Naming is hard. The name needs to be long enough to make the variable meaningful, but not longer.
I have encountered a programmer (in the corporate space) who bought into the "longer name" concept, to the point where he started complaining that the compiler had a 128 char limit for variable names.
For example instead of a variable called say "tax" he'd use something like "CustomerSalesTax". That was mostly bearable, but the context (and the fact it was the only tax field) made the extra description redundant.
That habit expanded though. Until he had names 50+ characters long. By then the code is illegible. Especially when the difference in variable names is minor. As in
TotalDepreciationAnnualisedInterimTaxValue
versus
TotalDepreciationAnnualisedInterimBookValue
So yeah, descriptive names good. Verbose names bad.
Well done for doing some market research before rushing off to code. This is far more sensible than coding first and wondering later.
To answer your question, no. I read a lot and frankly I've never wanted to discuss anything with an author. My relationship is with the characters in the book, not the author.
For non-fiction books there is so much information online that if I want to dig deeper I'll just Google or Chat it.
I've written two text books myself - very (very) niche books that sold in the hundreds of copies. (So very small). I've never had a reader reach out to discuss anything.
Yes, I expect there are people out there who want to correspond with authors. But I suspect a large fraction of them aren't "curious" but more want to demonstrate competence or whatever. I doubt an AI would satisfy them.
Yes, I think there is a market (however thin) for this, but reaching that market will be close to impossible. I would suggest either building this knowing you'd be the only user, or abandoning the idea.
The reason I think it is hard in the US is because there is a very strong "work or die" ethic in the US. Everything is driven by money. Even basic things like healthcare are driven by money. Your life after retirement is determined by how much money you accumulated. The word-association between "poor" and "lazy" is strong. Taxation should be light. Each man should keep what he accumulates.
BI by contrast values people over money. It recognises not just the social responsibility of the rich to the poor, but also the dignity of being human.
Some countries are further along that path than others. Health care, education, unemployment benefits, are all steps towards BI. The wealthy are taxed to pay for the poor. Ultimately the suppresses the excess, while raising the floor.
From a cultural point of view, the US has many steps to take before society is really for (real) BI.
BI does not stop people doing meaningful things. Society will (mostly) reward things which add value. We have a very efficient system for that, and it doesn't go away under BI.
We are already spending massive amounts of money on disease, fusion and so on. There's no issue there, and BI doesn't move that needle.
At the moment society (especially in the US) operates on a "add value or starve" basis. (That's an over simplification, but the underlying "morality" us strong in that direction.)
BI moves the needle for those who are not "adding value" (in a materialistic sense.) Artists and Authors are free to spend their time creating works, of which a rounding error will have any value. Sure there's some unappreciated author out there cranking out literature, but there's also everyone else cranking out rubbish.
BI doesn't make 'big things' easier to do. Arguably it makes them harder. Rather it allows individuals to gain satisfaction from little things. Budding poets can write all day long. But if (great) poetry is currently ignored, do not expect much on that front.
I say this not to denigrate BI but rather because allowing the meaningless is precisely its goal. To miss that is to miss the point. It allows people to find worth and dignity without having to add value to society.
I too think Basic Income is a necessity. I don't think it can happen in the US (for cultural reasons) but I think elsewhere it can work. (And indeed in many places it kinda, sorta, already does).
>> That would enable the authors, activists and hackers to pursue what's meaningful
I would counsel not using the word "meaningful" in the context of BI. We already have a way of evaluating "meaningful", it's called "money". If society gets to judge what is meaningful or not, well, that's the system we currently have.
BI is about letting people do whatever they like especially if it is meaningless. BI implies an economy (you have to spend the Income on something) so meaningful will always be richly rewarded.
Incidentally publishers exist to act as curators and filters. The value they add is real. There's no shortage of self-published stuff on say Amazon, but 99% of it is drivel. I go into a bookshop to find the 1% that at least someone thinks is worth reading.
A good marketing partner will tell you what to build. 100% of success is building the right thing and being able to reach the market.
Unfortunately, of course, there are lots of bad marketing folk out there. I've lost count of the "if only it could do x, I could sell millions" type promises I've heard. If you don't understand marketing metrics you'll waste more times.
To be clear, a good marketing person is necessary. But you need the skill set to evaluate good in this context. Or you need to be lucky.
If you've built 10 products and hot no-where then perhaps your strategy is a bad one.
And yes, building something then looking for customers is a bad strategy.
I strongly recommend you spend the next month finding a market. Don't start building the next product until you have made sales. If someone says "I'd pay for something that does x" then ask for a deposit. If they say "no", then keep looking.
And no, paid advertising is not the solution. That doesn't get you users (at this point). At this point you need to talk to people.
No there won't be clauses about rental amounts. It's not that straightforward.
It boils down to collateral for the loan.
A building has a value based on future rents. The owner borrows from the bank based on that value. The building is collateral for the loan.
The rental rate (not occupancy) determines the current building value. (Occupancy affects cash-flow, but not building value.)
Reducing rent improves cash flow, which may help paying the loan, but loan payments here are not important.
What is important is that the collateral covers the loan. Reducing the rent triggers a re-evaluation of the building value, which in turn affects the loan. There's no discretion here, it's just math.
On the other hand, as long as the owner continues to pay the installment on the loan, and as long as the building remains the same value, the banker doesn't have to do anything.
Yes, there are ways the price can be fudged a bit (bundling services, remodeling allowances and so on) but the "list price" of the rent can't come down without (automatically) triggering loan problems.
