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crabasaon Millennials are flocking to the Pacific Northwest, study finds

I am not a millennial (born in 1977) but the combination of the strong regional economy and access to natural beauty (Puget Sound, Pacific Ocean, Olympic Peninsula, etc) is really amazing.

On top of this, the area has a significant resistance to the kind of temperature highs that are hitting most of the country right now. I spent the weekend camping on Vancouver Island where the high was 71 when I was there.

crabasaon JSON Resume – 5th Birthday and New Features

So, I am working on a "better resume" product for developers: https://fizbuz.com

We plan on shipping API support so that developers can build better experiences on top of the data (alternate rendering engines, import/export, etc).

I'd love to see about supporting export to JSON Resume. Is there a list of ecosystem tools that speak this format?

crabasaon We tried to hustle our way into YC after we got rejected

Sir, you just got yourself a ConferenceBadge customer for https://2019.cascadiajs.com

crabasaon Dropbox Is Experiencing an Outage

Oddly, I can access dropbox.com just fine, but my wife sitting in the next room is getting a 500 error page.

crabasaon Ask HN: What is your money-making side project outside programming?

I organize a conference for developers (see: https://2018.cascadiajs.com).

Organizing events is obviously very different than programming and shipping software, but it's nice to create something that programmers enjoy and it's been awesome to meet so many industry folks whose work I really admire.

crabasaon A guide to threads in Node.js

Except this is a guide for Node.js (JavaScript). The one assumption the author can make is that the reader knows and is comfortable with JavsScript.

crabasaon A guide to threads in Node.js

When writing a developer guide, especially to something as fundamental as "threads in Node.js", it pays to:

1) Make as few assumptions as possible regarding what the reader knows or has experience with

2) Make code samples as complete and "copy-and-pastable" as possible.

You're assuming that all developers reading this guide will effortlessly translate that TS code to JS.

Using TS creates a possible barrier to understanding, which I'm sure isn't the intent of someone publishing such a guide. Better to simply write some comments or augment the prose in the guide.

crabasaon A guide to threads in Node.js

> type WorkerCallback = (err: any, result?: any) => any;
export function runWorker(path: string, cb: WorkerCallback, workerData: object | null = null) { const worker = new Worker(path, { workerData });
worker.on('message', cb.bind(null, null)); worker.on('error', cb);
worker.on('exit', (exitCode) => { if (exitCode === 0) { return null; }
return cb(new Error(`Worker has stopped with code ${exitCode}`)); }); return worker;
}

For an article titled "A Guide to Threads in Node.js", I really wish the first example of writing a thread wasn't in TypeScript.

crabasaon Ask HN: Who is hiring? (June 2018)

Costco Travel | Full-Stack Engineer | FULL-TIME | Issaquah, WA | ONSITE

Costco Travel is looking for a creative, full-stack developer to be a critical member on the development of current and upcoming projects and enhancements to its ecommerce portal. This will include both internal and online applications and will involve the development enhancement and maintenance of reservation software and creation of vendor specific connections via web services for product availability, pricing and reservations.

Our team values:

  - Communication & empathy
  - Spending time together away from work
  - Providing a family friendly environment
  - Work/life balance

Preferred Stack: Java, MS-SQL, T-S

Nice to Haves: Experience in the travel industry

Benefits:

  - Free Costco memberships
  - Travel discounts
  - Medical/dental coverage
  - 401(k)

Learn more via Fizbuz: https://www.fizbuz.com/companies/costco-travel

crabasaon Ask HN: Looking to branch out into remote work, how to start

As someone who has spent the last 6 years working remotely, the #1 thing you can do to get started is to build a website that makes it clear to prospective employers not just what your skills are, but what your interests are and what you're like to work with.

Finding remote jobs isn't really the problem. The challenge is landing the job, and often it's less about your programming skills and more about fit. Here are a few examples of websites that I think do a good job of presenting a more complete picture of a developer:

- https://ryanhayes.net/

- https://github.com/dkundel/about-me

- https://www.fizbuz.com/u/yechielk

crabasaon Full Guide to Developing REST API’s with AWS API Gateway and AWS Lambda

For folks who just want a FaaS platform that comes with all the batteries included:

https://StdLib.com

For folks who already have AWS infra and want the benefits of Lambda without the pain of API Gateway or Cloud Formation:

https://arc.codes

crabasaon Klout shutting down

Services that turn people into numbers have no future. Glad to see Klout go.

Hopefully Hackerrank and its ilk will follow.

crabasaon Programming Languages

This is where I think Wikipedia really falls down as a repository of information. It's crazy that if a new programming language is invented, people would have update N Wikipedia pages.

