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I had to take down my course-swapping site or be expelled

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Re: I had to take down my course-swapping site or be expelled

#441

Post by diggan »

zonkerdonker wrote: post #27
jdkaim wrote: post #7

Update: I immediately took down my class project site after receiving yesterday’s ultimatum. I still don’t think the simple demo site violated the letter or spirit of the registration rules, but I took it down because I always want to operate in good faith. They followed up today to thank me for doing it, but also indicated that they were putting a hold on my account anyway. As a result, I am not going to be able to…

If you had managed to build this system during my time at UW, I know for a fact that I and dozens of other students would have happily paid hundreds of dollars to use your project. The class and reservation system there was (and presumably is?) incredibly broken. I remember literally the only way to get a spot reserved in some /mandatory/ courses was to find an upper classman with prioritized registration dates and a…

> I know for a fact that I and dozens of other students would have happily paid hundreds of dollars to use your project

Is this normal in the US, that students have high enough disposable income that they would be able to pay "hundreds of dollars" to use a webapp to swap classes with each other? Or is this school uniquely one for the more well-off kids out there?

Remembering my time when my friends were in university, some while working, just about no one would have hundreds of dollars to spend on something like that.

Re: I had to take down my course-swapping site or be expelled

#442

Post by lupire »

hooverd wrote: post #84
ryandrake wrote: post #13

Why would the school admin go nuclear over a request to integrate with the registration system, a system that is clearly intended to be used by applications: > “The Student Web Service gives your application access to information in the Student database such as course data, registration data, section data, person data, and term data (general academic data).” It doesn't make any sense. Was there something left out of…

Yea, I don't understand the response to him here. You can just tell the random student who wants the keys to the student database "no" and go about your day.

[flagged]

Re: I had to take down my course-swapping site or be expelled

#443

Post by twodave »

lupire wrote: post #436
loeg wrote: post #239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, for context, UW's registration system runs on, like, a single 1980s VAX.

I didn't know VAX had web APIs. Do you know that software can be used to build a wrapper layer around other software?

It's much easier to build a gateway API for a legacy system than to extend it. Not disagreeing with you. Honestly, though, software systems for academic institutions are ridiculously complicated, because they are essentially a student portal, a school, a sales organization, a rules engine, etc. etc. all wrapped up into one and interconnected in ways that aren't obvious on the surface.

Re: I had to take down my course-swapping site or be expelled

#444

Post by Workaccount2 »

darth_avocado wrote: post #56
Aurornis wrote: post #21

I have several friends on the administrative side at Universities. The two things you have to realize is that there are an incredible number of administrative staff at Universities and they're extremely territorial. You rocked someone's boat and they got upset. They have a lot of time on their hands because there are so, so many people in administration. Now they're coming after you like it's their job. I think you'r…

> They have a lot of time on their hands because there are so, so many people in administration. Not so polite take: most of them could be replaced by a 20 line shell script.

My mother works at a state university as a secretary for about 15 years now. Her job, especially after the pandemic, is pretty much to forward one or two emails a day to her boss. $70k/yr, lush state benefits, pension, all that stuff. The workday is 7 hours officially, but only 3-4 in reality (she comes in a few hours late and leaves a few hours early). 3 days in office, 2 remote. Basically unlimited PTO days too, since they are already generous in allotment and unused ones roll over.

She loves it, obviously. Her boss loves her too, they chit chat all day when together, so she isn't getting laid off. But man, the inefficiency and waste is unreal.

Re: I had to take down my course-swapping site or be expelled

#445

Post by croemer »

prophesi wrote: post #409
croemer wrote: post #367

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd take commit numbers with a grain of salt. Also, I wouldn't call half the commits _mostly_ at all: https://github.com/JDKaim/HuskySwap/graphs/contributors?from... By that metric, he did half the work. But it still means he completely disregards the other half.

56 commits, +273,244, -7,270 LOC vs 46 commits, +478, -94 LOC I think it's safe to say it was mostly him.

Don't get fooled by LOCs.

