23 ms·

I tried to adjust the time on my alarm clock

372 points by niccl 7y ago

pavel_lishin 7y ago
I don't know who I'm shaking my head at more: the person who bought this nightmare of an alarm clock, or the person who sold it.
- vwuon 7y ago
  That's what I was thinking. This guy is one of the most reputable software developers in the world, bearing the weight of the Windows Shell on his shoulders, with a career that spans decades... and he bought... an alarm clock with wifi? Was he drunk that day?
  - rudiv 7y ago
    Let they whom has never purchased something on the internet while intoxicated throw the first stone.
  - logfromblammo 7y ago
    I'd be fine with a clock with a wi-fi chip, provided that it have a hardware firewall that blocks everything but Network Time Protocol, and include a USB port for business such as updating firmware, updating zoneinfo, or changing IP addresses. Also, it might have been a gift from a well-meaning friend or family member.
    - pavel_lishin 7y ago
      I'd be fine with a clock that has a wifi chip, provided I didn't need to install a fucking app on my phone to change the goddamned alarm.
      - TeMPOraL 7y ago
        > I'd be fine with a clock that has a wifi chip, provided I didn't need to install a fucking app on my phone to change the goddamned alarm. It's worse than that. You have to create an account. I facepalmed reading that. I hate companies that create such garbage.
      - logfromblammo 7y ago
        Agreed. My phone already has an alarm clock app that sounds an alarm through the phone speaker. If someone tries to sell me a separate alarm clock hardware device that requires a smartphone app to accomplish basic functionality that is already available on the phone itself, I am liable to become very hostile and recount unflattering anecdotes about the salesperson's mother. It's a GDMF clock. We already have well-established user interface paradigms for clock-setting that require only two binary input buttons, in devices that cost less than $0.05 to manufacture. The use case for a network-connected clock is to never have to set the time manually, or update it for daylight savings. That is a feature you add to a clock that is already completely functional without a network. You can add a wifi password with just two buttons and a 16-segment LCD, if you are patient enough.
        perl4ever 7y ago
        "You can add a wifi password with just two buttons" Reminds me that I bought a printer with wifi, which I didn't really want, but it didn't come with a cable, so then I found out you had to enter passwords by hitting an up or down button to scroll through all possible characters. Eventually I found a USB cable that worked with it.
    - JohnFen 7y ago
      > I'd be fine with a clock with a wi-fi chip Not me, if only because that's entirely unnecessary for a clock to do what I want a clock to do (including setting the time itself).
  - joe_the_user 7y ago
    It's a head shaker. My guess would be that people sincerely and carefully design one particular consumer-facing item put so much effort into that design that they expect other consumer-facing items to also be worthwhile. I wonder if the people who actually design this crap would buy it?
    - jschwartzi 7y ago
      Having borne witness to the multitude of compromises and suboptimal design decisions that are required to bring a product to market with a bare-bones team at two hardware manufacturers now, I assume that everything described on the box will be shoddy, glitchy, and not work at all as described.
  - pavel_lishin 7y ago
    It could have been a gift.
  - tclancy 7y ago
    Could also be he bought the clock because he liked the look of it and never guessed the wifi part was required rather than optional.
  - mikestew 7y ago
    I am neither as brilliant, nor my career at Microsoft nearly as long as Raymond's, but I am in no position to cast that first stone. My list of "should've known better" stretches temporally long, and quite wide in it's breadth of categories of bad purchases. Yes, some of them were alcohol-fueled. Sadly, most of them were not, thereby removing any excuse. I'm a little older than Raymond (I think), and I am probably just now reaching the point where I consistently think to myself, "nooo, you know full well how this is going to end." when faced with a bad potential purchase.
  - jasonlotito 7y ago
    "The person who bought said clock was unaware of its lurking mysteries."
- jlv2 7y ago
  Or the engineer that designed it.
  - jschwartzi 7y ago
    I can guarantee no sane engineer would have designed that. That was almost certainly designed by some marketer who didn't know the first thing about alarm clocks. The engineering team was probably outsourced, saw the requirements, facepalmed, and implemented them exactly as described. The project manager made sure the project was on-time by removing any workarounds for creating the account. And the clock team had a great dinner out to celebrate another successful product.
glitchc 7y ago
An alarm clock with a wifi chip to phone home your sleep/wakeup times. Maybe they should pay the OP to buy the clock if data is the real monetary transaction here.
paol 7y ago
A fitting entry for https://twitter.com/internetofshit https://twitter.com/internetofshit
commandlinefan 7y ago
> I’m thinking maybe of plugging the clock in at exactly midnight. Good plan, but unfortunately you’d need to be able to set an alarm to know when it was midnight.
