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Apollo Back end just made public

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Re: Apollo Back end just made public

#171

Post by 411111111111111 »

gabereiser wrote: post #141
napsterbr wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Amen to that. When I first started coding (some 15 years ago) I wrote the ugliest, buggiest and "owasp-ridden-est" PHP spaghetti code. Turns out that code went viral and was used by millions of users for a few years. Yet, I came to the conclusion that that's the best code I've ever written, for it's been the most used code I released so far. Real software development is far different than the ideal one.

Software managers take note… Your MVP isn’t necessarily your perfect code. It’s the messy, “get it out the door”, value it brings to others. This is your product, refine it from there but don’t hold it back for sake of polishing a turd. Myth busters proved you can indeed, polish a turd. Don’t waste the sprints.

No, that's just wrong. It's totally fine to put scrappy code up to get a product going, but that time has long since passed if you're already at a scale to have dedicated managers.

At that point you're likely going to cause more damage to the brand/corp with the half-assed implementation then the value you're providing with said code.

Re: Apollo Back end just made public

#172

Post by rootusrootus »

hospitalJail wrote: post #71
fron wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's more than likely that they'll inject their own softball questions and focus on those instead of addressing everyone's concerns in any meaningful way.

When they removed the upvote/downvote count, it was clear reddit was fine with manipulation. Anything I read on the website has been met with extreme skepticism since it very well could be an astroturfer. It's money. Reddit wants astroturfers, it grows their platform and helps sell ads.

> Anything I read on the website has been met with extreme skepticism since it very well could be an astroturfer.

Good advice for any site. It's not like HN is immune to astroturfing.

Re: Apollo Back end just made public

#173

Post by acatton »

_thisdot wrote: post #162
acatton wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reddit's doom has been announced over and over again since they started raising the bar for what is an "acceptable" sub-reddit in 2011. The reality is that Reddit hasn't ceased growing since then. The same thing happened with YouTube. YouTube pushed its content to switch from filthyfrank to Jimmy Kimmel/Fallon. Advertisers are not interested in us, early-adopters, mostly young and middle-aged western males. They want…

I have friends who fit the target audience criteria you mention. These people absolutely do not care about the client and never find the need to step outside the default client. My partner has access to Apollo Ultra through iCloud Family, yet she finds the default reddit client good enough. If these people exist and they’re the majority, why kill 3rd party apps to mess with a minority?

Because if you're a ruthless company going public, you want to avoid ways for your users to block the ads or "cheat the walled garden." Forcing them to use the official app is the way to go. And advertisers feel safe.

I'm not saying I approve the practice. I'm saying that it makes sense from their perspective.

Re: Apollo Back end just made public

#174

Post by roamerz »

Waterluvian wrote: post #77
andremedeiros wrote: post #4

Hi all! I wrote this code, and for educational purposes, I’d be more than happy to answer any questions. A gentle reminder that the whole history is here for show. This is very vulnerable — you can see the times I was in a rush, or when I took my time. You’ll find my mistakes. Either way, all I ask is please be kind. I know there are 50 things I could have done better, but this is a product of the reality at the time…

You made something that people got a lot of value out of. That’s incredible. The actual code and commits are just the journey. They’re not the product. I’m rather delighted every time someone shows a realistic journey full of all the things we all experience, but some of us pretend don’t happen. Thanks for being vulnerable and sharing this.

What an awesome comment.

Re: Apollo Back end just made public

#175

Post by TheNewsIsHere »

andremedeiros wrote: post #4

Hi all! I wrote this code, and for educational purposes, I’d be more than happy to answer any questions. A gentle reminder that the whole history is here for show. This is very vulnerable — you can see the times I was in a rush, or when I took my time. You’ll find my mistakes. Either way, all I ask is please be kind. I know there are 50 things I could have done better, but this is a product of the reality at the time…

As another who will stop using Reddit when Apollo goes dark, I wanted to say thank you for your work with Christian!

Apollo saved my Reddit use after they bought and killed Alien Blue. I have gotten so much out of and out so much into the more obscure technology subreddits. It’ll be missed.

