Hacker News Reader

trentnixon Most people don’t finish online job applications

4. You are not fucking suppose to verify or reference check on me before I even had my interview or offer. So now my boss / management knows I am job hunting?

Many years ago, I posted my resume on a job site to see what my options were. An enterprising recruiter called my current (at the time) workplace asking if they'd need help filling the position I might be leaving.

To make his pitch, he asked to speak to the "hiring manager", which happened to be me. He quickly hung up.

trentnixon Most people don’t finish online job applications

1. Some application processes ask me to upload my resume and then want me to manually enter it again in a series of web forms. I'm not interested in spending 30+ minutes manually copying and pasting the resume I just uploaded. I figure that lack of common sense is systemic in the company, so I don't want to work there.

Workday! If the "Apply Here" button takes me to a Workday link, that's my off-ramp.

I have no idea how Workday is so ubiquitous when its user experience and aesthetic is so terrible.

trentnixon Most people don’t finish online job applications

I just went through the job search process (and actually found my job thanks to Hacker News) and was astonished at how many job posting and job application antipatterns I observed. Here’s just a few:

- job descriptions that don’t tell me anything about what the company actually does to make money

- repeating the same question in your application form, sometimes in sequence

- “submit application” buttons that resulted in a server error or 404 (and when pressing back to try again, all your previous info is gone)

- requiring me to generate an account (with an overwrought password complexity requirement), validate my email, log in, and then I can finally upload my resume

- "we don't discriminate" promises followed by way too many questions about gender preferences and vaccination status and diversity pledges

- absurd captchas asking you to identify the “smiling dog” or "plant on a table" or "picture of a living room" through multiple pages

- asinine questions like "tell us why you want to work at (Acme Corp or Bunyon Doctors of America or Dunder-Mifflin Paper Company or whatever)"

It’s all out there and extremely common. If you manage to get to complete the application and get to the interview process, things don't get much better:

- 5 stages of interviews with 11 people over 4 weeks before the committee meets to decide if we want you to pitch us on whether to offer you

- "as a policy we don’t provide feedback" but here’s multiple nagging emails requesting your feedback to help us improve our process (looking at you, Amazon)

- 3-4 weeks between submitting an application and receiving a request for a phone screen

- an endless barrage of “tell me about a time when…” questions

Companies often remark they are desperate for good talent but then invest seemingly nothing in making the process efficient, enjoyable, and succinct.

trentnixon Online card payments still suck

Yep. I remember it being recognized as essential for payments in 2002.

trentnixon Pouring the 200 inch disk at Corning Glass Works

They have some of the best minds in the world working for them. Their knowledge of glass, the physics of light, materials, and related manufacturing is unmatched.

trentnixon Pouring the 200 inch disk at Corning Glass Works

+1 on the museum

I did some consulting for Corning back in the late 2000s and took an afternoon to visit the museum. I can't recommend it enough.

Corning is an exceptional company and so much of our technology, from fiber-optics to monitors and screens to Gorilla Glass, is thanks to the brilliant minds at work there.

trentnixon AI models that predict disease are not as accurate as reports might suggest

Yet.

trentnixon Nearly Half of San Franciscans Have Been Victims of Theft, New Poll Says

The road to hell is paved with good intentions…

trentnixon I don’t believe in sprints

Sprints provide natural alignment for multiple teams trying to coordinate. They also provide data about how your team makes software, frequent (scheduled) points when change is acceptable, and repetition that allows habits to form. And for teams that struggle with it, they provide a great excuse to push back on a requirements team that refuses to provide details and struggles to break down requirements into chunks that can be addressed in the duration of a single sprint.

That said, they aren’t magical. They are often misused. Not every team and every project needs them or is faced with any of the problems sprints set out to solve. And there are lots of ways to build good software.

trentnixon Ask HN: Who wants to be hired? (October 2022)

Location: Amarillo, Texas

Remote: 100%

Willing to relocate: No

Technologies: Go, Kubernetes, AWS, C#, .NET, Javascript, SQL

Résumé/CV: https://www.linkedin.com/in/trent-nix-a051b978/

Email: trent at sciencerocketry.com or trentonnix at hotmail.com

I'm an experienced development manager/director looking for a new remote opportunity in leadership that still has an impact on implementation and technical direction. I've developed, managed, consulted during my career and am passionate about building great teams and great software. I also worked full-time in my own business for nearly a decade (retail and eCommerce) and have all the experience, knowledge, and scars that come from that journey.

Send me an email and I'll be happy to send my resume.

trentnixon New Webb image captures clearest view of Neptune’s rings in decades

2 year trip? At that speed, you’d zip by faster than the Griswold family vacationed at the Grand Canyon.

