead]
The barrier to entry is also lower than ever. This means there is less incentive to truly think through every detail before starting a new endeavour, which leads to a higher percentage of failure. As has been discussed ad nauseam on HN, this is not necessarily a bad thing.
benparsons··on Barbarians at the digital gate
Comments on that article are impressively xenophobic (above and beyond expected criticism of a rival state I mean.)