- TeMPOraL 7y ago
  You can travel to another continent, set it there during the day, and bring it back.
  - vidanay 7y ago
    But what about time dilation?
  - commandlinefan 7y ago
    No, he has to plug it in where he wants it to run at exactly midnight there, because he can't change the time, either. You have a problem-solvers mentality though!
    - TeMPOraL 7y ago
      Power banks are a thing. I bet it uses either USB charger or something trivially hackable to be powered off 5V/2A!
      - NullPrefix 7y ago
        Some clocks use switching of AC polarity as a time keeping source. There was a big event in Europe sometime recently where lots of clocks went out of sync, because power grid was doing some resyncing and was not constant 60Hz
edgarvaldes 7y ago
>They say that a broken clock is correct twice a day. This one can’t even manage that. It's hilarious, but also sad.
- mikestew 7y ago
  That saying hasn't been true for a long time, if one is speaking generally. I have a house full of clocks, and only one will tell the correct time twice a day if it is in "stopped clock"[0] mode. The rest of them don't tell time at all in that mode. [0] "Even a stopped/broken clock is right twice a day."
- robocat 7y ago
  It really depends on how it is broken. I bought a digital clock home from the US, and it synched it time using the mains frequency, so it was 20% slow, so it would show the right time once every 0.6 days or so. There might have been a pin to control 50Hz vs 60Hz but I couldn't find docs. Instead I bought a 60Hz generator chip, and figured out how to solder it in to make the clock keep time. Unfortunately they used the positive and negative parts of the AC cycle to control the LED display (saving half control lines by using diodes). So although it kept time, I couldn't read the time on the display. Note that my time is more valuable, I suspect I will invest many more days making it work!
emptybits 7y ago
A fun and cringeworthy post. Thanks. But why withhold the make and model of alarm clock? 1. Maybe others could chime in or assist. 2. Brands that sell fragile and frustrating garbage like this should be exposed.
- choward 7y ago
  3. Increase my confidence that the article is actually real. I have no way of verifying anything in this article so as far as I'm concerned it's fake. I need a picture or at least a make and model so I know the alarm clock in question actually exists.
  - BoiledCabbage 7y ago
    And maybe Raymond Chen is completely fine with 'choward' of Hacker News not believing him.
    - cgrealy 7y ago
      Yeah... he's Raymond goddamn Chen. He's not even aware of our existence. :)
      - choward 7y ago
        Doesn't ring a bell. Am I supposed to know who he is?
        cgrealy 7y ago
        He's the author of The Old New Thing... he was heavily involved in the development of Windows and he's generally highly regarded in software development circles. He's been around for a long time.
      - perl4ever 7y ago
        I thought the name sounded familiar, but looking on Wikipedia, there are two Ray(mond) Chens (one is a Federal judge) and neither of them seems to be this guy.
pkamb 7y ago
Why would you buy this clock or allow it in your home?
- annoyingnoob 7y ago
  You allow it in your home so that you do not offend your family member that gave it to you.
tibbydudeza 7y ago
An alarm clock that needs WiFi and an app to control ????. This all reminds me of John Siracusa and his fixation with the perfect toaster oven .. something tells me he would buy one with WIFI and smartphone app if it was available.
- rhinoceraptor 7y ago
  If you need a laugh, here's the list of his reviews: https://www.cardsagainsthumanity.com/toasters/ https://www.cardsagainsthumanity.com/toasters/
kempbellt 7y ago
What is the value add for a wifi-enabled alarm clock? Truly, what do you get from supposedly being able to program it from your phone? You have to download yet another proprietary app, go through a tedious syncing process to connect with the device, learn another GUI (unusable in this case), and cross your fingers, hoping that it works. Is clicking a couple physical buttons on an actual device such a strain? If you're frequently setting multiple alarms, as many people do on their phones for various reasons, does it benefit you to use this rather than just using your phone?
- PhasmaFelis 7y ago
  If someone wants to make a "smart" alarm clock, I'd really like to see one that actually has a ten-digit keyboard with dedicated function buttons, instead of trying to cram all time and alarm functions onto three buttons and a switch. It can't possibly be expensive. Pocket calculators cost $5.
