6 ms·

Ask HN: What problems your industry has that desperately need a solution?

15 points by ever_curious 8y ago

jppope 8y ago
I work in tech, and we really need to find a way to get tech companies to move from the bay area to different metro areas in the country.
- paulcole 8y ago
  Voting for taxes on tech companies should do the trick?
- sgillen 8y ago
  This is starting to happen I think. The economics are starting to make sense, for some companies, due to insane rent and cost of employees.
bachbach 8y ago
There are no young new workers in the construction trades. Average age of some trades is now 60 and these are not trades typically performed by older generations. Wages are rising but I believe there exist opportunities to use AR to transfer tacit knowledge - the type of knowledge thought to be difficult or impossible to formally educate. I believe solving for x on this problem has higher order side affects that we don't presently anticipate because this topic is a neighbour to long standing mysteries in AI.
- ILikeConemowk 8y ago
  I would love to ask you a couple of questions. Do you have an email or social media profile where I could reach you?
  - bachbach 8y ago
    See my HN profile.
    - O_H_E 8y ago
      PS: Your email is not view-able from your HN profile. Test in a private browser tab
      - bachbach 8y ago
        Not sure why that's set to private and don't see an option to make it public. Here's the address: delete-username-dashes-only-i-n-t-e-r-n-a-u-t@internet-mail.org
        O_H_E 8y ago
        I think that you have to write it in the about field in your profile page
        bachbach 8y ago
        Of course! Seem to be a bit dim today. I'll blame it on the weather. It is raining and the sky doesn't have a colour.
  - bachbach 8y ago
    Oh and sorry, but remove the dashes - from the email address username.
- BOOSTERHIDROGEN 8y ago
  Did you mean an EPC company ?
  - bachbach 8y ago
    No.
- sloaken 8y ago
  I blame this on the attitude that everyone needs a 'College Degree'. It has caused people to not value real work the way they should.
  - bachbach 8y ago
    That is true, and partially as a result it will shortly be that blue collar labour will earn higher wages than white collar labour. That and many important tasks will remain unaccomplished like people having houses to live in or clean environments. This happened before in the early 20th century when middle class abruptly had to learn to cook and clean because their cooks and maids went to work in the factories - used to be true that human labour was very cheap.
tmaly 8y ago
I work in Fintech, I think training people on how to write good requirements and specifications is lacking
- The_DaveG 8y ago
  It's not just in Fintech, it's a problem in most industries, I deal with it in automation most days. It's a skill that is not easily leaned (well).
- gls2ro 8y ago
  I am finding the same issue in many areas. But I am asking myself if it is just lack of knowledge and knowhow or is it also lack of time, processes and tools for writing and maintaining requirements. My observations are that along with not knowing how to gather and write requirements people at the project level also threat them as second hand objects for the success of project. Eg: some people in agile talk about requirements being user stories with clarifications and decisions around them. Other people say that in agile requirements are conversation starters. In a way these might be good points but also it creates the impression that we should not invest quality in requirements. As it will anyhow change.
  - tmaly 8y ago
    What I find is that many people do not consider different edge cases or understand what the data really represents. They have some vague notion of what they want, and you only get that very high level limited case. They almost need some training on how to think like a program in some sense to understand just how much detail is needed to provide a good spec.
- sloaken 8y ago
  It is a common problem. Although it can be improved it can NEVER be fixed. Why? Because until they see it and use it they will not be inspired to say 'Well why did you not ...' Until they have the product they did not know they had a requirement xyzzy. I remember a computer history class, where the teach mentioned time sharing was invented in the mid 60's and one guy was insistent it should have been invented earlier. He felt the requirement was always there, and should have been done in the 40's...
toastal 8y ago
I found it incredibly difficult to find part-time (20-30 hours per week) work. It was even more difficult to find it remotely.
cucho 8y ago
In my day job, I work as an advisor to UHNW families and individuals. They have their investments spread across multiple institutions, each providing their own monthly statement, holdings, etc. Our clients pay 4-figures fees monthly to have a consolidated statement (how much money I earned on August, what has been my return YTD, etc.) and portfolio holdings (How much fixed income do I have? How much I am exposed to the Turkish lira? to Argentinian stocks?). Most of the information is in the individual statements (in pdf) and the rest from providers such as Bloomberg and Morningstar. The solutions out there are custom-made and have a lot of manual input. I think a bit of AI and good visualizations can go great lengths to solve this problem.
O_H_E 8y ago
Older thread (9 years): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=893529 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=893529

