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Ask HN: What do you wish someone would build?

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Re: Ask HN: What do you wish someone would build?

#181

Post by jlengrand »

cromulent wrote: post #176

A non-cloud off-site backup appliance. This is what I want (I know there are alternatives, but this is what I want): A device that I buy, and can plug at least one hard drive in to. I give it some sort of passphrase. I then place it in a friend's house and connect it to their internet connection. I can then access it remotely from my house. I can easily backup my stuff to it. My backups are encrypted, both over the w…

Hey there,

I know it does not totally answer your request, but you totally can achieve that with Crashplan; and for free. Simply buy a NAS or equivalent, place it at your parents and install Crashplan on it.

It is not as perfect as a totally untied system like you want, but it is free and offsite :).

I am a happy customer of Crashplan for a while but other than that I have no ties there :).

https://www.crashplan.com/en-us/

Re: Ask HN: What do you wish someone would build?

#182

Post by Hondor »

gcb0 wrote: post #90

A decent portable computer. Obscenely large, replaceable battery. small screen (1080p or 720p at 10~13in) that i can actually slide up when open so i don't have to look down and kill my neck/back. decent mechanical keyboard at least 90% size (like the eeepc1000) it can be low on CPU but should have the most connectivity it can. It can weight a little more than a 15" gaming laptop weights today.

For laptops with removable batteries, you can buy aftermarket extra-sized batteries. They double as a stand which helps with your screen height problem too.

Re: Ask HN: What do you wish someone would build?

#183

Post by cromulent »

jlengrand wrote: post #181
cromulent wrote: post #176

A non-cloud off-site backup appliance. This is what I want (I know there are alternatives, but this is what I want): A device that I buy, and can plug at least one hard drive in to. I give it some sort of passphrase. I then place it in a friend's house and connect it to their internet connection. I can then access it remotely from my house. I can easily backup my stuff to it. My backups are encrypted, both over the w…

Hey there, I know it does not totally answer your request, but you totally can achieve that with Crashplan; and for free. Simply buy a NAS or equivalent, place it at your parents and install Crashplan on it. It is not as perfect as a totally untied system like you want, but it is free and offsite :). I am a happy customer of Crashplan for a while but other than that I have no ties there :). https://www.crashplan.com/…

Yeah, I think it is close but not quite. It seems that you can back up to a friend's trusted computer, but it has to be turned on. Plus I don't necessarily want to trust them in that way.

Re: Ask HN: What do you wish someone would build?

#185

Post by lgas »

hitsurume wrote: post #70

I want Jarvis, literally the AI in the Iron Man movie. I want him to converse banter and operate my computers / servers with whatever I need, and do it FAST. Siri and Google are doing good things, but I want something I can host myself so its quick, responsive and feels like i'm talking to a real person.

https://github.com/felixrieseberg/JARVIS

is a start...

Re: Ask HN: What do you wish someone would build?

#186

Post by [deleted] »

hitsurume wrote: post #70

I want Jarvis, literally the AI in the Iron Man movie. I want him to converse banter and operate my computers / servers with whatever I need, and do it FAST. Siri and Google are doing good things, but I want something I can host myself so its quick, responsive and feels like i'm talking to a real person.

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: What do you wish someone would build?

#187

Post by StavrosK »

DdCb7Qlk2lyaw wrote: post #102
StavrosK wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If there was a billion dollar company to build on this premise, someone would have. In practice, users don't care about having to install five different messengers and not using their own clients.

Do you suggest that all billion dollar companies have been already founded and there's nothing new which can be done? I find such way of thinking harmful.

No, I suggest that all billion dollar messaging companies that don't lock their users in have already been founded. I would love nothing more than to be proven wrong.

Re: Ask HN: What do you wish someone would build?

#188

Post by firewalkwithme »

cromulent wrote: post #176

A non-cloud off-site backup appliance. This is what I want (I know there are alternatives, but this is what I want): A device that I buy, and can plug at least one hard drive in to. I give it some sort of passphrase. I then place it in a friend's house and connect it to their internet connection. I can then access it remotely from my house. I can easily backup my stuff to it. My backups are encrypted, both over the w…

I want exactly the same thing!

Re: Ask HN: What do you wish someone would build?

#189

Post by radmuzom »

_delirium wrote: post #177
tajen wrote: post #174

A paid Linux. To get stunning UX design, upstream bugfixing and excellent marketing. Let me explain myself. I love the levels of ergonomy and polish of Mac OS X. But it's closed-source software. If I use (and pay) Ubuntu, then great patches are sent upstream, which I can use in Debian on my servers and Arduinos. It becomes useful to everyone. With Mac OS X, we're not advancing the world. But when I used Ubuntu for wo…

Would something like Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) or SuSE fit what you're looking for (both are paid, commercial Linux distributions), or am I misunderstanding?

I think the OP is thinking more from the general consumer perspective. Not sure whether RHEL or SuSE targets this market.

Interestingly, I had similar thoughts years back - https://www.quora.com/Has-any-company-tried-the-Apple-busine...

Re: Ask HN: What do you wish someone would build?

#190

Post by carussell »

_delirium wrote: post #177
tajen wrote: post #174

A paid Linux. To get stunning UX design, upstream bugfixing and excellent marketing. Let me explain myself. I love the levels of ergonomy and polish of Mac OS X. But it's closed-source software. If I use (and pay) Ubuntu, then great patches are sent upstream, which I can use in Debian on my servers and Arduinos. It becomes useful to everyone. With Mac OS X, we're not advancing the world. But when I used Ubuntu for wo…

Would something like Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) or SuSE fit what you're looking for (both are paid, commercial Linux distributions), or am I misunderstanding?

I've thought about this phenomenon a lot:

The problem is that if you start giving your money to some group that could be working on the things that are most important to you, but they aren't working in that direction yet, then your support is understood to be a mandate for what they're already doing. Waiting until they're actually doing the things you want them to do before you start sending money their way doesn't work, because the point is to be the thing that incentivizes them to move in the direction you want.

This isn't so subtle that it's impossible to talk about and be understood, and it might work if your case is one that involves you being a patron for an individual or small group (e.g., through Patron). But for large, shambling, Red Hat-sized organizations, the message is one that's nuanced enough that you can pretty much count on it going uncaught.

But even for small groups, there needs to be a way to send the signal "please don't take this to mean that you can't stop doing the exact thing that you're doing now or else you'll disappoint; by all means, experiment on new stuff".

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