remyp

So long, and thanks for all the fish. -85907003

Thank you! This is super helpful.

This is a big concern for us. Fortunately, we are self-funded and only answer to ourselves.

I’d love to hear more about your experience - please feel free to email me (info in profile) if you’re not comfortable sharing publicly.

A developer happiness product, https://workdna.com. It sends out employee pulse surveys that are purpose-built for dev teams and don't suck to fill out.

Lots of companies just cobble together a Google Form full of irrelevant questions, send it out, and throw their hands in the air when nobody fills it out.

WorkDNA surveys your team on criteria like CI/CD reliability, test flakiness, PR feedback quality, job satisfaction, and psychological safety. The surveys take 20 minutes to set up, 5 minutes to fill out, and are completely anonymous.

Over my last few programming jobs I've felt that building software these days usually amounts to drudgery in the short term and burnout in the long-term. I'm building a product [0] to fix that. It helps engineering leaders gather candid feedback to identify and improve quality of life problems in their teams.

Think employee pulse surveys, but purpose-built for dev teams.

It's cool not because the tech is interesting (it isn't) but because the product helps improve the working lives of actual human beings. Working on a company that's calm, deliberate, and fully independent has been a breath of fresh air for my career in tech.

[0] https://workdna.com

I'm a bootstrapper. I use a merchant of record service to handle this because I need to spend my time building and growing, not doing paperwork.

Yes, it sucks that it costs more. Yes, it sucks that I have more platform/vendor risk. Yes, it sucks that I can't use the platform I know best (Stripe).

But yes, it's worth it to know that if our efforts succeed and we grow a lot then we won't have to drop everything to get compliant with the 87 countries and countless local jurisdictions we've made sales in.

As a lifelong midwesterner I don’t need sirens, the internet, TV, radio, or low frequency sound to warn me about a tornado. If it’s “green” outside I’m heading down to the basement.

I think there are bus services that run between the Algarve and Lisbon, I've had friends use them before.

I live in Lisbon. Give a shout if you make it up this way, contact info is in my profile.

I regularly text in 3 languages. The increase in autocorrect frustration is exponential, not linear.

Thanks for this, I really needed it.

Have you considered teaching and/or mentoring? I’m sure you have a lot to offer to students and people who are early in their career.

The United States has a homeless population bigger than Malta [0][1]. 11.5% of our population -- 38 million people -- live in poverty [2]. The median household income is $74,580 and health insurance for a family of 4 costs $17,244 ($1,437 * 12) per year [3][4]. Average housing expenditure is $24,300 ($2,025 * 12) per year [5]. This leaves $33,036 per year in household income BEFORE taxes are taken in to account.

Meanwhile, the legal requirement for paid parental leave in most places is 0 days. Paid sick leave? 0 days. Notice period for firing an employee? 0 days. Cost of 1 year at a 4 year university? $36,436 [6]. You get the idea.

We're rich compared to developing countries, but we're a far cry from "unbelievably rich".

[0] https://endhomelessness.org/homelessness-in-america/homeless... [1] https://www.worldometers.info/world-population/malta-populat... [2] https://www.census.gov/library/publications/2023/demo/p60-28... [3] https://www.census.gov/library/publications/2023/demo/p60-27... [4] https://www.anthem.com/individual-and-family/insurance-basic... [5] https://www.fool.com/the-ascent/research/average-monthly-exp... [6] https://educationdata.org/average-cost-of-college

It's even more fun in Safari on MacOS. Videos don't autoplay, but they also don't play when you DO hit the play button.

Lots of reasons, in no particular order:

- I've wanted to live in Europe for as long as I can remember. I can apply for a Portuguese passport after 5 years of residency, which unlocks the entire continent.

- I'm from Chicago and can no longer handle the 6 months of no sun and debilitating seasonal depression during the winter.

- I'm at the age where I'm no longer invincible health-wise and the US system is a comically expensive dumpster fire. The Portuguese health system has problems, but it is unlikely to literally bankrupt me like in the US.

- The US has had (on average) multiple mass shootings _per day_ this year [0]. Portugal has had _one_ and is one of the safest countries on the planet.