We should have something orbiting Neptune or at least on its way. I’ll be a very old man before anything could get there if we want to put something orbit (if I’m not already gone by then).

trentnixon Ask HN: Does Hacker News still do in person meet ups?

Amarillo, Texas! Anyone? :-)

trentnixon 22,000 smart thermostats in Colorado locked over ‘energy emergency’

This has nothing to do with climate change, and everything to do with a tangential topic: energy generation. Colorado has more residents with larger domiciles than ever before, and the supply has not kept up with the demand. Additionally, almost all investment has been in areas that are inconsistent in their ability to provide energy when it’s needed.

Simply deciding for other people that they shouldn’t have access to energy because of your misplaced fears around climate change is a recipe for envy, bitterness, and significant societal unrest.

trentnixon 22,000 smart thermostats in Colorado locked over ‘energy emergency’

I expect stuff like this will become compulsory in the near future. “For your own good”, of course.

trentnixon “Quantum-Safe” Crypto Hacked by 10-Year-Old PC

This headline, “Quantum-Safe” Crypto Hacked by 10-Year-Old PC, was pretty awesome until I got to the "PC" part.

trentnixon A captured American spy plane that crashed during a Hungarian pleasure flight

“Pleasure flight” sounds a whole lot more scandalous than a sightseeing trip.

trentnixon My newsletter is making $2k per month with 7k subscribers – AMA

And I'm now a subscriber! :)

trentnixon My newsletter is making $2k per month with 7k subscribers – AMA

Thank you! I was looking for a link so I could subscribe but the OP neglected to provide one.

trentnixon Samsung asks for planning permission for 11 fabs in Texas

Samsung asks permission (but makes no actual commitments) right before Washington votes on whether to subsidize chip manufacturing. Maybe I’m just old and jaded and maybe asking permission has nothing to do with posturing for DC money, but experience tells me this might not be as genuine as the headline suggests.

trentnixon Tell HN: You can't hire because you don't post salary ranges

It also provides insight into the type of talent you can expect to work with. I work best when working with smart people that I can learn from and that challenge me. On the average, those types aren't going to be found in workplaces that aren't aggressive in how they compensate talent.

trentnixon High property taxes are good

Homeowners over 65 in Texas (along with certain widower situations and disabled veterans) are also eligible for exemptions that “freeze” the amount of tax they are required to pay (if the property is their homestead) irrespective of the appraised value of the property.

trentnixon Assassin’s Creed Liberation delisted, unplayable even to owners starting Sept 1

Does it? I had an 80+ GB practically-day-one-download waiting when I bought Forza Horizon 5 for my XBox. The disc might as well have been a blank.

trentnixon Uber broke laws, duped police and built lobbying operation, leak reveals

For example, Uber can be replaced with an open source, decentralized marketplace that doesn’t take 50% of all drivers’ revenue, but has a free market and ratings / reviews operated by the community.

Sure! I volunteer you to build it for me.

trentnixon Books That Changed How I Hear Music

My reading list just got 10 books longer.

trentnixon Why the World Economy Hasn’t Collapsed Yet

we have most probably reached peak oil extraction in 2018

We’ve been assured this is imminent for 50 (FIFTY) years. I’d bet the farm this prediction is dead-ass wrong too.

trentnixon ‘Blade Runner’ at 40

Blade Runner is best viewed on the biggest screen you can get. First time I watched it was on VHS on a small CRT and I didn’t get it. Now, on the living room big screen, it’s immersive and sublime. A theatrical environment makes all the difference.

Same thing happened to me with Ghost in the Shell. I didn’t appreciate it until I saw it on a big screen.

trentnixon Baby pics, life lessons, and obits: What happened to LinkedIn?

It's wall-to-wall virtue signaling. And no amount of "I don't want to see this" seems to move the needle.

trentnixon Ten years after the Higgs, physicists face the nightmare of finding nothing else

Wasn’t there an article a week ago about a new particle found “on a tabletop”?

Feels like I'm being hustled.

trentnixon The Toxic Grind

A lot of people are working lots of hours but their output doesn't match their effort. They "work" 12 hour days and only provide some fraction of that in real value due to distraction and procrastination and whatever else they sink their time into. But chaining yourself to a desk for 12 hours and complaining is a lot easier than developing the discipline and focus to put in a solid day's effort.

trentnixon Lies we tell ourselves to keep using Golang

I'm not emotionally attached to Go, I want to learn rust, and I'm old enough to realize the search for the perfect tool is utter folly. So the inevitable religious wars that surround critiques like this don't move the needle for me.

So while this article didn't really convince me of anything, I have to admit I did learn a thing or two (or five). Kudos to the author, who is a fantastic writer and communicator. Even if you aren't neck deep in the language wars, it's worth reading.