Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

BBC Betsie: Perl program to create an automatic text-only website version (1999)

web.archive.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 34 posts

Re: BBC Betsie: Perl program to create an automatic text-only website version (1999)

#21

Post by unfocussed_mike »

unfocussed_mike wrote: post #13
zinekeller wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a little bit complicated but before 1991-1994 (where there are large-scale changes outside of BBC), Radio Times were exclusively for the BBC while TV Times were exclusively for the ITV companie s (yes, ITV wasn't just a single company those days!), Channel 4, and S4C (technically there is a third one, Channel Times, but that's for the Channel Islands which has a very interesting ITV setup at that time).

Yeah -- I remember more than a full decade of two listings magazines per week! To break it down a little for non-British HNers (it is very confusing and messy): The BBC does not run adverts, but it does have a carve-out from that to mention its own associated products in limited circumstances. Most significantly the listings magazine, The Radio Times. We start out in the situation zinekeller mentions where the BBC li…

I should correct myself above because the group wasn't the ITA, it was the ITCA -- the Independent Television Companies Association. Which is now UKIB:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Kingdom_Independent_Bro...

Re: BBC Betsie: Perl program to create an automatic text-only website version (1999)

#24

Post by mmaunder »

cnorthwood wrote: post #16
mmaunder wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I worked for the BBC in 2002. I created OneMusic which showcased unsigned bands. You can see an archived version here: https://web.archive.org/web/20050416110703/http://www.bbc.co... Within 2 weeks we managed to get our first band signed. A Swedish band called Maas. I worked with a producer Andrew Barron, who takes a lot of credit for seeing the project past the finish line. Andrew sat with me over a weekend and deep…

I'm guessing the mansion was Kingswood Warren, where BBC Research was based before cuts relocated them to London: https://www.bbc.co.uk/rd/

Sounds right.

https://www.bbc.com/historyofthebbc/buildings/kingswood-warr...

Re: BBC Betsie: Perl program to create an automatic text-only website version (1999)

#25

Post by thyrsus »

unfocussed_mike wrote: post #22
forinti wrote: post #8

Wow, it only includes Socket. You could make this a bit simpler nowadays with some libs like Mojo and LWP.

Or you could really go easy on yourself and not use Perl. ;-)

Please substantiate that claim by citing similar code exhibiting better clarity.

Re: BBC Betsie: Perl program to create an automatic text-only website version (1999)

#26

Post by hackernewds »

quesomaster9000 wrote: post #15

Wow this brings back memories. While it was tedious it's something which has humbled me over the years. Due to various laws we had to guarantee accessibility of most if not all 'official communication' to native speakers of several languages and various (dis)abilities. With some minor structural tweaks and guidance from an 'accessibility coordinator' who worked at a college we were able to realistically make it very…

Mind elaborating on how the blind guy used iphone?

Re: BBC Betsie: Perl program to create an automatic text-only website version (1999)

#27

Post by hackernewds »

unfocussed_mike wrote: post #18
mmaunder wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I worked for the BBC in 2002. I created OneMusic which showcased unsigned bands. You can see an archived version here: https://web.archive.org/web/20050416110703/http://www.bbc.co... Within 2 weeks we managed to get our first band signed. A Swedish band called Maas. I worked with a producer Andrew Barron, who takes a lot of credit for seeing the project past the finish line. Andrew sat with me over a weekend and deep…

> One of the absolute worst design decisions I made was to design the application so that it would support sessions for users without cookies enabled. I think we all did this at least once back then and all regret it for the same reasons...

why don't we do it anymore

Re: BBC Betsie: Perl program to create an automatic text-only website version (1999)

#28

Post by quesomaster9000 »

hackernewds wrote: post #26
quesomaster9000 wrote: post #15

Wow this brings back memories. While it was tedious it's something which has humbled me over the years. Due to various laws we had to guarantee accessibility of most if not all 'official communication' to native speakers of several languages and various (dis)abilities. With some minor structural tweaks and guidance from an 'accessibility coordinator' who worked at a college we were able to realistically make it very…

Mind elaborating on how the blind guy used iphone?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3FVjLXIaBC4 gives a good overview

The key thing is with ear buds in, which works even if you're fully or partially sighted you can keep it in your lap and quickly respond to messages or lookup facts without it looking like you're breaking attention, e.g. in a meeting or even during a full blown conversation much in the same way you'd read an article and listen to TV at the same time.

Re: BBC Betsie: Perl program to create an automatic text-only website version (1999)

#29

Post by samwillis »

hackernewds wrote: post #27
unfocussed_mike wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> One of the absolute worst design decisions I made was to design the application so that it would support sessions for users without cookies enabled. I think we all did this at least once back then and all regret it for the same reasons...

why don't we do it anymore

If you include the session ID in the url it can leak to other uses if they send a urls to someone, it also exposes the session id in intermediate proxy/router log files (if using plain http, not tls). So it’s basically a security risk.

Before cookies had widespread support it was basically the only way to implement sessions.

Re: BBC Betsie: Perl program to create an automatic text-only website version (1999)

#30

Post by zinekeller »

adw wrote: post #20
zinekeller wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a little bit complicated but before 1991-1994 (where there are large-scale changes outside of BBC), Radio Times were exclusively for the BBC while TV Times were exclusively for the ITV companie s (yes, ITV wasn't just a single company those days!), Channel 4, and S4C (technically there is a third one, Channel Times, but that's for the Channel Islands which has a very interesting ITV setup at that time).

The ITV network still isn’t a single company! STV (Scotland) is not owned by ITV plc.

Fair enough, but outside Scotland it really feels like ITV is just a channel rather than the original plan of federation of channels...
Post reply on HN