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Ask HN: What discontinued company/product do you wish was still around?

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Re: Ask HN: What discontinued company/product do you wish was still around?

#381

Post by FourthProtocol »

Windows Phone on Nokia Hardware. Have extensively used both iOS/iPhone and Android/Xperia since my last Windows Phone and neither come even close to WP usability, and although the sense of quality the iPhone gives me does match what I felt with Nokia, nothing has come close to matching the 1520,the best mobile device I've ever used.

Re: Ask HN: What discontinued company/product do you wish was still around?

#382

Post by birchy »

The scripting language for the Macintosh's rolodex-type database (Hypercard) called "HyperText". I'm not aware of any more natural language scripting tool before or since. I can still write code in it, some two decades later... For example: 'put the first character of the third word of line 5 of card field "sometext" into theChar' or 'put the value of card field "typehere" * 1.25 into theValue'

Re: Ask HN: What discontinued company/product do you wish was still around?

#383

Post by gardaani »

benjiweber wrote: post #243

Nokia n900. Portable linux box, real keyboard. http://neo900.org/ doesn't seem to have gained much traction. https://www.planetcom.co.uk/ seems to be the closest thing we have now.

There is SailfishOS, which is a Linux running on phones: https://jolla.com

Your can purchase it and install it on Sony Xperia X and lots of 3rd party supported devices:

https://jolla.com/sailfishx/ http://verdanditeam.com/device/list/

Here's a picture of various devices (some with a keyboard): https://twitter.com/Mister1Magister/status/10510971372101509...

Re: Ask HN: What discontinued company/product do you wish was still around?

#384

Post by fiddlerwoaroof »

kodablah wrote: post #270

Surprised nobody mentioned them yet: Borland and their approach to UI development. I know some of their products live on, but I am nostalgic towards the wysiwyg days of old without being forced to use MS. I of course am aware of modern equivalents, but sadly the market/users moved.

I wish Lazarus and free pascal would get some love: Lazarus works on more platforms than Delphi ever did and, ignoring bugs, feels like making apps in Delphi 4.0 did.

Re: Ask HN: What discontinued company/product do you wish was still around?

#386

Post by disillusioned »

wishinghand wrote: post #303
function_seven wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple has ditched so many cool things in the MacBook line. 1) MagSafe. I know they really want to go all in on USB-C, but the original MagSafe connector was awesome. Even the weaker 2.0 version was nice. There were two instances where that connector saved my laptop. 2) The laser-drilled power indicator. That was so cool. It looked like the light magically appeared through the aluminum. Now there's no indication whats…

I forgot to list magsafe as one of those awesome things that was lost. I could take or leave the power indicator but it was kind of cool. It's such a no brainer that I'm surprised it's not been copied. Apple must have patented it too well.

My understanding was that they purchased the company that specialized in the laser perforation and all of the proprietary equipment required to make the metal thin enough for the light to shine through, which is a big part of the reason we haven't seen it elsewhere. And yeah, probably IP too.

Re: Ask HN: What discontinued company/product do you wish was still around?

#388

Post by treffer »

wishinghand wrote: post #303
function_seven wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple has ditched so many cool things in the MacBook line. 1) MagSafe. I know they really want to go all in on USB-C, but the original MagSafe connector was awesome. Even the weaker 2.0 version was nice. There were two instances where that connector saved my laptop. 2) The laser-drilled power indicator. That was so cool. It looked like the light magically appeared through the aluminum. Now there's no indication whats…

I forgot to list magsafe as one of those awesome things that was lost. I could take or leave the power indicator but it was kind of cool. It's such a no brainer that I'm surprised it's not been copied. Apple must have patented it too well.

There were several articles around that...

It was a very special manufacturing procedure, something that is hard to copy without the special hardware.

And Apple bought all that supply. You couldn't get the production line to do it...

(IIRC, bit my memory may fail me on that. Please Google it, I would be interested in rereading it!)

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