  - Johnny555 7y ago
    I saw an alarm clock like that in a hotel once -- it had a cheap 10 digit keyboard and poorly debounced keys, setting the time was harder than using the backward/forward button style, because typing "12:00" ended up as "11:11" more often than not, it took many tries and a firm press to get the time set correctly.
  - cardiffspaceman 7y ago
    I have the most awesome alarm clock. It has an LED display, a radio, and it plugs into the wall for power. It has a knob for tuning the radio and a small slide switch for adjusting its band. It has assorted other affordances on its outside that I will skip over. The best features are the following: It has a battery-backed time-keeping chip which means it has never needed to have the time reset due to any loss of power to its main power supply. It has a piezo alarm that will sound if the main power is out and the alarm is on and triggered. It also has a slide switch labeled "DST -on DST -off" so in theory I would never have to +/- the time EVER once it was on the right time zone. I found it in a outlet-style store when I was looking for a WWV clock and this clock answers all my clock needs without needing WiFi, Bluetooth, any other antenna (for AM/FM radio it might be using the power cord, but I don't need that). It doesn't need to be told a password and I don't need to set up an account. I think it was marked down to $10 when I bought it.
Entalpi 7y ago
Reminds me of every time I use a new microwave. Or dishwasher.. Common appliances dont need to be soo different just to stand out to be honest.
- perl4ever 7y ago
  I bought a cheap Sharp microwave because I'd been accustomed to the way Sharps work since childhood, but I was disappointed they seem to have messed with the interface for no good reason. It's not quite as weird as one atrocious GE I remember, but they still fixed what wasn't broke. The numbers are entered from the left for some reason.
Johnny555 7y ago
Who would buy an alarm clock that needs an app to set it? As soon as I saw that I needed to install an app (and create an account!?) just to set my alarm clock, I've have sent it back. Though I guess I do have an alarm clock that needs an app to set it since my only alarm clock is my phone. But if I bought a standalone alarm clock, I'd want it to be really stand-alone, not dependent on my phone.
- falcolas 7y ago
  Dark patterns on the packaging that obscure the need for a cell phone app. I've seen this kind of thing show up all the time.
  - vengefulduck 7y ago
    So why not return it?
    - Nition 7y ago
      He did.
  - Mountain_Skies 7y ago
    Ran into something similar with a resistance band workout system. To access the how to use videos, you must sign up for an account. To sign up for an account, they must verify your phone number via SMS. Why on Earth does a set of resistance bands need your contact information? I sent the whole thing back. Maybe if companies start hurting due to restocking costs, they'll stop.
  - steelframe 7y ago
    > packaging that obscure the need for a cell phone app There have been a handful of posts on this theme. The idea being that food labels disclose the raw facts about things like high-fructose corn syrup and saturated fats. Likewise IoT packaging should do the same. https://www.troyhunt.com/what-would-it-look-like-if-we-put-warnings-on-iot-devices-like-we-do-cigarette-packets/ https://www.troyhunt.com/what-would-it-look-like-if-we-put-w... https://www.symantec.com/blogs/expert-perspectives/why-we-need-security-and-privacy-nutrition-label-iot-devices https://www.symantec.com/blogs/expert-perspectives/why-we-ne...
u801e 7y ago
I think the only clocks I need to manually adjust are the ones in my cars and the microwave oven. Everything else sets itself based on NTP or radio signal (for the radio clocks).
- mark-r 7y ago
  Do your radio clocks still work? The US government was reportedly going to turn off the transmitters this year, but came through at the last minute to keep them online. I have 4 car clocks, 2 oven clocks, 4 wall clocks, and 2 bedside clocks that need setting manually. My phone and PC are automatic, luckily.
deckar01 7y ago
> January 1, 2018 If your system clock is too far behind, SSL certificates will fail validation. I suspect during QA the certificates were valid for the reset date, but the current certificate is not.
- deckar01 7y ago
  Two downvotes and no replies. Set your system time several years in the past and see what happens to secure sites. I encountered this issue several times as a PC repair technician. We would turn a computer on after summer break and find its CMOS battery had died and the system date had reset. The computer was unable to browse sites secured with SSL certificates. The start time of those certificates were in the future relative to the system time, so the system thought they were invalid.
mindingdata 7y ago
I actually went back to an old school casio watch recently because my Fitbit refused to connect to my phone. It had the incorrect time on it and you cannot set the time on the watch itself (Must be via the phone app). I get that a fitness tracker is kinda worthless without syncing the data up. But I was happy just seeing my daily steps and being able to tell the time and I couldn't even do the latter.
