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How a 19-Year-Old Raised $5 Million to Revolutionize Search

inc.com

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Re: How a 19-Year-Old Raised $5 Million to Revolutionize Search

#21

Post by ashish_0x90 »

iworkforthem wrote: post #4

easy to click Greplin Programming Challenge: http://challenge.greplin.com/ Anyone managed to pass level 1? I am stuck at level 1. Please share the logic.

I did manage to solve all three problems and I really liked the way the problems were put up on the website.

Anyway, I would still suggest trying for some more time before looking at the solution that that I have provided here - https://gist.github.com/849813 .

The first problem itself took me most of the time. All this time I was trying to come up with a optimal approach (and was stuck in some boundary condition in implementation for Approach 1) until I realized that even a brute force solution will work in this case because of the smaller text input.

Re: How a 19-Year-Old Raised $5 Million to Revolutionize Search

#22

Post by Natsu »

iworkforthem wrote: post #4

easy to click Greplin Programming Challenge: http://challenge.greplin.com/ Anyone managed to pass level 1? I am stuck at level 1. Please share the logic.

It was posted to HN ages ago. Several people, myself included, passed it. Brute force is sufficient; you don't really need any clever algorithms.

Just spend a few minutes thinking about what you know about palindromes and what they look like and it shouldn't be too hard to code.

Re: How a 19-Year-Old Raised $5 Million to Revolutionize Search

#23

Post by Natsu »

RiderOfGiraffes wrote: post #14
iworkforthem wrote: post #4

easy to click Greplin Programming Challenge: http://challenge.greplin.com/ Anyone managed to pass level 1? I am stuck at level 1. Please share the logic.

What a crock - the second challenge requires calling a USA phone number. Color me unimpressed.

The last time it was posted, they had an alternative. I don't know if it's still up, though. I'd check the previous story, though.

Re: How a 19-Year-Old Raised $5 Million to Revolutionize Search

#26

Post by pbiggar »

kouiskas wrote: post #20

It looks like he's using APIs, which means that he can only index as much data as the services are willing to provide. They can squeeze him out of business by shutting down or reducing access to the data whenever they please. Or just add to their API TOS that keeping a cached copy of the data is a no go. The service would lose a lot of relevance if suddenly one of the main players like Facebook decided that they don'…

Why would they do that? That's what the APIs are for.

Re: How a 19-Year-Old Raised $5 Million to Revolutionize Search

#28

Post by blhack »

iworkforthem wrote: post #4

easy to click Greplin Programming Challenge: http://challenge.greplin.com/ Anyone managed to pass level 1? I am stuck at level 1. Please share the logic.

Holy crap this is fun.

I'm stuck on level 3 right now. The way I'm doing it is probably very very stupid, but I think it will work :)

(I'm trying to brute force it. I may look back at this as very very stupid, but we'll see).

This could get filed under: "Ways to denial-of-service Ryan".

Love it. Thanks to whoever set up the challenge.

Re: How a 19-Year-Old Raised $5 Million to Revolutionize Search

#29

Post by kouiskas »

pbiggar wrote: post #26
kouiskas wrote: post #20

It looks like he's using APIs, which means that he can only index as much data as the services are willing to provide. They can squeeze him out of business by shutting down or reducing access to the data whenever they please. Or just add to their API TOS that keeping a cached copy of the data is a no go. The service would lose a lot of relevance if suddenly one of the main players like Facebook decided that they don'…

Why would they do that? That's what the APIs are for.

Facebook already updates their API and policies very regularly, nothing they give an application access to can be given for granted in the long term. Especially when it deals with private content.

When your service is dependent on another, you're always at the mercy of an update that can shut down the API feature you were using, whether the intention is to kill your service or not.

In this case it seems like the goal of the website is to become a starting point for a person's browsing/searching experience, facebook and google want the same thing. If they feel threatened they could cut just stop Greplin in particular from accessing their API. It's not hard for them to update their API terms of service to make that kind of use forbidden, for instance. That kind of tactic has been used in the past.

That's why I see a lot of uncertainty in the future of that service. I'm not worried about the founder and the company, though, their most likely exit is a talent acquisition by Facebook or Google.

Re: How a 19-Year-Old Raised $5 Million to Revolutionize Search

#30

Post by lysium »

RiderOfGiraffes wrote: post #14
iworkforthem wrote: post #4

easy to click Greplin Programming Challenge: http://challenge.greplin.com/ Anyone managed to pass level 1? I am stuck at level 1. Please share the logic.

What a crock - the second challenge requires calling a USA phone number. Color me unimpressed.

There's an alternative, just click the provided link: http://challenge.greplin.com/static/nophone.html
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