Hacker News Reader

br0keon Ask HN: Freelancer? Seeking freelancer? (July 2015)

Seeking work: USA/Baltimore|Remote

Hi, I'm currently focusing on iOS for internal business apps and startups exploring adding an iOS client to their offering. I spent over a decade developing internal tools to improve workflow in environments that require high reliability (FedEx, US Army Research Lab, etc).

iOS dev (Native/ObjC), backend dev (C, ObjC, C++, PHP, Ruby, scheme, common lisp, java), SysAdmin/config (fbsd,obsd,solaris,linux)

https://elfga.com/~erik/resume/Erik_Greenwald.pdf

https://github.com/erikg

http://sourceforge.net/users/erikgreenwald

https://www.linkedin.com/in/erikgreenwald

https://www.elfga.com/~erik/

erik@elfga.com

br0keon Ask HN: Freelancer? Seeking freelancer? (June 2015)

Seeking work: USA/Baltimore|Remote

iOS dev (Native/ObjC), backend dev (C, ObjC, C++, PHP, Ruby, scheme, common lisp, java), SysAdmin/config (fbsd,obsd,solaris,linux)

https://elfga.com/~erik/resume/Erik_Greenwald.pdf

https://github.com/erikg

http://sourceforge.net/users/erikgreenwald

https://www.linkedin.com/in/erikgreenwald

https://www.elfga.com/~erik/

erik@elfga.com

br0keon Ask HN: Freelancer? Seeking freelancer? (May 2015)

Seeking work: USA/Baltimore|Remote

iOS dev (Native/ObjC), backend dev (C, ObjC, C++, PHP, Ruby, scheme, common lisp, java), SysAdmin/config (fbsd,obsd,solaris,linux)

https://elfga.com/~erik/resume/Erik_Greenwald.pdf

https://github.com/erikg

http://sourceforge.net/users/erikgreenwald

https://www.linkedin.com/in/erikgreenwald

https://www.elfga.com/~erik/

erik@elfga.com

br0keon Ask HN: Freelancer? Seeking freelancer? (April 2015)

Seeking work: USA/Baltimore|Remote

iOS dev (Native/ObjC), backend dev (C, ObjC, C++, PHP, Ruby, scheme, common lisp, java), SysAdmin/config (fbsd,obsd,solaris,linux)

https://elfga.com/~erik/resume/Erik_Greenwald.pdf

https://github.com/erikg

http://sourceforge.net/users/erikgreenwald

https://www.linkedin.com/in/erikgreenwald

https://www.elfga.com/~erik/

erik@elfga.com

br0keon Ask HN: Freelancer? Seeking freelancer? (March 2015)

Seeking work: USA/Baltimore|Remote

iOS dev (Native/ObjC), backend dev (C, ObjC, C++, PHP, Ruby, scheme, common lisp, java), SysAdmin/config (fbsd,obsd,solaris,linux)

https://elfga.com/~erik/resume/Erik_Greenwald.pdf

https://github.com/erikg

http://sourceforge.net/users/erikgreenwald

https://www.linkedin.com/in/erikgreenwald

https://www.elfga.com/~erik/

erik@elfga.com

br0keon Ask HN: Freelancer? Seeking freelancer? (February 2015)

Seeking work: USA/Baltimore|Remote

iOS dev (Native/ObjC), backend dev (C, ObjC, C++, PHP, Ruby, scheme, common lisp, java), SysAdmin/config (fbsd,obsd,solaris,linux)

https://elfga.com/~erik/resume/Erik_Greenwald.pdf

https://github.com/erikg

http://sourceforge.net/users/erikgreenwald

https://www.linkedin.com/in/erikgreenwald

https://www.elfga.com/~erik/

erik@elfga.com

br0keon How to Recreate a Sloppy Ancient Greek Drinking Game

The article says "West Chester University of Pennsylvania"...

br0keon Spreading a little Christmas job-hunting hope

Grats on the job!

I hear you about the anxiety. I managed to land an interview with nvidia in 2001 and was so nervous that I couldn't eat or sleep for the 24 hours before the start of the interview (then ate lunch with them at their cafeteria and was wolfing food down like an animal). Didn't fare well, but a year later of hunting and working as a substitute teacher, I ended up working with a great team at FedEx for a while and went to being a "computer scientist" at the army research lab after that.

Anxiety is a challenge, but it can be overcome! I'm even in the process of starting with "toastmasters" to get me out of my comfort zone and learn how to be "on" around strangers.

Again, congratulations and thanks for sharing!

br0keon Ongoing MacKeeper fraud

purge(8) flushes and clears the disk buffers, which is not the issue that kills me with my old macbook with 4G ram.

It looks like disk cache expiration is slow and tends to kick in when it's a bit too late. With the speed that modern apps chew through memory, I'm sent into a swap thrash and get sluggish response and beachballs.

MemoryKeeper on the App store seems to mostly clear the file cache and do some -fu to compact memory (maybe it's a memory defragment, the docs are a little lacking in technical details.) When I manually run it, everything runs great until the free memory dries up and I'm back in that alloc/swapthrash/cachepurge cycle again.