JohnFen 7y ago
> For some reason, my alarm clock requires that I install an app on my phone. And the app required me to create an account The larger mystery is why he didn't immediately return the clock as soon as he discovered this requirement.
- drei109 7y ago
  He mentioned in a comment that the person who bought it didn't know that an app was needed. So it was maybe a gift from someone else.
  - wUabkSG6L5Bfa5 7y ago
    There's going to be a really awkward conversation at his next dinner party.
    - kempbellt 7y ago
      "Remember that nifty alarm clock you gave me last year? I finally got around to trying to set it up and....wow, what a piece of shit. I'm an engineer and I couldn't even get it working. After wasting an hour trying to set it up, I just threw it in the closet. Whatever engineer designed that thing probably doesn't even use it. It was a fun idea, but probably more useful for throwing at burglars. Thanks again haha" Any of my friends/family would be laughing along with me, and giving me shit for not being able to setup "something as simple as an alarm clock".
  - JohnFen 7y ago
    Even so, he could probably have returned it. Even if he couldn't, though, that doesn't explain why he used it. It wasn't even a passive thing he could have overlooked -- he had to actively download an app!
  - jasonmp85 7y ago
    If someone gave me something like this for a gift, I'd immediately sell it on Amazon, or possibly throw it in a Goodwill pile. If I'm feeling especially charitable, I'd go out to my local Good Recycler, who will probably want me to pay for the PCBs/backup batteries, etc. to be handled correctly, but it would be worth it. Under no circumstances would I—after realizing that it required an app to function—continue with setup. _That's_ what's baffling to me about this post. Why didn't he do the same? What the hell did he expect? All I want to know is "_what_ benefit did you think would come from using this that led you to continue with setup despite all of the obvious negatives?" Either that expected benefit is _huge_—in which case, why not mention it?—or he didn't anticipate any downsides—in which, I don't know, maybe pay more attention in the world. In any case, this post was essentially devoid of any meaningful information.
_bxg1 7y ago
A bit cheeky from a company that won't let you use your desktop computer without an online account
- JohnFen 7y ago
  You can totally use Windows without an online account. I do it.
  - jandrese 7y ago
    Not that Microsoft wants you to know that. They make the offline account button/link smaller and harder to spot regularly. I've thought several times that they finally removed it only to spot it hiding in a corner in a grey link one shade darker than the background.
    - NullPrefix 7y ago
      They could be treating it internally as unsupported workflow too. Or at least untested workflow. Kind of like that issue where your CPU would be loaded 100% when you open start menu if you have cortana disabled.
  - JTbane 7y ago
    In version 1809 there was a dark pattern that misled people installing Windows into thinking it was not an option.
  - noja 7y ago
    Only if you know to disconnect the ethernet cable, then the local account option magically reappears.
- jodrellblank 7y ago
  It isn't "from a company" > Statements do not establish the official position of Microsoft Corporation. - https://devblogs.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/?p=25453 https://devblogs.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/?p=25453
rootsudo 7y ago
I do not know if Raymond is posting in HN or not. I've been seeing an increased number of his posts lately on HN.
lordnacho 7y ago
Not clear why you'd use your phone to connect to an alarm clock when the major phone OSes all come with an alarm clock app? I'd have thought phones had swallowed up alarm clocks along with maps, calculators, walkmen, etc by now.
- JohnFen 7y ago
  > I'd have thought phones had swallowed up alarm clocks along with maps, calculators, walkmen, etc by now. Nah. If we define "walkmen" as meaning "dedicated portable music players", then people are still using all those things. I see everything in your list being used regularly (except for paper maps -- although I used one of those last week). Not nearly as much as before smartphones, but still.
failrate 7y ago
My phone is my alarm clock. Why would someone desire a single purpose device for "alarm clock"?
- marcosdumay 7y ago
  There is a lot of value on your alarm clock not receiving messages and phone calls, and not having any other interface that isn't related to reading the time or waking you up at the correct instant.
- bargle0 7y ago
  I want an alarm that's independent from my phone. That way if I lose, break, or forget to charge my phone, I still have an alarm.
- fzeroracer 7y ago
  Separation of concerns. Phones operate as a sort of monolith which is dangerous because if your phone fails, it takes down all of your services. Phones are also designed to be replaced fairly often which can mean redoing your alarms and so forth. It's one of those things you really don't realize until your phone suddenly dies on you and you have to scramble to get a replacement.
  - failrate 7y ago
    I have a Nokia drawer in my kitchen.
