You're already doing it wrong. Camel caps? Eww.
uglyAsFuckAndAlmostUnreadable -> fail. acceptable_using_underscores -> better. using-hyphens-as-lisp-does -> great.
Ask HN: What Would you want in a government API?
31–40 of 40 posts
Re: Ask HN: What Would you want in a government API?
#32I'd like to see citizens issued with official public/private cryptographic key pairs. I think this would have the potential to hamper identity theft, enable legally meaningful electronic signatures, and bring encrypted/authenticated communication to the public.
It could be like a driver's license for the internet, and a post office franking mechanism at the same time.
Although seriously now would you want every blog comment tied to you with a digital signature, provably yours forever?
Re: Ask HN: What Would you want in a government API?
#33You're already doing it wrong. Camel caps? Eww. uglyAsFuckAndAlmostUnreadable -> fail. acceptable_using_underscores -> better. using-hyphens-as-lisp-does -> great.
heh.
Re: Ask HN: What Would you want in a government API?
#34At a different level of government, I'd like a real-time public transport api. Tell me where all the buses and trains are right now, and let me make sense of it for my website's visitors.
For the bay area, this exists. http://transit511.org
You mistyped the link? That seems to be a spam domain.
In London we have http://journeyplanner.tfl.gov.uk but there is no api and the user interface is shoddy.
Re: Ask HN: What Would you want in a government API?
#35Earlier quoted context omitted.
For the bay area, this exists. http://transit511.org
You mistyped the link? That seems to be a spam domain. In London we have http://journeyplanner.tfl.gov.uk but there is no api and the user interface is shoddy.
I missed a dot. It should be http://transit.511.org. Past the edit deadline unfortunately.
Re: Ask HN: What Would you want in a government API?
#36Earlier quoted context omitted.
You mistyped the link? That seems to be a spam domain. In London we have http://journeyplanner.tfl.gov.uk but there is no api and the user interface is shoddy.
I missed a dot. It should be http://transit.511.org . Past the edit deadline unfortunately.
Thanks.
There doesn't seem to be an api mentioned anywhere on that site. It appears to be for end users only. Am I missing something?
Re: Ask HN: What Would you want in a government API?
#37> I imagine it would create a thousands of government jobs, boost every sector of hardware sales, foster the creation of thousands of start ups and bring accountability and transparency to government, among other things.
The money you need to fund this stuff has to come from somewhere; hence destroying thousands of non-government jobs, slowing down every other sector of the economy and preventing the creation of thousands of startups.
Re: Ask HN: What Would you want in a government API?
#38shutdown()
I'd say it should be:
taxes shutdown()
but I have a feeling it would be void shutdown()...
Re: Ask HN: What Would you want in a government API?
#39I vote for the API equivalent of "svn blame".
It would be easy to implement:
return (DEMOCRATS == current_administration) ? REPUBLICANS : DEMOCRATS;
Re: Ask HN: What Would you want in a government API?
#40Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't know about e-mail - I've been locked out of several accounts, and have had a few scary false-positives with my spam filter. On the other hand, I doubt any spam is going to come from a .gov domain...
Email in addition to what we have now would only help, even if 30% of the emails sent weren't received.
I think the dangerous part is when other people receive them.