Hacker News Reader

martijn_himselfon Developers mentoring other developers: practices I've seen work well

It's a catch 22 situation because a lot of organisations expect folk to skill up but don't provide a formal structure to do so. I've worked on projects where I was helping out junior developers but criticised because it wasn't a profitable use of my time.

I agree with your point about "forced" mentoring though, some people just don't like to mentor so they shouldn't have to, but an organisation should encourage and reward it if it happens voluntary.

martijn_himselfon iPhone 11 Pro and iPhone 11 Pro Max

So the iPhone and iPad line-up look fine to me. Nothing exciting, but it doesn't have to be if you are upgrading every 2-3 years and you are a fan of Apple's tight integration of software and hardware.

The most worrying is the state of the App Store, a graveyard of abandoned apps and games. Apple Arcade looks like it will be such a missed opportunity. Why can I not develop full-fledged iPad apps on my iPad Pro?

The App Store used to be part of reviews of Apple's mobile devices, often giving it the edge over Android. Why is it not anymore?

martijn_himselfon The Horror of Microsoft Teams

In my experience Teams is often used alongside other 'channels of communication and collaboration' which makes it a burden more than anything else.

Ever since it was introduced it seems more like an unfinished tech experiment (but Slack felt the same to me). It seems to be designed with the aim of increasing productivity rather than making it easier to communicate with people.

martijn_himselfon Programming Fonts – Test Drive

I don't own a Mac at the minute but I must say Monaco is hands down the best programming font I've worked with.

Most of the fonts on this list don't even come close.

martijn_himselfon Apple tells suppliers to produce 10% fewer new iPhones

I couldn't agree more. The other, perhaps equally worrying thing is that the App Store is becoming a graveyard of abandoned and unsupported (as in not running on newer versions of iOS) apps drowned out by apps and games designed to fleece (vulnerable) people.

Instead of curating the store and promoting quality apps and games Apple is actively promoting the 'evil' apps. Apple should be working with apps and games publishers on other platforms to port their successful titles to iOS- instead Apple is only interested in taking their 'cut'.

martijn_himselfon Fibre:A WebGL application for visualizing 3D vector fields and dynamical systems

Yes, that's what I thought. So are these pretty pictures visualisations of scalar fields?

EDIT: or maybe like iso-lines (is that what you call them?) lines connecting points with the same value?

martijn_himselfon Army's £113M recruitment website 'was 52 months late'

That sound really interesting, I'm sure there are lots of subtleties to working for the armed forces that wouldn't become apparent to an outside contractor that would come in even if it was for multiple years.

Also these big contractors would usually customize existing (CRM) products to deliver these projects, many of them may not be a good fit.

martijn_himselfon Army's £113M recruitment website 'was 52 months late'

These projects are incredibly complex that fail for a variety of reasons, most of them to do with politics, conflicting requirements, too many stakeholders and decision makers, and too many people with little to no interest in or grasp of the technology involved.

First and foremost the lesson should be that the army should have its own dedicated IT department.

Also, any company peddling 'digital transformation' should be a red flag to start with.

martijn_himselfon Exploring the .NET Core Runtime

I have no familiarity with Java but I'm not surprised you are more productive with Python, Flask and Django (although you are conflating languages and frameworks to some extent here) versus C# and .NET Core's way of building API's and web applications.

I have been developing in C# for years and I still prefer Python's simplicity over C# and .NET. C# and .NET just seems to have too many concepts, indirection, and 'enterpriseyness' for my liking. This is alleviated by things like LINQ, but still an issue for me.

martijn_himselfon Microsoft Wins $480M Army HoloLens Contract

It definitely would be I suppose. However the current gen HoloLens is not much more then a tech demo for use in a controlled environment, pretty much the opposite from the envisaged use case.

martijn_himselfon Microsoft Wins $480M Army HoloLens Contract

This seems to be a typical case of someone in charge of a budget having to spend it otherwise it will be allocated elsewhere.

Either they have access to a completely improved device or expect a lot of devices being chucked out by aggravated servicemen. The current gen HoloLens is not much more than a toy.

martijn_himselfon Blazor, a framework for browser-based .NET apps using WebAssembly [video]

This is quite enlightening in that I'm very excited by the prospect of using C# in the browser without the downsides that came with Silverlight, but especially 1) seems to be a big negative! (I'm not sure I completely understand 2) and 3), does 2) only apply to server-side Blazor? Is 3) not inherent to all web development in that authentication on the client is 'disconnected' from users/ permissions on the server anyway?).