- BorgHunter 7y ago
  Some years ago, I recall there was a bug in iOS which caused alarms not to update correctly when DST started (or ended), resulting in lots of oversleeping as alarms failed to alarm when expected.[0] Personally, I have a problem with my cheapish Android phone where it will suddenly and for no apparent reason decide it's been moved to UTC, and move the time ahead to UTC. It forgets about this delusion when I restart it. So far this has only happened in the middle of the day (and all it's done is mess up the period it's supposed to be silent during, when I'm at work, thus the downside so far has been a couple annoying dinging noises at my desk). Also, I have a fancy alarm clock which alarms by gradually lighting up the room, instead of by blaring loud noises. I find this a more agreeable way to wake up in the mornings. I also like having a dim, but legible time display on my nightstand to glance at when I wake up in the night, rather than having to press a button on my phone, which is then way too bright to look at in my dark bedroom. Finally, apart from software bugs, single-purpose alarm clocks are quite cheap and reliable. Although it is not in my bedroom anymore, I still have an alarm clock that was my bedside alarm clock when I was in elementary school. It's thirty years old by now, yet it still works perfectly. The alarm function still works (although it's quieter than it once was). The display still is flawless (although it's dimmer than it once was). It's a simple, reliable device. My phone...isn't. [0] https://www.theguardian.com/technology/blog/2010/nov/01/iphone-dst-alarm-bug-europe https://www.theguardian.com/technology/blog/2010/nov/01/ipho...
levismaina 7y ago
The inmates are running the asylum.
drdec 7y ago
My alarm clock has the most brilliant feature - a two position slider for activating and deactivating DST. Took me less than a second to make the change this weekend.
noblethrasher 7y ago
I've complained about this before [1], but I once bought a $70 (USD) Microsoft Arc Mouse that required you to both register an MS account and download an app just to be able to turn off the obnoxious synthetic clicking sound that was enabled by default. I made a second trip to the store that day just to return the the thing. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11390494 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11390494
NetBeck 7y ago
He said he thinks the WiFi chip might be broken. I wonder if the thing is trying to connect to an NTP server.
- jandrese 7y ago
  I'm guessing he upgraded his Router to something with more modern encryption and the new chip doesn't support it. This is a huge problem with IoT shit, getting trapped with obsolete protocols because updating all of your old devices is impossible. Or you have to run an old network specifically for the IoT garbage and firewall it off heavily from the Internet, after doing god knows how much research into each device to figure out what cloud services they use.
iamaelephant 7y ago
As much as I love Raymond I have completely run out of time for people who buy unnecessary "smart" devices then complain about them. 6 years ago I would understand, but by now we all know this stuff is junk. Yes, all of it.
- city41 7y ago
  We recently got a new fridge and my friends and family were all amazed I didn't choose a "smart" fridge. "But you're in tech, why wouldn't you want a high tech fridge?", "Because I'm in tech."
  - matwood 7y ago
    Agreed. My washer and dryer are close to 20 years old. They each have a few buttons, and the 'computers' are mostly mechanical (think egg timer). I'm dreading when they break because anytime I have looked for simple, basic models like I have they no longer seem to exist.
    - GhettoMaestro 7y ago
      That's why I bought a Kenmore HE3. I can buy most parts for $<50 on Amazon (or eBay in the worst case).
    - artursapek 7y ago
      My mother and father in law have these, they specifically sought them. They're these old brown Maytag machines. Really nice and easy to use. If I ever replace the ones that came with my house I'll probably look for the same kind.
    - JRKrause 7y ago
      If you are really worried just drop a few dollars on spares for all the internal parts. Most everything can be found on Amazon. It's hard to imagine drying enough clothes to wear out the heater element more than three times in the average human lifespan.
jacknews 7y ago
OK I'm going to be the contrarian here. Now I agree, having to make an account to use your device absolutely sucks, why on earth would you need that? And it sounds as though the user experience of connecting to the clock also sucks. BUT, if this is done correctly (eg wave nfc phone near your clock, and the appropriate app fires up and connects automtically etc), then I see this is a good future. In this clock example, you wouldn't need to 'advance the hour' for DST - the phone would just set the correct time automatically with a swipe. My phone becomes a universal remote. No longer those crappy LCD screens (or just LED lights), and weird buttons on every applicance that I have to learn to use. Not to mention they are expensive parts of the device, and take a lot of development effort. Also those screens and buttons are always the first to break, and are totally unrepairable except by ordering a spare from the manufacturer (if they still make them). Unlike say a broken valve in a washing machine that can often be repaired or replaced with a commodity equivalent. So, I'm going to say that using phones as a standard appliance interface is potentially a huge UI improvement, cost-saver, and reliability/repairability improvement - if it's done well. Or of course a dystopian nightmare if done badly.
