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I came here to ask about submitting to the App Store. Does this mean that a Mac is, technically, no longer required for the entire process of development -> release of iOS apps?

I think this is humorous, and, in a way, brutal. Keep in mind it's not an official document from Postgres but rather just a guy who is big on Postgres writing a funny, and yes, snarky response to Uber. He makes some decent points, if not about the technologies themselves, about people switching to something more or less equivalent for reasons that could easily be interpreted as more gut reactions than solid business and tech necessities.

To me, Uber acted as though someone bought a Honda and it had some mechanical issues (and no seat heat), so he went apeshit, drove it off a cliff, then bought a Toyota thinking he will never have that problem again.

Is this taboo? I also use Edge and find it great.

So clearly you're here just to call me out, so it's funny you should bring up time saving.

Other commenters on my comment have not provided a good reason. Like I said, I walk through customs and passport control with my phone in my hand all the time (20 or so trips per year) and could easily click this button the instant something unusual happens.

I realize I'm not the first person to come up with most ideas I have. I don't mind.

Care to share the reason it hasn't taken off? Or are you here just to call me out?

Exactly. With and without Global Entry, I've always had my phone in my hand through passport check and customs.

Nah, I'm sayin the area leading up to passport control or in the baggage claim area. I realize once you're sure something sketchy is happening, there's no actions left to take anymore. I pretty much have my phone out and in my left hand 100% of the time I'm in airports/planes, so nothing suspicious about right as someone's coming up to you or right as you walk up to a CBP officer you just tap a button.

It would be nice if there were a feature built in to phones to facilitate this. Like, on the lock screen, an emergency wipe button that runs a procedure you specify (log you out of everything, obfuscate which services you subscribe to, etc) and this way as you're going through customs, you can gauge your risk and at any point you feel uncomfortable, you discreetly click your button before smoothly handing over your phone and password with a warm smile.

Why don't they just use kinetic energy from the movement of your arm like mechanical watches have been doing for many decades now? Surely it's easier and more of it.

It is strange. On the other hand there's something suspicious here. Some things clearly aren't being communicated properly.

I'm being told I need a modern browser for this, then redirected to the Chrome download page.

I'm using the latest version of Chrome.

Yeah, maybe I do lack some perspective having never worked for a truly giant company. My parents both work at massive banks (in technology, in fact, my dad has almost the same job as I do), and a lot of what they talk about is how much politics they have to do on a daily basis that has nothing to do with their job, but rather just appeasing golden retrievers with treats and belly rubs.

But then, this goes even further to show how every situation is different and there's no umbrella of advice that works for employment.

But this means you're not a programmer. If you understand a business's problems and create software to solve those problems, you've already moved higher up in the ranks than a programmer, so of course, call yourself whatever your title is (architect, engineer, director, whatever).

> Ever had to lobby your idea or project to a non-technical decision maker?

This is actually my job; I'm an architect and I interface a programming team with non-technical superiors (I simplified my position previously to make a point).

Part of my spiel in talking to non-technical superiors is being straightforward and bullshit-free. If something's a program, I call it a program, not a solution, business lalaploo, schpleplipagan, or quilbilbalala wrapped in bacon. It's a program, and it's programmed by programmers who are hired to program and spend their time programming. My non-technical superiors cherish this directness and lack of semantically loaded garbage. They "gravitate" towards the most clear and well-put solution, and part of that is not to wrap it in any narrative whatsoever, but to tell them straight up what the situation is. By wrapping something in a narrative, and trying to make it seem more than it is, it starts sounding less like professionalism and more like philosophy, and you instantly set off my bullshit detectors (and those of my superiors too). It starts smelling of indirectness and ulterior motives.

And this goes the other way too--when hiring someone, I'm hiring a programmer. Not an artist or philosopher who can tell me what silly billy value they add to my company. I decide what value they add; if they add any at all, it's the value of the programs they program (don't take that the wrong way--this is a lot of value, and I appreciate it fully, but it's still programming programs--the programs are the vehicle with which they add value).

That sounds like a bigger issue--being oblivious to what your role is/how companies work. No amount of re-naming/re-titling yourself will fix that. A name is just a name; it's what you do that matters.

> Engineers are hired to create business value, not to program things

So is every employee of every company. They create business value by doing what their role is. This is the point of a company, this is how it's always worked. The role of a programmer is to program things. So a programmer programs things, and that is what they are hired for.

Why do we constantly get blog posts discussing ridiculous semantics like this?

Sure, it might work for some companies, but that's so utterly unimportant. I'm a programmer, I tell people I'm a programmer, I'm paid to program business applications, and I'm happily employed and liked by my superiors and company. Clearly this line of thought also works fine.

So maybe the best advice is to just do what you do, call yourself whatever, and cut it with these self-important blog posts preaching your way to everyone else as though it's some holy advice on cracking the employment puzzle.

Are hippos not nearly as endangered as elephants and rhinos? I heard they poach them too for their teeth or something.