Since property companies tend to have multiple properties, cash flow is sufficient to pay the loan. So that's a lot better than triggering a revaluation.
In short commercial real estate does not behave like residential real estate.
You call them "customers" not "users", implying you'd like to earn money from this? In which case no, I don't think you should Open Source it. Getting paid for Open Source, especially by companies, is unlikely.
You have a product targeting orgs big enough to use Jira. That's a tough market to be in. Hope you've done your market research and have a sales strategy figured out.
If you don't, then consider this a good learning exercise. Do the hard parts first (marketing, sales etc.) The code is the easy part, do that last.
The answer to your question depends on your goals. Without understanding what outcomes you are hoping for it's difficult to reply.
You should also tell us more about your market research. Who is your target customer? (Are you expecting the Jira user to pay? Or the company they work for?)
Or do you want users, but not money?
IME Jira tends to be used by people at larger organizations, who likely have strict "what you can install" rules. Which would make this an Enterprise sale.
But anyway, tell us more about who you built this for, and how you intend to reach them.
I'm not sure about maintenance hours. That matters as a function of proximity to maintenance staff, parts, new supply and so on. Flying from home bases, with no shortage of skilled labor can cover that.
Supercruise also matters a bit less when the distance to combat is shorter. Less fuel expended on "getting there" is more fuel for "on station". Plus, assuming more-or-less unlimited supply of machines and pilots means more flight hours on station.
So while the engines play a part in a hypothetical conflict, supply lines (and the length thereof) play (I think) a larger part.
But interestingly their ambitions are "local". This has a large impact on the machines and materials required.
In other words, let's says the Chinese military jet engine is 15 years behind is say fuel economy. Which reduces range. If the conflict is local that doesn't matter overmuch.
Equally operating from land, not carriers, reduces reach, but if what you want to reach is local then that doesn't matter.
If China has military ambitions (and despite the sabre rattling there's no overt indication of that), they are all in a specific area.
By contrast the US likes to participate in, or instigate, actions far from home. Moving planes means long open-ocean ferry flights. Single-engine reliability, range, effeciency and so on is paramout.
Equally the US relies on friendly local countries to provide support bases, logistics, fuel and so on. As evidenced just this year, that support can be withdrawn. Will Japan or Korea want to be dragged into a US / China conflict over Taiwan?
So if the Chinese are operating engines later than the first gulf War, and on par with the second, I'm not sure that's a defining difference.
The US doctrine of air-defence suppression followed by air superiority may not be possible in a space near the Chinese mainland.
Currently I generate about 66% of my annual power requirements with solar alone. If I had even a small 10kw battery I'd be moving that closer to 80%.
But demand for base load is irrelevant to my thesis. My point is that financially it makes no sense. So private capital aren't interested. [1]
So that leaves govt. They could decide (especially in regulated markets) to ignore Financials and build it anyway. Which is great, except govts are typically really bad at large capital projects that span multiple administrations.
[1] private capital cam get involved if the govt signs guaranteed income contracts. It's a model that puts the bad Financials on the govt (hence the people) while the govt avoids the pain of building. This model typically works as well as you might suspect.
Ultimately what we (the customer) want or need is irrelevant. The real world revolves around the money. And the only way to make the money work is to make the customer pay a lot.
The base-load question is solved with better, cheaper, storage. Not expensive power stations.
>> Solar power, wind power, hydro power, nuclear power are all heavy on capital costs and light on operational costs
I'm not sure I agree.
Firstly, I can get solar panels without building a solar panel factory. Hence the capital cost of a solar farm is cheap. I can't buy a nuclear power plant off the shelf.
Equally on the running cost, solar costs pretty much nothing to run. I'd argue that the costs to run a nuclear plant are substantial. Plus I need highly skilled people on-site permanently. With solar I need skilled people to install (skills easily taught) but I don't need permanent engineers on site.
The overriding impression I get is that the whole facility is complicated. There are lots of processes in place, and lots of very trained people required to keep it all running. The size and complexity of the control rooms for example, but also the inevitable maintenance and inspection of all the piping etc. Even the details of the cleanup (checking each store foot, grinding surfaces etc.)
I've recently been on a train in Europe and I saw solar panels and wind turbines everywhere. And what's striking by comparison is the lack of people or extraneous construction. They're just solar panels, or wind turbines. They're easy to install, easy (read cheap) to maintain, and are mostly just left alone to do their thing.
If I had a $100b to invest then solar, wind, even battery, is much more attractive than the time, complexity, uncertainty, running cost etc of nuclear. Not to even start on cleanup issues.
I get the base-load issue. But even there current storage is more attractive. And investing in future storage technology seems like a better return.
The argument against nuclear (fission, and even more so fusion) is purely financial. We can nimby and worry about the radiation but ultimately nuclear doesn't happen because financially its a dead end.
A 90/10 split of what exactly? I mean, where does the "100" come from?
I'm guessing you mean some sort of subscription approach? But if node servers make 90% of the money, how would you stop all machines just being nodes? How would you stop larger nodes from dominating traffic?
I agree. Depending on what you measure,total US subsidies are far larger than Chinese ones.
I'd say you can certainly compare them though, and US ones are in the same order of magnitude- although it gets worse if you adjust for population size.
For example, the US subsidizes the defence industry to the tune of a trillion $ a year. (As a % of total federal budget the US spends about double that of China.)
You need a DNS provider which supports API calls (I use DNSimple) but the core is all very straightforward.
To prevent having to include DNSimple authentication on the client's internal server I have a small API server on the web which does the Acme work.