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by freehunter 5307 days ago
It's not just the programming stuff I wish I could filter, it's the worship of Ruby, node.js, CSS, etc. Web languages that really aren't useful in the hacker sense of the word, but rather in the business sense of the word.

My opinion wasn't so much about what would replace those posts, but what not having those posts would attract.
2 comments
ceol 5307 days ago
This is anecdotal, but I've seen more Python articles in the past couple of weeks than Ruby. node.js is a pretty useful tool for random hackery, and most of the CSS articles have been "hacks" for creating cool UIs. I like to think of the "Hacker" in Hacker News as someone who employs neat tricks to get the job done.

Are you looking for news related to network security?

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freehunter 5306 days ago
Network security would be one aspect of hacking (actually the aspect I am employed in). Breaking out of the confines of an API would be another, or just doing something because you want to see if it can be done, not because you're following a tutorial on GitHub. Actually, someone on reddit put it best related to their plans for a Darknet project: "don't expect help from Hacker News, if it doesn't have a business plan they won't be interested." Hackers don't care about business plans. The site used to be called "Startup News", in the days when the original redditors were pining for the days of the original reddit base. Based on the content still present, Startup News is still quite fitting.

In short, simply re-creating something in a new-wave language is what I'm kind of complaining about. That's not "hacking", that's just good programming.

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rayiner 5306 days ago
Hacker means people who hack on code. Why aren't languages like Ruby relevant.
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freehunter 5306 days ago
At least in my view of the term, creating intelligent code isn't "hacking". It's just being a good programmer. Hacking would be doing something that hasn't been done before on a wide scale with the intention of creating a result that varies from what an average user would expect. The jailbreakers hacked sideloaded applications onto their iPhone. The average user followed their directions and achieved expected, predictable results.

Ruby _can_ be used hacking. "How to recreate Path in Ruby" does not a "hack" make.

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sukuriant 5306 days ago
It's not that they aren't relevant. I think it's the frequency of mention of said languages that is the problem to the above poster.
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