cmeranda

Have you tried just getting him to read the Wikipedia page? It describes how those gases circulate and how it was discovered. Particularly the "Misconceptions" section. Also the shape of the depletion is not shuttle-sized AFAIK. Finally remind him of rain, or a house in a tornado. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ozone_depletion

IMHO this is a fantastic way to make sweet, very flavorful iced coffee without it being too weak or containing an acidic aftertaste. On especially hot days it's nice to freeze some into large square or spherical ice cubes to put in glasses of iced coffee later. Serious Eats also has a great article on cold brewing:

http://drinks.seriouseats.com/2012/04/best-way-to-make-cold-...

It is interesting that sometimes being in a new environment can promote creativity and even discipline (for instance, it's easier for me to work continuously on a plane--which I'm doing right now--than when I'm in our home office because I perceive I have less choice: not sure what that says about me). And I agree that if I'm doing performance testing or adding a mellow feature, then sure, throw me in the middle of Cirque du Soleil and I'll be fine.

But I would challenge the idea that complex programming problems (cloud sync, NLP, etc, choose your poison) can be solved equally well in a suboptimal environment. Here is my "hypothesis": unregulated noise[1], temperature[2], and other travel-centric environmental factors (such as the need for vigilance in a new environment) distract from cognitive performance in the majority of people, if not all people.

[1] http://peterhancock.ucf.edu/Downloads/ref_pubs/Szalma_Hancoc... [2] http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1600-0668.2004....

To be clear, I don't think it is possible to write my best code in a park, an airplane or a café, regardless of mood. But I would be curious to see relevant studies which demonstrate otherwise. I agree that changes in environment are stimulating and that stagnant workplaces hold their own dangers.

I also agree that 2-3 months is a good baseline for getting to know a place: you don't feel as jostled about by your schedule, and there may even be time for cursory grasp of the language (w/some prepping beforehand) and making a friend or two. Plus you don't have to cram your (potentially expensive) excursions into as short a block of time.

Programming (for me) occurs at the apex of an extended Maslow's type hierarchy, and traveling often destroys the very foundations of it. The code I write when sleep-deprived, hungover, hungry, sunburnt, and sitting on a bumpy Thai train wondering if I missed my stop and wishing there was internet & coffee, is strongly inferior to what I write in a well-lit, quiet environment, fed, rested, fueled by engineering conversation and mental/real bandwidth, etc. That's not a proscription of adventure so much as an acknowledgement that the whole nature of adventure is disruptive: multiple variables in your equation are changing at rapid rates, and they are important variables: food, shelter, language, currency. Over our two-year stint in Asia, we usually found ourselves in one of two situations: 1) blissfully immersed in the culture and outdoor activities of <x> country but contending with unreliable internet, limited work time and near-nonexistent attention spans, or 2) sitting on a nice nondescript hotel bed somewhere with A/C, good wifi and our tiny MacBook Air screens, and feeling like we may as well have not left the US at all.

We're a two person development team who sits in the same 5 foot radius and we've had to merge xibs semi-frequently. It's not overly viable to ask the person next to you what files they plan to work on in the hour, because that can be difficult to determine in advance. Additionally once I upgraded Xcode before my partner, and suddenly our xibs were out of sync. In terms of one person working on the UI, even if that's the case, the other person might change an outlet, or create a non-UI object in the xib. It's complicated to coordinate changes because the breadth of features (as they appear in the codebase) is unpredictable.

Even if they self-correct, it's how they'll be treated. They just tapped into a massive vein of loathing for vague DMCA notices (particularly on the design trend front), and did it quite effectively. In the case of incendiary actions with ugly consequences, once is enough to brand you.

I have to wonder if training and repetition might make a difference there; for instance, after a week of doing computations while walking, can your friend now multiply faster? The mind is an efficient adapter. It would also be interesting to discover what qualifies as exercise in those studies, and if the benefits of increased circulation and possibly a clearer airway based on improved posture, which presumably also increase brain function, could offset the glucose depletion.

Yeah, the glamour goes quick, that's for sure. But when it goes it reveals the bones of the thing, and that can be good. A fast learner and thorough problem solver will find work in programming, IMHO, competition be damned.

Personally, I didn't learn very much in my college CS studies (incidentally, I was also in Marine Corps ROTC at the time at VA Tech). My cofounder, who studied at UCLA, whistles a very different tune, but I don't think his education has been a determining factor in his success as a programmer. I think that for me, the missing impetus was money: once coding became about a paycheck and an actual customer, that's when I began to love it. Pure theory just doesn't turn me on. You might consider that what you're lacking isn't education, but motivation: find a good problem to solve, and fill in the blanks of your skills from there.

All this to say, starting at a young age is not the sole determining factor of success in programming, and having a CS degree may not get you where you want to go. Recommendation: if it's possible for you financially, apply to a startup whose mission you find compelling, lie brazenly on your résumé, and take the risk of being fired.

I agree with the majority of this but would like to add that founding your own startup and keeping it ultra lightweight can gain you these same freedoms on a higher income.