Out of the 273k LOC added, all but 20k, that is 253k are just from the boilerplate auto-generated copy/paste initialization code: https://github.com/JDKaim/HuskySwap/commit/e9f0df0d5a221b3c7...

Sure he probably did most of the coding, but it's still weird to talk all about I and not mention the other 5 in a single word when they _did_ contribute. Maybe they did testing or other things that are not reflected in LOC, e.g. presentations etc.

Re: I had to take down my course-swapping site or be expelled

#446

Post by roywiggins »

dylan604 wrote: post #289
sethherr wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hmmmm. Yes but, if I hire a programmer to build me an app and no one ever uses it, I still have to pay the programmer. This is exactly the gotcha. You paid for a service. The outcome isn’t guaranteed.

Did you need to use a tractor to move those goal posts?

Oncologists get paid even if the cancer kills you, that's not a good argument against oncologists.

Re: I had to take down my course-swapping site or be expelled

#447

Post by Bedon292 »

tiahura wrote: post #425
nothrabannosir wrote: post #265

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I am not planning to get a lawyer involved as I have faith that UW leadership will make it right in the end. An officious word for lawyer is counsel , because that’s what they’re for: they offer legal counsel. You don’t technically “talk” to a lawyer , instead you ask them questions. They answer. That’s why client-attorney privilege exists at all: so you can feel free to seek counsel, ie ask questions , without fea…

As a lawyer, your post is almost entirely incorrect. Privilege in no way depends on whether the communication involves questions. It cracks me up. As a lawyer, I would never post on HN to argue about pointer arithmetic or inference optimization, yet the law seems to be fair game for amateur hour.

I don't think the post says privilege depends on whether the communication involves questions. I read it as saying that privilege exists so you can seek counsel. And, in their opinion, seeking counsel should always involve asking questions. Which seems reasonable to me. I am struggling to think of a situation where someone initiating contact with a lawyer wouldn't need, or at least want, to ask any questions. Are there situations where that is not the case?

Re: I had to take down my course-swapping site or be expelled

#448

Post by croemer »

craftman210 wrote: post #370
croemer wrote: post #357

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Note that in the LinkedIn post he exclusively talks in first person: I developed the project etc. In fact if you go on GitHub, their project presentation lists a 6 people team: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/117dGuEK98-TwAPGUBijf... . He was on the backend team, but still mentions angular in the LinkedIn post. Did the others not do anything? Or why is he not giving them credit in the LinkedIn post?

I'm mostly looking at lines changed -- 273k is a lot more than 500. But yeah, there can definitely be shady stuff that fudges it.

Out of the 273k, 253k were boilerplate template in the first commit, entirely copy/paste or tool-generated: https://github.com/JDKaim/HuskySwap/commit/e9f0df0d5a221b3c7...

Re: I had to take down my course-swapping site or be expelled

#449

Post by lupire »

jccalhoun wrote: post #420
The_suffocated wrote: post #387

“...find partners to trade spots in critical classes after they filled up”. I am not from the USA and I don’t understand the context. What does “trade spots” mean? Does it mean that if I have registered to course A but not course B and my friend have registered to course B but not course A, we can swap our registered courses in the official registration system?

I assume it means that at the start of the semester or just days before it starts that if class A and B are both full but I am enrolled in class A but wanted to drop it and get in class B and you are in class B and wanted in class A then we could swap enrollments.

But how? The university threatens students with expulsion if they do that!

So, why do they allow people to do it, but expell them for... publicly discussing it? When the university could just, you know, not offer the service!

Re: I had to take down my course-swapping site or be expelled

#450

Post by devwastaken »

jdkaim wrote: post #7

Update: I immediately took down my class project site after receiving yesterday’s ultimatum. I still don’t think the simple demo site violated the letter or spirit of the registration rules, but I took it down because I always want to operate in good faith. They followed up today to thank me for doing it, but also indicated that they were putting a hold on my account anyway. As a result, I am not going to be able to…

you enrolled in a predatory institution designed to indebt workers forever. theyre not there for your interest. social media blast, leave, and potentially litigate.
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