- mark-r 7y ago
  Knowing how these devices are produced, what do you think are the chances of having one done well vs. done badly? In theory you make a good point, but in the real world we just aren't that lucky.
- bipson 7y ago
  You mean the (approximately) three "weird" buttons to adjust date and time? No, no and again no. The future were I need a smartphone to set my clock is not a good one for me, however you put it.
  - jacknews 7y ago
    the clock could come with cheap (and replaceble) IR remote for your button fetish - no need for that on the clock itself - buttons are nearly always the first point of failure IMHO, closely followed by screens. Also you need to learn to use whatever limited UI /menus they've managed to cram into such limiting UI hardware, rather than the whole richness and usability of an app. Not so bad for an alarm clock perhaps - until it has multiple daily//weekly alarms with custom sounds, custom snooze schedule, custom lighting profile, etc, etc - ah but a reason it doesn't have any of this stuff is because it would be too difficult to cram into a 3-button UI. Anyway, a limited hardware UI is also much more problematic for many other appliances. Better just to do away with it completely (saving cost, improving reliability) and use a phone or cheap tablet which are ubiquitous these dayss, or even a new market for cheap dedicated universal smart remotes. PS downvoting me (twice!) because you don't agree wiith my point is fairly childish I think, and should be reserved for insulting , nonsensical and troll posts, etc. IMHO.
hyperman1 7y ago
Going slightly OT here, but I wonder: Is Raymond doing the old new thing for free or does he get some MS company time for it. On one hand, he clearly does hardcore technical stuff on the job so he can't have much time. The blog meanders between hard core windows programming and human interest stuff. All that says hobby project. But it runs on microsoft infrastructure, he must put in a lot of time to write the posts and curate the discussions. The marketing value for microsoft must be non-trivial. So that says company provided resources.
- freeone3000 7y ago
  If any of us want to write a blog post, we can, and it gets the same support. His is better than most of ours. :)
miki123211 7y ago
I see a lot of people here denigrating devices that need mobile apps to function. While it may be frustrating for some, be aware of the accessibility implications of this approach. Most devices are simple enough that the only way to access them is via buttons and a screen. If you can't see the screen or have problems pressing the buttons, you're screwed and need to get a device made especially for you. This has been the case with blind people for years, and such devices usually cost about 4x the normal ones. Mobile apps, if done properly, allow such people to use the devices. Sure, an app as an alternative interface is usually a better idea, but the point still stands.
- cpmsmith 7y ago
  The "if done properly" is carrying a lot of weight there, though. Keeping on top of accessibility that way is a challenge in apps that are their companies' entire business, to say nothing of apps that are companions to a "real" product.
  - miki123211 7y ago
    even if not done properly, a semi-accessible solution is better than a totally inaccessible one. A friend of mine has a hi-fi set that, obviously, doesn't have a built-in screen reader and the menus are complicated enough that she can't use it on its own. However, a crashy, semi-accessible app lets her use it somehow. I don't think anyone at the company cares about accessibility. Sure, it would be better if someone did, but that's still better than a (touch)?screen and menus with three levels of nesting that wrap around and remember your position.
- JohnFen 7y ago
  > While it may be frustrating for some From my point of view, it's not a "frustration" issue, it's a privacy/security issue.
Someone1234 7y ago
If his alarm clock is a "HeimVision" (which it sounds like it could be from the description) holding the brightness for a long time will allow adjustment of the time. Unfortunately the WiFi light will never stop blinking.
- jasonmp85 7y ago
  Wow just looked up this product and… there is no need for WiFi. Hell, I just bought an in-wall sunset/sunrise timer to control some grow lights for my plants in the winter. Works great, literally a simple board and backup battery in a wall switch. If you want your room to brighten for wake, I don't know, invest in some actual home automation? I've got a dimmer on my master cans and it is _trivial_ to do this sort of thing, except with much larger benefits overall and a much more robust/supported ecosystem. Sigh…
stevenringo 7y ago
Is this a Microsoft product?
everdrive 7y ago
You can still find traditional alarm clocks in thrift stores. They're often $2-$5 and work fine!
nkrisc 7y ago
Shopping for a radio recently I passed up loads of crap that I believe would have met the same fate as his clock. Internet enabled shit that will probably die once an LED goes out. I ended up getting a nice, solidly built radio with a wood cabinet that has a volunteer knob, an AM/FM knob, and a tuner knob. No app required. The one quality of life feature it does have is a little light that lights up when you've hit a signal on the tuner. This is nice because the exact position required for a station can drift. I assume this is due to atmospheric effects and other interference.