- Cost of living in Portugal (for an American) is low. This allows me to work less and live more.

- I'm a guy and I've never fit in to the dominant American (particularly midwestern) macho culture. Expectations for men are different in Portugal and Europe in general, so I'm much more comfortable.

- US politics. No further comment.

[0] https://abcnews.go.com/US/mass-shootings-days-2023-database-...

D7, because I actually want to live in Portugal. That was before the new DN visa, though. I'm told that anyone with active (ie employment) income needs to apply for the nomad visa.

Because it's difficult to unlearn a lifetime of habit :)

> somewhat confused by the general lack of "can do" attitude

I moved from the US to Europe a year ago and this rings so true it hurts. Sometimes requests (for anything from another glass of wine to government bureaucracy with big stakes) are simply met with a shrug and "nope, I can't do that." No solutions, no apology, they just go back to looking at their phone. This is nearly nonexistent in the US.

In general, living in southern Europe it's a big adjustment to a culture where time essentially has no value, or at least is valued way less than in the US. Just wait another 30 minutes, why are you in such a hurry?

I'm an American and moved from the US to Portugal a year ago, though I still spend a lot of time in the US. Here's what my biggest challenges have been:

- Family and friends are now an 8 hour flight and 6 time zones away. Staying connected is difficult, particularly given American rat race schedules. I don't have children, so this is a challenge but manageable.

- The visa -- among the easiest to get for Americans with no family ties to Europe -- took 5 months and TONS of paperwork. I had to lease an apartment for an entire year in order to APPLY for the visa. In total, it cost about $40k to get set up there. Most middle-class Americans don't have that laying around.

- The language/culture barrier is real, even in a place with lots of English speakers. I'm diligent about attending lessons and studying, but it takes time. Learning the culture is even harder and I quite regularly make a fool of myself in public.

- Above all, I've gained an appreciation for how optimized for convenience life in the US is. I dry my clothes outdoors on a line just like everyone else. This alone is a nonstarter for most Americans I know.

Not as such. The tech is incredibly cool, but I'm rooting against cars whether they're self-driving or not. Cities are for people.

I went a private hospital ER in Portugal and it worked exactly this way since I didn't have (Portuguese) health insurance. I was there a couple hours, they gave me an IV, ran a blood panel, and wrote me a prescription. I then paid the cashier €250 and that was the end of it.

Additionally, the visit actually solved the problem, which is something that rarely happens when I go to the doctor in the US.

I have a small SaaS business and do the vast majority of development myself. I made it just as easy to cancel as it is to sign up, just a couple clicks. Not that anybody does: churn is way below every benchmark and those who cancel for a time frequently come back.

Being customer-friendly pays dividends, folks. Not sure why big companies don't get that. Maybe it's because the only stakeholders I have to answer to are myself, my cofounder, and our customers.

I spent the first 15 years of my career grinding and saving cash + equity as a SWE. It turns out that some of that "worthless" startup equity eventually CAN turn in to Real Money and now I'm using it to pay my bills while I build my own thing.

As an Illinois resident, voter, and taxpayer, I'm pleased by this. I don't think I've never been _happy_ with Illinois politicians, but this current set is meaningfully productive enough for me to consider plausible the idea of being happy with my government.

Don’t believe this, West Lafayette is terrible. Go Illini ;)

I’m writing a weekly newsletter called Meaningful Jobs while I’m working on my too-early-to-share-publicly SaaS. The newsletter is focused on engineering jobs at companies working on climate change, healthcare, and education.

https://www.workdna.com/newsletters/meaningful-jobs

There’s a space for a small text-based ad in the introduction emails people get. I sold a few for small amounts, but lately I’ve used the space to ask people to donate to UNICEF.

It didn't flop, but awhile back I created https://findkismet.com to help introduce HN users to each other. We sure could use an influx of new users!

It's free and has cost me more to run than it has ever made in revenue.

Yes, and Paddle will ask you to prove it.

Cal Newport’s book Digital Minimalism is a good place to start. Think of it as a mindset, not a to do list.

https://www.calnewport.com/books/digital-minimalism/