Don't take on investors: make a product that earns money. Don't hire full or part time employees: find intelligent automated solutions to tricky problems or bring on contractors as necessary. Having control over what you make and when you make it means (for me, at least) more sleep, more money and less wasted time making someone else's dream a reality.

I suppose that's a temporal difference...you had it, then you ate it. It appears that both things are possible, given sufficient duration and stomach.

You could actually perceive women-only gyms and scholarships as a response to events such as this. How would you react to being told your presence caused bad behavior, and so you'd been disallowed? Why, you'd create a space from whence you couldn't be removed--by making yourself the only entity. However, that's not to say it is an ideal solution. Also, I've never really understood that aphorism, "Can't have your cake and eat it." WTF was the point of giving me the damn cake if I can't eat it?

We'd like to eventually create a few templates to choose from that have more of our look and feel. Thanks for the advice, glad to know others feel the same way!

Ah that's brilliant! Love it. We could definitely track calls and maybe directions as well.

Great suggestions, thank you. Would love to target the Chinese takeout market, that's spectacular, although the restaurants we've spoken to so far in that corner are somewhat frugal/take more convincing :)

See I think that statement is a fallacy. Restaurant owners began to believe in the power of websites when other restaurants began having them and HN-type people began using them, and they saw what a great tool the internet is to draw more business and promote themselves. HN-type people (love this hyphen) create the groundswell by which businesses recognize what direction to go in, and restaurant owners are no different, just a little later to the party because they've been cooking the meals.

We've got a lot of numbers in our minds, that's for sure. We do believe that 1000 clients is a possibility in a landscape of potentially millions worldwide, but a lot of that depends on how much traction we can acquire in the restaurant community.

We've been wondering: what's the business model there? How are you dealing with development and hosting costs?

I think the key word here is "required". Most of the restaurants we've spoken to are averse to the idea of having to promote a new piece of technology because of the time and effort that involves. This gives them the opportunity to make the decision about promoting it--restaurant websites deemed "bad neighborhoods" might choose otherwise :)

Hmmm, good idea, maybe I'll change that.

Thanks for your feedback! This sounds precisely like what we're encountering right now: restaurants are uncertain why people would want to see their site on a phone and how it increases their bottom line. We'd like to educate them and show them that customer discovery = ROI, but we're not sure how to evaluate that in our context. Some people here have suggested success stories, which we think is fantastic.

Well I've got to give you credit for saying it to our faces, considering I designed that site. Now on the count of 3, tell me how a software engineer with no design experience can figure out in under a month how to put together a full-featured web application with a frontend, user control panel and admin interface and still worry about the uniqueness of the landing page graphic design? My real concern was that it worked and it communicated our message.

Edit: I should mention that I totally agree with your comment. Can't wait to hire a graphic designer :)

I used freeprivacypolicy.com for the PP and ToS from Wordpress, however I modified both of them extensively due to people warning me against the Wordpress ToS being basically like Calvinball. A caveat: freeprivacypolicy.com WILL continue to send you email until time literally ends or our planet is sucked into a black hole.

Thanks for the input, I'll validate our blog tonight. We do extensive testing and validation of our mobile sites on many mobile platforms but obviously were sadly neglectful of our Wordpress blog. Doh!

We're very interested in expanding the product to include a desktop website version as well for a nominal monthly upgrade. The reason we didn't start out there is because we felt the mobile lure was a little stronger, due to the fact that many restaurants already have websites. Do you think the product would be more compelling if it offered both from the outset?

That whole vertical idea is brilliant: if we could convince a handful of pizza joints it would give other like restaurants a high level of motivation to join them. What type of restaurants do you think we should target? Who would most benefit from a mobile site?

I've heard the general POS term of existence is 2-5 years, so a lot of restaurants might be inclined to upgrade I would think. However, restaurant owners can be a suspicious lot, and they require more than proof-of-concept by early adopters (not even sure who those would be) to convince them.

We think it's worth the time and the money, and we agree that the current clunky, antiquated hardware and counterintuitive software is a disgrace. It's one of those ideas (upgrading restaurants) whose time is fast approaching.

Holy crap icons are apparently affordable from iconshock, as are logos! I was imagining like $1000+ for a logo, never having commissioned one myself. Thanks!

Great points, and we agree wholeheartedly. Most of our cold calls to restaurants have terminated in "We're just not interested" or "We have a website." Wish there was a way to take all of this feedback and channel it directly to them (or perhaps we need to work on our sales pitches? :) )

Like the Chinese restaurant idea. Wonder how receptive they'd be to changing their phone order system.

I very much like the Apple bite idea with the C, and you're right, I've already made our site so Web 2.0 that what's a little nudge further? :) I'll get in touch with you, thanks.

We'd like to do one in Python/HTML5, open-source, cloud-based server. Not sure about device interaction though, and can you imagine the sales cycle? Yikes. Are people on HN interested in being part of a project like that? We weren't sure (at ChompStack) that we could get enough developer interest, and it's a big project. We've written touchscreen software for restaurants before, for about 5 yrs.