- Turing_Machine 7y ago
  For anyone who, like me, was wondering what a "volunteer knob" is, I suspect it's an autocorrecto for "volume knob". Took me a second to get it.
  - nkrisc 7y ago
    Dang it, I completely missed that and now I can't edit it. Doesn't everyone's radio have a volunteer knob?
baggy_trough 7y ago
Just get the simplest, cheapest clock (the $6 ones on Amazon). [Clock Set] [Alarm Set] [Hour] [Minute] is the ideal UI we want. I had a fancier Sony clock that was designed to make it impossible to set the time. I couldn't figure it out, so I threw it away. Ridiculous!
eps 7y ago
For some reason, an operating system that I paid money for and installed on my very personal computer that I also bought for my own buckazoids insists that I create an online account to be able to log in locally. I'm going to repeat that: in order to use my super-duper computer I had to create an account with Microsoft. How ridiculous is that? * Yes, I know I could've faked the machine being offline, then clicked through some gray-on-gray links in 3px font and I'd be granted a reprieve. But, please, as much as I like reading about Windows quirks on Raymond's blog, he is not exactly in position to complain about a device needing an online account to operate.
- 0x00000000 7y ago
  I actually thought the post was going to be a metaphor at first. Especially the part about the barely-functional clusterfuck of a UX.
- throw12221999 7y ago
  Based on his blog I get the impression that he probably totally agrees with you, this post could be one diplomatic way of saying it.
  - diminoten 7y ago
    The clock may not have actually ever existed, not that it matters.
- bochoh 7y ago
  I just did a new online install of Windows 10 professional and the offline account option was still there.
  - pm7 7y ago
    Professional might be different. I can personally confirm this issue on Home, version 1903-v2.
  - taneq 7y ago
    I did an install of Windows 10 Home (or whatever it's called) about six months ago and the offline account option was there then (albeit hard to spot, the page is designed to look like it's mandatory but there was a skip option). Unless they've removed it in the past six months it should be there. Edit: As a cousin post mentions, this option may only be available if the computer is not connected to the internet. Which is annoying as heck.
scarejunba 7y ago
I like my smart clocks (Google Home devices). They needed a phone to set up, but then stay synced. I don't adjust the time. I didn't even realize DST changed until after the gym. Alarms worked correctly. Reminders I set the day before worked correctly. This is what I want life to be like. Changing clocks is a bullshit problem. It's not worth thought.
- raxxorrax 7y ago
  Don't you have radio clocks? A single transmitter has a range up to 2000km. Perhaps more depending on the frequency. There are also GPS solutions, although those are more error prone.
  - scarejunba 7y ago
    They're cool. My dad had one. The Google ones do other things too so I prefer them.
not_a_cop75 7y ago
On the bright side, it's not being used for a botnet anytime soon.
hollander 7y ago
I have two radio controlled clocks. One checks each night at 2 o'clock with the radio time, and then sees it is probably 0.1 second ahead. Apparently this analogue clock can only adjust time forward, so each night it has to do a 12 hour cycle (minus 0.1 second). This means 50% extra battery use. Plus it's annoying when you're up at that time. All is quiet and then you hear this strange squeeking sound. The other clock is digital, so adjusting time is easier, except that it forgets to do this when changing to and from summertime. The only solution is to unplug the power cable. Why this clock doesn't know this is a mystery. It only has to check once a week. I don't know how this radio signal works, but can't they send info about winter- or summertime along with the time?
- jrockway 7y ago
  The signal does contain a DST flag. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WWVB#Announcement_bits https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WWVB#Announcement_bits The reality is, at least in the Eastern US, that you probably don't successfully receive the signal often enough to ever get the DST bit. When I lived in Chicago, I used WWVB clocks and they worked fine, when I moved to New York, I never got them to sync. I also have a bunch of chips for receiving the signal and they have never worked. You have to use the new phase modulated signal, and nobody sells chips for receiving these. (Naturally the older AM receivers are a cheap single-chip solution. So would a receiver for the phase-modulated data, but nobody feels like making one, so you are stuck.)
cabaalis 7y ago
The account deal is becoming pervasive and annoying. This is a common interaction I have at a local pet store: "That'll be $15. What's your phone number?" "No." ... strange look for a moment, finally followed by just taking my $15 and not knowing who I am or being able to easily track me.