I appreciate all your work. For what it’s worth, I’ve never had server-side issues with Apollo (that I’ve noticed anyway!)

Edit: typo

Re: Apollo Back end just made public

#176

Post by marginalia_nu »

andremedeiros wrote: post #4

Hi all! I wrote this code, and for educational purposes, I’d be more than happy to answer any questions. A gentle reminder that the whole history is here for show. This is very vulnerable — you can see the times I was in a rush, or when I took my time. You’ll find my mistakes. Either way, all I ask is please be kind. I know there are 50 things I could have done better, but this is a product of the reality at the time…

FWIW, that just sounds like real code to me. You can spend your time polishing code until it shines and jerking off over the perfect crystal of logic you've created, or you can spend your time building something impressive that does cool stuff.

Especially when you're solo or on a small team, technical debt is actually something you can lean into. In this domain, refactoring is cheap and cutting corners can help you get where you need to go faster.

It's a too common mistake to think that because technical debt is a tar pit that kills many large products that this is universally true. The real trick is lowering the tolerance for flaws as the project grows and matures.

Re: Apollo Back end just made public

#177

Post by TheNewsIsHere »

411111111111111 wrote: post #171
gabereiser wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Software managers take note… Your MVP isn’t necessarily your perfect code. It’s the messy, “get it out the door”, value it brings to others. This is your product, refine it from there but don’t hold it back for sake of polishing a turd. Myth busters proved you can indeed, polish a turd. Don’t waste the sprints.

No, that's just wrong. It's totally fine to put scrappy code up to get a product going, but that time has long since passed if you're already at a scale to have dedicated managers. At that point you're likely going to cause more damage to the brand/corp with the half-assed implementation then the value you're providing with said code.

I tend to agree with this. My spouse is currently entrenched in an over-budget, under-funded, mismanaged project that was recently announced by the CEO.

That’s at a Fortune 500. It all started with a “well we can do an MVP and get that out the door first.”

It turns out that was a massive mistake.

Re: Apollo Back end just made public

#178

Post by Gunnerhead »

andremedeiros wrote: post #79
Aachen wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Since I have no idea what's even here, I can't really answer that. Maybe just a few sentences on what this code does in general?

I’ll be happy to once I sit down in front of my computer.

A naïve question, but why is a backend needed and why couldn’t the app call the APIs directly? Just curious to learn!

Re: Apollo Back end just made public

#179

Post by hawski »

tester457 wrote: post #97
542458 wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I haven’t seen a compelling OS alternative to Reddit yet. The ones I’ve seen have all either been big on decentralization at the expense of long load times and a lot of UI complexity, or big on 4chan-style dialogue with little moderation. Neither of those sounds like a great migration path. IMO this is the same problem “migrate off Twitter” efforts had.

Have you seen Tildes? - incredible moderation and respectful community - you can't sort by controversial - non-profit, no investors can corrupt it - beautifully simple UI, better than old.reddit on mobile - fast and not decentralized - no images just text - open source - The site is the main mobile interface, not an app - No limits to logged-out browsing - Completely functional for browsing without javascript - Zero…

Why inability to sort by controversial is seen as a positive?

Re: Apollo Back end just made public

#180

Post by gabereiser »

411111111111111 wrote: post #171
gabereiser wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Software managers take note… Your MVP isn’t necessarily your perfect code. It’s the messy, “get it out the door”, value it brings to others. This is your product, refine it from there but don’t hold it back for sake of polishing a turd. Myth busters proved you can indeed, polish a turd. Don’t waste the sprints.

No, that's just wrong. It's totally fine to put scrappy code up to get a product going, but that time has long since passed if you're already at a scale to have dedicated managers. At that point you're likely going to cause more damage to the brand/corp with the half-assed implementation then the value you're providing with said code.

You'll note I said MVP. To get the product going. I agree that once it's going it's best to refine and polish tested features but software managers are still usually hands on at launch phase. Once you have your fit then follow best practice and have a proper process in place (agile, waterfall, whatever). What scale does one have to be to have a manager? Do companies operate without management?
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