I wrote a tiny C program for linux to force cache expirations (in a very sloppy but reasonably portable way) back in '98 that I've started using again on osX, it fixes the issue and runs quite a bit quicker than MemoryKeeper. I can make it available if anyone else wants it.

br0keon Ask HN: Hackers who cook

1. Fun. The preparation and cooking (and subsequent eating) is a good change of pace and can be zen-like

2. Not really. I plan special dishes once every couple of weeks, but have enough stuff on my 'normal' weekly grocery list that I can do a fair variety

3. Beef stroganoff, lo mein, stromboli, spaghetti, fajitas, tabbouleh, sushi rolls, steak&baked potatoes, etc

4. No, though I've been trying to reduce fat and cholesterol with low/no fat versions or substitutions (greek yogurt instead of sour cream, ground turkey, etc)

5. Mise en place (prepare everything before turning anything on). Experiment; tweak the recipes and try new things. Don't go cheap on essential equipment (knives, pots&pans). Try doing things without countertop appliances (fresh ravioli with a rolling pin and knife, hand kneed breads, mince with a knife instead of using a food processor, etc) to learn what to look for. Have fun cooking so you do it more often and it's a positive thing :)

br0keon Ask HN: Do you still use an RSS reader?

I'm using TinyTinyRSS (ttrss) right now. After google reader was shut down, I was using both ttrss and theoldreader, but found that theoldreader was missing a significant number of entries. Then theoldreader set a cap of 100 feeds for free accounts and removed 30 of my feeds (taking me from 102 to 72...) so now I'm just using ttrss. Open source, has a decent user interface plus free ios apps.

br0keon Ask HN: Freelancer? Seeking freelancer? (July 2014)

Seeking work: USA/Baltimore|Remote

SysAdmin/config (fbsd,obsd,solaris,linux), backend dev (C, ObjC, PHP, Ruby, Scheme, Common Lisp, C++, Java, SQL), iOS dev

https://elfga.com/~erik/ erik@elfga.com

br0keon Ask HN: How do you sell in a new programming language?

sell the result, not the medium. I've written code for fortune 100 companies and gov't agencies in "crazy" languages like scheme and lisp... I didn't say what technology I was going to use, I just told them what the result and cost would be.

br0keon Stop the autoconf insanity – Why we need a new build system (2003)

Yes! A former coworker dug up my old O2 running a 6.5 variant, installed cmake and built BRL-CAD ( http://brlcad.org/ ) with it. Supposedly, it worked quite well (but took a very long time, I believe it was a low end cpu, I want to say 183mhz). Given that I rewrote the build system in 2003 for BRL-CAD to use automake instead of cake, I'm very impressed by cmake.

br0keon Ask HN: How to increase self-discipline as a self-employed person?

"I'm just saying, what works on planet Gelgamek isn't necessarily goin' ta work for the rest of us here, on Earth."

br0keon Paid maternity leave world maps for mothers and fathers

I think your numbers might be outdated, we're paying ~1200/mo in a fairly rural area outside of the baltimore area (not exactly known for wealth) for the cheapest "professional" daycare for about 4h a day, as the child is in kindergarden and only needs 3-4 hours a day of extra help. I'm told that the upper end daycare (across the street) is more like 4-5k/mo in the same semi-rural area.

br0keon Ask HN: How much savings did you have before quitting your industry job?

I think it's better to count in time rather than dollars... I just quit last week with approx 14mo, but I'm just starting so who knows if it was a good move :)

br0keon Ask HN: Have you settled on a Google Reader replacement?

I'm also using theooldreader, but find that updates are sometimes slow and it seems to miss some stuff, so I've been using an install of tinytinyrss as well

br0keon Amnesty Int'l: Don't Call Female Genital Mutilation "Barbaric"

I think there might be a growing group that look at 'barbaric' as the classic latin variant of "them frrnrs", so the word changes from 'bad person' to 'slightly different person by culture' and diminishing the impact and altering the meaning...

br0keon Ask HN: Your stack of choice for web development?

freebsd, apache, sbcl, ucw, postgresql/cl-store, bootstrap, jquery

br0keon Ask HN: Freelancer? Seeking freelancer? (February 2013)

Seeking work: USA/Baltimore|Remote

iOS dev (Native/ObjC), backend dev (C, ObjC, PHP, Ruby, scheme, common lisp, java, python), SysAdmin/config (fbsd,obsd,solaris,linux)

http://www.elfga.com/~erik/ erik@elfga.com

br0keon Ask HN: What's your blog?

http://elfga.com/blog/ lisp, ucw, ios programming, bootstrap, ajax, open source, and whatever else

br0keon Ask HN: Do you use a time tracker for client work?

vim proj.log

:r!date

br0keon IRC is dead, long live IRC

I hope IRC isn't dead, I'm hoping to productize my replacement for cia.vc ( http://elfga.com/notify ) for startups

br0keon Ask HN: Freelancer? Seeking freelancer? (January 2013)

Seeking work: USA/Baltimore|Remote

SysAdmin/config (fbsd,obsd,solaris,linux), backend dev (C, ObjC, Java, PHP, Ruby, scheme, common lisp), ios/android dev

http://www.elfga.com/~erik/ erik@elfga.com

br0keon Ask HN: Freelancer? Seeking freelancer? (November 2012)

Seeking work: USA/Baltimore|Remote

iOS dev (Native/ObjC), backend dev (C, ObjC, PHP, Ruby, scheme, common lisp, java), SysAdmin/config (fbsd,obsd,solaris,linux)

https://www.elfga.com/~erik/ erik@elfga.com

br0keon Ask HN: In which class do you learn about threading

The university I went to covered threading in the operating systems class (4th year undergrad), iirc. Working through an online tutorial for java concurrency might be beneficial?

br0keon Ask HN: Freelancer? Seeking freelancer? (October 2012)

Seeking work: USA/Baltimore|Remote

SysAdmin/config (fbsd,obsd,solaris,linux), backend dev (C, ObjC, PHP, Ruby, scheme, common lisp), ios dev

https://www.elfga.com/~erik/ erik@elfga.com

br0keon Code Janitor: nobody's dream, everyone's job

I'm a big fan of it, myself. We call it 'code gardening' on my team, and I find it has a similar zen like aspect.