Earlier quoted context omitted.
GLONASS, But that's splitting hairs
Galileo:P
And now also BeiDou, QZSS, and IRNSS-NAVIC.
Build Unix, Not Uber
61–70 of 117 posts
Re: Build Unix, Not Uber
#62Earlier quoted context omitted.
There are a lot of alternative programming languages that those companies could have used. There's no GPS alternative for Uber.
Alt to php at that point in time was usually Perl. Don’t think Facebook would have succeeded with Perl.
Is there a reason Apache w/mod_perl wouldn't have worked?
Re: Build Unix, Not Uber
#63Earlier quoted context omitted.
Alt to php at that point in time was usually Perl. Don’t think Facebook would have succeeded with Perl.
What about Perl would have made Facebook fail? I don't particularly like Perl but I'm curious.
You don't get it, Facebook wasn't just a CRUD from the start and had some niche programming language needs. /s
:P
Re: Build Unix, Not Uber
#64Earlier quoted context omitted.
Very early versions, but they were already using python before you could create your own subreddits, for example (which is around the time when it started becoming more mainstream)
IIRC, they were able to fully rewrite it in Python in a weekend. I guess that shows the (small) scale of what it was at that point.
Why did they need to rewrite it in Python? Isn't lisp more powerful, meaning it would have been easier to create and experiment with more features?
Re: Build Unix, Not Uber
#65An alternative to the corporation is the chaord. This is an idea that went nowhere. Except that Visa International was a chaord. A chaord is useful when you have a shared resource that's needed by competing entities. That's exactly what Visa International was set up to be. It's an operator of a data network and a standards body. It doesn't issue cards. It doesn't handle money. It just transmits transaction data betwe…
This is gold, comments like this is why I come to HN.
Re: Build Unix, Not Uber
#66An alternative to the corporation is the chaord. This is an idea that went nowhere. Except that Visa International was a chaord. A chaord is useful when you have a shared resource that's needed by competing entities. That's exactly what Visa International was set up to be. It's an operator of a data network and a standards body. It doesn't issue cards. It doesn't handle money. It just transmits transaction data betwe…
Arm and the underlying infrastructure of music streaming should be this.
Re: Build Unix, Not Uber
#67It's always interesting to me how little credit is given to GPS in Uber's story. The existence of space-based, free and ubiquitous semi-precise navigation was an enormous subsidy.
Another element of the GPS story is the profound impact of the US flipping a veritable switch and turning off Selective Availability in 2000 (https://www.gps.gov/systems/gps/modernization/sa/), taking accuracy from perhaps 50m to a couple of meters.
Re: Build Unix, Not Uber
#68does the author know that Unix was a private software made by AT&T bell lab (a big company) with clear intentions of making revenue, although I agree it was and it is still a great idea, it was created because it would generate value to people and we appreciate value and we pay for it. it's obvious the author made a good reflexions with good intentions, but poetic/utopic futures are not the solution and are dangerous…
Unix was created by two rogue engineers as a side project at a time AT&T were operating under a 1956 US DoJ consent decree which forbad the firm from entering into the computer market. (There was no independent software market as such.) AT&T Unix as a commercial product did not become a possibility until after the 1983 break-up settlement, which lifted that restriction. But at the time of Unix's creation, there was absolutely no possible route to commercialisation, which is a chief reason the operating system was freely distributed (for cost of media, in most cases), often with the note "Love, from Ken" (Thompson).
System V appeared shortly after, as well as a set of legal disputes known as "the Unix Wars" beginning around 1988, most especially against BSDi (1-800-ITS-UNIX).
On January 14, 1949, the government filed an action in the District Court for the District of New Jersey against the Western Electric Company, Inc.[3] and the American Telephone and Telegraph Company, Inc. (Civil Action No. 17-49).[4] The complaint alleged that the defendants had monopolized and conspired to restrain trade in the manufacture, distribution, sale, and installation of telephones, telephone apparatus, equipment, materials, and supplies, in violation 136136 of sections 1, 2, and 3 of the Sherman Act, 15 U.S.C. §§ 1, 2, and 3.[5] The relief sought included the divestiture by AT & T of its stock ownership in Western Electric; termination of exclusive relationships between AT & T and Western Electric; divestiture by Western Electric of its fifty percent interest in Bell Telephone Laboratories;[6] separation of telephone manufacturing from the provision of telephone service; and the compulsory licensing of patents owned by AT & T on a non-discriminatory basis.*
https://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?q=United+States+v.+A...
Re: Build Unix, Not Uber
#69An alternative to the corporation is the chaord. This is an idea that went nowhere. Except that Visa International was a chaord. A chaord is useful when you have a shared resource that's needed by competing entities. That's exactly what Visa International was set up to be. It's an operator of a data network and a standards body. It doesn't issue cards. It doesn't handle money. It just transmits transaction data betwe…
There’s also the cooperative. Here in Switzerland they are rather popular - some of the biggest banks, insurances and property owners, and more notably, the two largest supermarket chains (making up >80% of food / non food market) are organised this way. Your customers could be part of the ownership structure of your company, which creates a strong loyalty effect and a focus on organic & vertical growth rather than growth just for the sake of beating quarterly numbers.
Re: Build Unix, Not Uber
#70Earlier quoted context omitted.
I wonder if Uber is feasible with wifi and cell tower location routing alone and if not how close you could actually get.
at the end of the day, it's just a stationary location with a permanent address. GPS just allows for turn-by-turn navigation so any body can find that location without being intimately familiar with an area. so, yeah, it's nice that the rider can see the route the driver is taking to feel like they are not being "taken for a ride", but I've been in rides where the drive did not take the same route my app was showing.…
one use to stick up the thumb and get a ride. detours to be negotiated