Hacker News Reader

For me the reason is two fold. Sharing the hacks I build is easier when I don't have to deal with NAT. Secondly, for some environments, like the default Amazon Linux AMI the default packages and PATH makes it a huge hassle to compile/install Node. This AMI was born out of our own frustration with that process which I'm sure affects Linux distros other than just the Amazon Linux one.

EDIT: Removed lingo abuse.

View on HN

"real-time web apps"? C'mon, don't abuse the lingo man.

NAT? Who doesn't have IPv6 these days?

If I want to share my node app with someone, I just tell them to visit http://snowball2.jrock.us:4545/ and there we are.

(Really? -2? I am actually surprised that this is a problem. I have to share web apps with my friends, in both directions, regularly. It's never been a problem. Everyone has a publicly-routeable address these days.)

Sadly, not all ISPs allow this. I run into this frustration whenever I visit my parents. They use a wireless ISP which does not provide each customer with a public facing IP. They all share the same public IP address and therefore can not receive incoming connections.

It's quite frustrating.

Ah, but it's easy to get a publicly-routed IPv6 tunnel.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com