shaneeb

Right now the layouting is pretty basic. So data will only fit within the width/height you 'draw' on the template. We are working on a dynamic layouting engine which will be able to automatically paginate tables cleanly, but its not rolled out yet.

Noted, thanks! Btw, you can also use the feedback widget within the editor to give quick feedback like this. Its on top right corner.

You are right that was a bit too far fetched, we'd see how to make it better. Thanks!

Hmm, thats a very interesting perspective. We would definitely give it thought. Much appreciated!

Thanks for your feedback! Which products do you have in mind which do the design part? Particularly those that work in a browser.

Essentially we are something like Crystal Reports for web apps. Being web based is a core part of our proposition.

PDF generation time depends on the length of the document but ideally it should be pretty quick.

No you cannot manipulate existing PDF but only generate new ones. Thanks!

Thanks! As of now this support is not available but we would definitely look into it. For now only our 'native' charts are available which can be populated with data as well (including bar, stacked, pie.. etc).

Also if you have an image url, that could work too.

We just launched our alpha (and are sending out invites to people who sign up). We want to validate our value proposition so any feedback/suggestion is very much appreciated!

True, but making a NY Times-like website for tech news wouldn't work either. HN works for techies because its clean and simple, and the karma/upvote mechanism keep the content relevant. So there is a difference from NY Times.

My question then remains, what is different?

I never said it claims to be better and it isn't. Let me rephrase the question: why would anyone want to be on echojs instead of HN, given that it's essentially an HN clone for JS and HN community is bigger at the moment? Why would you use it?

I am just trying to understand its value for myself.

Apart from the fact that its JS only, how is it better than HN? Why not just use HN to follow topics you like (JS in this case)?

I don't have any counter-evidence to show if the incubator trend is a bubble or not so I am not going to argue along those lines.

I have a very different perspective to offer. I live in Pakistan where there is an energy crisis so serious we don't have electric power half the day. It is in these challenging conditions that we are trying to establish ourselves as a tech startup. Perhaps this is not such an issue in SV but incubators can play a very crucial role in places where the conditions are not so ideal .

For example the incubator we have here, apart from providing seed money and mentoring, provides 24/7 power supply, connects us with businesses abroad (huge benefit, because no one wants to do business with a Pakistani startup, right?), is trying to get some foreign investors on board, etc. In effect, an ecosystem is being built and I dont see how it could have been possible without an incubator at its center.

Perhaps in SV these things dont even matter but they can be the difference between survival and failure in lesser developed ecosystems.

Connecting with other geeks/hackers?

How about connecting with other geeks out there? Is that possibility not useful enough?

True, but then its the geeks who make the likes of Facebook, Twitter and then not use it themselves :)

Not implying that one language is better than the other, but how does Lua help solve problems that web developers face? I say this because I have been working on a "killer" web app (JS intensive) for the past few months and it has been a real pain but I dont see how Lua could have helped either.

We, as entrepreneurs, are so obsessed with creating the next "photo sharing app" when there are some real, hard problems to be solved. Maybe its the daily dose of blogs incessantly hyping over such ideas, but we might just have lost sight of the big picture. I speak for myself, but entrepreneurship should be about more than just this.

If that was the measure, maybe we could use a language nobody knows because it will pass this test with flying colors :)

I guess if we could replace it with Lua we would still be sad. How do you think Lua makes for a better language for web?

Yes and this transparency gives you a new perspective on the underlying "pattern" between concepts, which is very powerful.

Orthogonal in the sense that the same concept is used if you need maps/arrays or for namespacing functions or metatables(for metaprogramming). Its like a "core" concept that binds seemingly different features in an coherent way. Havent seen a concept used this elegantly in any other language

Haven't used Lua much but the concept of tables is really neat. Its simple, orthogonal and the fact it lies at the core of many features in Lua (composite data types, metaprogramming, etc) means those features are neat too.

Yup. People have talked about the issues in C for years but few talk about "modern" languages. Ruby anyone?

Not to forget #define struct union which will pack all struct members together. Gives me chills even to think about it...

Just like everything else programming languages have evolved. From Assembly to Fortran to C to Java/C# (just saying, no exact sequence implied). I dont think the languages we have now, far from perfection they may be, would have been possible without the "dark corners" in the older languages. We learnt from them and made better languages. So I say show respect to the old languages, learn from them and keep improving languages/tools... Everybody is happy.