> It's nonsense to suggest that the majority vote was either a bad thing or done out of fear.

Actually, the majority vote is frequently one or both of these things. Whether or not this applies here.

> though might be a core value of the U.S. (being a nation of immigrants, after all).

This is exactly what I'm talking about. Like I said in the later bit of my post, our openness to immigrants and the lack of European-style nationalism and nationalistic discrimination is my favorite thing about the US. If this goes, I'd much rather live in Europe.

Like I said in another post, it's a matter of priorities. Of course I can't disagree that we need safety (cough gun control cough), economic prosperity, and job security. But unless these things are in much worse shape than they are now, I find that their importance doesn't hold up terribly well to what makes America great! :)

To me, Western Europe is a place where I can lead a much higher quality of life (I've lived in Germany and Switzerland and much prefer it over there). But I keep coming back to loving the US because we don't have this strange attitude I see in many Europeans of kinda... scowling at foreigners, thinking they're out of place, treating them differently... In fact, it's the contrary. In the US, we love foreigners. We're impressed by them, the languages they speak, the cultures and ideas they bring, and if we start having a more European approach to immigration, I'm worried we'll lose that. Then the US will become just another country.

> "nationalist leader"

Trump cannot be a nationalist leader as he does not respect the principles upon which this nation was founded (see my other comments for more specificity).

No. I don't like Hillary by any means, and I don't like her attitude on drug war and crime and whatever else you wanna cite, but these things are mere political differences, whereas racism and xenophobia are immoral, utterly nauseating, and unamerican.

Then we've arrived at a simple priority difference. I suppose I simply don't care that much about economic suffering of people when the values upon which my country was founded are in question ("that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights..."). I think these values are just marginally more important than the immediate well being of the middle class.

Note: all men, not all straight white Americans who aren't Muslims and are in economic turmoil

In my opinion, the most magical thing about the United States is our duty and tendency to welcome all people of the world, of any religion, of any ancestry, with open arms and make available a better life for them. If you take this away, I'm not too impressed with this country (as compared to most of Western Europe).

> You're asking people to effectively vote against their own best interests because it's in the best interests of someone else.

I'm asking people to consider the fundamental rights of others and to notice that they're at risk. Compared to putting up with the status quo for a bit longer, losing fundamental rights and being discriminated against by the government is a much larger issue.

I'm asking people to put up with the status quo for a bit more because the only alternative is discrimination and would take away fundamental rights of others.

I think everyone can have their own perspective on what a defining problem is. If you're straight and white, wealth inequality is a problem. If you're not, then I beg to differ on what the defining problem is.

If you can't at least try to see issues from other people's perspectives, then that's your main problem.

That's because any Trump supporter (be it by privilege or other) seems to be unfazed by Trump's racism and xenophobia. If we elect him, these are policies that will be at risk of being enacted, and this will affect minorities, immigrants, and Muslims. This is a large cost to our society, values, democracy, you name it.

In modern times, not caring that the rights of minorities and immigrants will be trampled is rightfully interpreted as being a racist xenophobe. We are trying to collectively move away from these old-fashioned bad ideas, and supporting Trump is backward in this sense.

It's disappointing to me that some people defend racists and xenophobes against being called racists and xenophobes. This is what they are, and it's completely appropriate to call them that, and worse.

Please note the "status quo" is in fact moving away from racism and xenophobia, very slowly. This is much better than scrapping the "status quo" in favor of plunging back into racism and xenophobia.

If the "status quo" isn't working for you and you want to scrap it in favor of Trump or Brexit, then you probably are not affected by issues like racism and xenophobia. And you need to look around you at minorities, immigrants, and Muslims, and consider them carefully before making a vote. For them, the "status quo" is definitely an improvement over Trump and Brexit, and we definitely shouldn't forget about them just because we're upset with things changing very slowly.

This isn't too much negativity (2 or 3 top-level comments that aren't even purely negative, but just questioning his heroism) and they were downvoted into the ground.

Rest assured, HN is clearly pro-Snowden and doesn't question it.

I'm not impressed by Snowden because I've seen worse than NSA surveillance (communist Romania, my grandfather was beaten to death in jail for having an anti-government journal) and I don't think the US can fall down such a slippery slope that we need to worry about it at the cost of security and massive irony. The formula that makes oppressive countries oppressive through surveillance just doesn't exist here. Not even close. Even by modern standards, we're not even in the same league as Russia and China in terms of oppression via surveillance. We should probably stop it at some point but it's not at the top of my priority list right now, and I'm not worried we're going to fall off some metaphorical cliff anytime soon.

Anyway, to see Snowden in such a positive light requires thinking that stopping NSA surveillance is a top priority that should be done at any cost.

You missed the point—this is a person's opinion. Harshly (and possibly ridiculously) worded, sure, but there are plenty of opinion posts everywhere and their point isn't to direct others as to how to live their lives.

You don't have to listen to it or even read it.

You're right, of course, but my point stands.

Nobody's telling anyone how to live their life here, much less you specifically.