As someone who is trying to wrap his head around all this, did they go with server side Blazor because browsers do not support all required WASM features yet? What is even the point of server side rendering?

martijn_himselfon Elon Musk unveils first tourist for SpaceX 'Moon loop'

SpaceX has delivered reusable rockets, which is one of the holy grails of space travel.

martijn_himselfon The iPhone Franchise

I agree with you on the smart watch and wireless earbuds (although perhaps the latter can hardly be called an achievement given the amount of resources Apple has).

They also managed to all but ruin their computing product line, to the point where people prefer to use ancient machines over recent ones.

martijn_himselfon The iPhone Franchise

Sure, Apple still makes the best smartphones and will sustain its current momentum and cash flow for the foreseeable future.

It has gone from a company built around its products to a company focusing on its shareholders with a CEO that is absolutely clueless when it comes to product development.

It's sad but surprising? No.

martijn_himselfon Google Maps is no longer a flat map

Google Maps must be one of the modern wonders of the world, it's still nothing short of breathtaking to zoom out of streetview in crowded London and then land somewhere on a country crossroads in remote Vietnam.

martijn_himselfon Japanese Writing After Murakami

I think one of the things I like about Murakami is that his writing doesn't feel pretentious and is matter-of-factly, even though most of it is quite fantastical.

I really can't bear pretentiousness in writing (or music).

martijn_himselfon macOS High Sierra: Anyone can login as “root” with empty password

I really don't think that to be the case. Quality on OS X was a priority in its own right and fundamental to everything at Apple, not just a by-product of a strategy to get people to move from Windows.

Of course all that changed when its only priority became to shift more iPhones, and everything became secondary to that.

martijn_himselfon Street View of 80s NYC

How appropriate. I was just watching Simon and Garfunkel perform 'The Boxer' in Central Park, 1981 on YouTube.

martijn_himselfon Apple Watch Series 3

I put in the comment and I then I thought you probably were :).

martijn_himselfon Apple Watch Series 3

I understand- and I am in two minds whether this would be a good thing or not- especially because of the control aspect of it.

martijn_himselfon Apple Watch Series 3

My comment was slightly tongue in cheek as I get where he is coming from. I suppose it could be an optional feature, or a way to differentiate the product.

martijn_himselfon Apple Watch Series 3

I suppose so. I guess I'm just arguing this is a bizarre feature request.

He is out on a run. Will it need a separate processor for image stabilization because he is running?

martijn_himselfon Apple Watch Series 3

You could share it by talking about it.

martijn_himselfon Apple Watch Series 3

A camera is the one thing I miss when I leave my iPhone at home and go for a run. I have no idea how a camera could work ergonomically on a watch. Maybe it’s just not feasible. But it is mildly frustrating when I’m out on a run and see something interesting that I’d like to photograph.

Why can't you just enjoy that something interesting there and then? Do we really need to capture everything and share it with everyone?

EDIT: slightly tongue in cheek but curious nonetheless.

martijn_himselfon iPhone X

I'm more than happy to pay £1k for the iPhone X if it docks and I'm able to use it as a Mac Mini running MacOS. It should be powerful enough.

martijn_himselfon If Carpenters Were Hired Like Programmers (2004)

I agree. I also read somewhere that talking about past behaviors (e.g. how you solved a complex issue) is the best indicator for competency (I can't back that up with sources sorry).

On a side note I also worked with RFID readers, they were yesteryear's Internet of Things :).

martijn_himselfon If Carpenters Were Hired Like Programmers (2004)

I suppose that is fair enough, and I don't think there is anything wrong with it being one of the ways in which companies assess potential candidates.

From my recent experience (and anecdotal evidence) it seemed it was becoming a deal breaker for companies but maybe I reached that conclusion too quickly.

martijn_himselfon If Carpenters Were Hired Like Programmers (2004)

That's interesting. For companies I have approached recently it was the first question they asked. Maybe it depends on the kind of company (for me it was mainly start-ups).

martijn_himselfon If Carpenters Were Hired Like Programmers (2004)

I think this is a great way of hiring people. With certain caveats of course: your company must give candidates, preferably one at a time, an honest chance and not exploit them to get leaky roofs fixed for free.