15 points by ever_curious 8y ago

I work in tech, and we really need to find a way to get tech companies to move from the bay area to different metro areas in the country.

paulcole 8y ago
Voting for taxes on tech companies should do the trick?
sgillen 8y ago
This is starting to happen I think. The economics are starting to make sense, for some companies, due to insane rent and cost of employees.

bachbach 8y ago

There are no young new workers in the construction trades. Average age of some trades is now 60 and these are not trades typically performed by older generations. Wages are rising but I believe there exist opportunities to use AR to transfer tacit knowledge - the type of knowledge thought to be difficult or impossible to formally educate. I believe solving for x on this problem has higher order side affects that we don't presently anticipate because this topic is a neighbour to long standing mysteries in AI.

ILikeConemowk 8y ago
I would love to ask you a couple of questions. Do you have an email or social media profile where I could reach you?
- bachbach 8y ago
  See my HN profile.
  - O_H_E 8y ago
    PS: Your email is not view-able from your HN profile. Test in a private browser tab
    - bachbach 8y ago
      Not sure why that's set to private and don't see an option to make it public. Here's the address: delete-username-dashes-only-i-n-t-e-r-n-a-u-t@internet-mail.org
      - O_H_E 8y ago
        I think that you have to write it in the about field in your profile page
        bachbach 8y ago
        Of course! Seem to be a bit dim today. I'll blame it on the weather. It is raining and the sky doesn't have a colour.
- bachbach 8y ago
  Oh and sorry, but remove the dashes - from the email address username.
BOOSTERHIDROGEN 8y ago
Did you mean an EPC company ?
- bachbach 8y ago
  No.
sloaken 8y ago
I blame this on the attitude that everyone needs a 'College Degree'. It has caused people to not value real work the way they should.
- bachbach 8y ago
  That is true, and partially as a result it will shortly be that blue collar labour will earn higher wages than white collar labour. That and many important tasks will remain unaccomplished like people having houses to live in or clean environments. This happened before in the early 20th century when middle class abruptly had to learn to cook and clean because their cooks and maids went to work in the factories - used to be true that human labour was very cheap.

tmaly 8y ago

I work in Fintech, I think training people on how to write good requirements and specifications is lacking

The_DaveG 8y ago
It's not just in Fintech, it's a problem in most industries, I deal with it in automation most days. It's a skill that is not easily leaned (well).
gls2ro 8y ago
I am finding the same issue in many areas. But I am asking myself if it is just lack of knowledge and knowhow or is it also lack of time, processes and tools for writing and maintaining requirements. My observations are that along with not knowing how to gather and write requirements people at the project level also threat them as second hand objects for the success of project. Eg: some people in agile talk about requirements being user stories with clarifications and decisions around them. Other people say that in agile requirements are conversation starters. In a way these might be good points but also it creates the impression that we should not invest quality in requirements. As it will anyhow change.
- tmaly 8y ago
  What I find is that many people do not consider different edge cases or understand what the data really represents. They have some vague notion of what they want, and you only get that very high level limited case. They almost need some training on how to think like a program in some sense to understand just how much detail is needed to provide a good spec.
sloaken 8y ago
It is a common problem. Although it can be improved it can NEVER be fixed. Why? Because until they see it and use it they will not be inspired to say 'Well why did you not ...' Until they have the product they did not know they had a requirement xyzzy. I remember a computer history class, where the teach mentioned time sharing was invented in the mid 60's and one guy was insistent it should have been invented earlier. He felt the requirement was always there, and should have been done in the 40's...

toastal 8y ago

I found it incredibly difficult to find part-time (20-30 hours per week) work. It was even more difficult to find it remotely.

cucho 8y ago

In my day job, I work as an advisor to UHNW families and individuals. They have their investments spread across multiple institutions, each providing their own monthly statement, holdings, etc. Our clients pay 4-figures fees monthly to have a consolidated statement (how much money I earned on August, what has been my return YTD, etc.) and portfolio holdings (How much fixed income do I have? How much I am exposed to the Turkish lira? to Argentinian stocks?). Most of the information is in the individual statements (in pdf) and the rest from providers such as Bloomberg and Morningstar. The solutions out there are custom-made and have a lot of manual input. I think a bit of AI and good visualizations can go great lengths to solve this problem.

O_H_E 8y ago

Older thread (9 years): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=893529 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=893529