If I built a simple DB that had all this info and interfaces (web, API) that folks could use to query or contribute, would anyone find this useful?

crabasaon Programming Languages

This comment got me Googling and I was amazed that I couldn't find a good, canonical list of programming languages.

The best I could find was a Wikipedia page, they're sorted by alpha which I find not very useful:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_programming_languages

Does anyone know of a better resource?

crabasaon Programming Languages

That was by far the weakest article.

My favorite was the Crash Course in Compilers:

https://increment.com/programming-languages/crash-course-in-...

crabasaon Ask HN: What has been your most rewarding job or project and why?

Every day I wake up and talk to engineers who are having trouble getting noticed either because they have untraditional backgrounds (non-STEM degree) or because they just don't understand how to market themselves or network.

The conversations are amazing, sometimes sad, but very motivating because it reinforces how broken hiring is and how much good could be done by helping engineers to better connect to one another.

Finding this mission was important for me because I had worked on purpose-driven teams in the past and I knew that's what made me happy. Best of luck finding yours!

crabasaon Don’t buy the MacBook Pros even on sale, in my opinion

I have an early-2015 Mackbook Pro that I am absolutely clinging to because 1) it works 2) it has all the ports that I need: USB, HDMI, Mini DisplayPort and MagSafe.

That being said, it feels like it's slowing down. Has anyone had success reviving the performance of their older machine? Anyone tried backing up and doing a restore?

crabasaon Tech company career ladders

>> and I really hope some company will notice my plight

Do you have a website? Is your story documented anywhere? It's really powerful.

crabasaon Tech company career ladders

>> What's the takeaway here? Know how the company works before you take the plunge.

This is good advice, but I think it's good advice for any company you join: understand how performance is going to be measured.

This is a key question that you should ask during the interview process. Remember, they're not just interviewing you, you are interviewing them.

crabasaon You probably don't need AI/ML. You can make do with well written SQL scripts

Back in 1999 I worked at an early web consultancy that built apps for clients on top of Oracle. We used their DB + a programming language called PL/SQL.

There was a feature of Oracle called SOUNDEX which was magical. Here's an example from their docs page [1]:

    SELECT last_name, first_name
    FROM hr.employees
    WHERE SOUNDEX(last_name)= SOUNDEX('SMYTHE');

This query will return all people with a last name that sounds like 'Smythe', including 'Smith' and 'Smithe'.

[1] https://docs.oracle.com/cd/B19306_01/server.102/b14200/funct...

crabasaon Rethinking GPS: Engineering Next-Gen Location at Uber

Sorry if this is off-topic, but I hate the trend of needing to "read" the TLD.

    ubere.ng

To me, that reads as some company called Ubere from a country code I'm not familiar with. Took a minute to read it as Uber Engineering.

crabasaon Be likeable or get fired

From 18 years in tech, through both my own experiences and observation the key is not likeability, it's relationships and empathy.

You can build relationships and trust people who don't like. It's more a matter of both parties understanding and empathizing where the other is coming from.

crabasaon Stripe Home

In case anyone is interested:

https://www.fizbuz.com

crabasaon Stripe Home

Lots of tech companies do this. It's like a rite of passage. Twilio built Bacefook once upon a time.

I'm most curious if Stripe will productize this. That would be massive.

crabasaon Stripe Home

This looks like an amazing product. I'm stunned they're sharing this sneak peak as simply a way to encourage engineers to apply to Stripe.

Does anyone have a sense of whether they intend to ship this as a product? It's incredibly validating for what I'm building right now.

crabasaon Tell HN: Today's the day that YC invites applicants to interviews

One of the top feature requests we have is help finding a mentor. It's a key use case we want to enable.

crabasaon Tell HN: Today's the day that YC invites applicants to interviews

Love this idea. I discovered FI(RE) a couple of years ago, and it changed my life. When I think of the number of tools I use to manage my finances and the amount of time I devote to it, it's no wonder more people aren't excited about taking control of their finances. Good luck!

crabasaon Tell HN: Today's the day that YC invites applicants to interviews

I'm very aware of Triplebyte, but what we're building is different. Those startups focus on building recruiting and evaluation tools. The company is their primary customer, and a developer will probably only have a Triplebyte account for a limited period of time.

Fizbuz places the developer first, and we want to build tools for developers that help them manage their career and brand over the course of decades. We will work with companies looking to hire as a byproduct of helping developers accomplish a goal (i.e. getting a job).

Doing the right thing for the developer is our #1 principle. Which is why we will never implement anything like InMail.

crabasaon Tell HN: Today's the day that YC invites applicants to interviews

Haha, thanks! I'm always surprised when a developer doesn't "get" it. Haven't we all been asked to implement FizzBuzz?

http://wiki.c2.com/?FizzBuzzTest