- siphor 7y ago
  i started giving them 303 867-5309. tons of accounts at every store (replace w/ ur area code).
  - variaga 7y ago
    I was using 123 456-7890 as my Vons' loyalty # for a while. "Thank you mister... Tester #2? You have $98,427 in savings this year".
    - wruza 7y ago
      I actually abused this once. A local general store required a phone number to “reactivate” my discount/bonus card and I went to free sms service to register it. My next visit was paid by a collective bonus of everyone who did the same. I think that every time someone registers a number+card, all bonuses from this number go to “new” card. Never worked again.
  - JohnFen 7y ago
    I much prefer telling the store "no". That way, they they'll at least get the occasional reminder that there are customers who hate this sort of thing. The funny thing is that in many stores that have "loyalty programs", when I tell them I'm not signed up and am not interested in signing up, they'll just use a different loyalty card number instead (I assume it's the clerk's, but I'm not sure).
    - perl4ever 7y ago
      You can't assume they will do that everywhere. I was in CVS, and it seems like rather than discounts for "loyalty" they have jacked up their prices if you don't have the card. They said they would look me up by my phone number, but when they didn't find me, that was it, no discount. I said fine and left the overpriced batteries behind. I don't know why grocery stores don't seem to care, whether it's corporate policy, or employee culture.
eledumb 7y ago
I just bought a new refrigerator and it comes with an app. I installed the app out of curiosity, the first thing the app demands is that I allow it to track the location of my phone at all times. The app's been deleted.
- NullPrefix 7y ago
  Return the fridge. If you don't return it, you're telling the company you're okay with this.
annoyingnoob 7y ago
That is a real Internet of Shit story. Fuck it, put a chip in it.
codedokode 7y ago
> For some reason, my alarm clock requires that I install an app on my phone. It is weird that a person working in IT pretends not to know why the clock reqiures an app. Of course to vacuum personal information, geolocation and hardware identifiers of all devices nearby.
caf 7y ago
This is firmly in the category of "not sure if it's satire or real".
WalterBright 7y ago
> The Wi-Fi connectivity is nice when it’s working (like it was during the springtime) since it means never having to adjust the time after a power outage or time zone change. I bought one of those "atomic clocks" 20 years ago that pick up the time from some government radio station. It's always dead on correct, and adjusts automatically for DST. There is no user interface, put a battery in and hang it on the wall. Best clock I ever bought.
- dzhiurgis 7y ago
  Ours picks time up from across the border with no way to adjust that
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
- justin66 7y ago
  The NIST radio stations that serve those radios have been under threat of defunding recently. So far, so good. https://www.voanews.com/usa/us-politics/time-may-be-running-out-millions-clocks https://www.voanews.com/usa/us-politics/time-may-be-running-...
jccalhoun 7y ago
I wish he would name the brand.
xg15 7y ago
I think it's useful to view connectedness in "smart" devices in the same way we view ads: They are as much a consumer feature as ads are about "informing users about business opportunities" - in truth, both are part of the payment for the service or good. As such, it's in the interest of the vendor to smuggle "smartness" into as many products as possible, whether or not there is consumer demand for it - or even if there is explicit desire not to have it.
perl4ever 7y ago
I have an alarm clock that's probably over a decade old, and I think I had a similar one 20 or 30 years ago. The controls are a large "alarm/snooze" button, small "Time", "Hour" and "Min" buttons, and an on/off "Alarm" slider. The display is a segmented red LED display, with one round light indicating PM (just turns off for AM) and one round light on the opposite side indicating the alarm slider is on. It runs on AC power, with a 9V battery backup. Hopefully they won't stop making them, since I don't think there is anything you could add or take away. There are not many devices where the logic of the controls is so simple and standard you could almost design a clone from memory.
oh_hello 7y ago
My Nest thermostats have become more trouble than they are worth. The learning feature constantly overwrites temperatures I have manually set in the schedule with garbage. Somehow it has learned temperatures I never set. It's infuriating. Time to shut off the smart features.
matt_the_bass 7y ago
I make wordclocks as a side project[0]. Mine connect to the internet via wifi to update the time. The user only needs to set the time zone offset since there is no location lookup. The clock has no app and doesn’t require an account. At start up, is has a softAP that you connect to with your phone so that you can give it your wifi credentials via a simple self hosted web server/form. Why use internet for time? Simple, I couldn’t find a stable RTC on a small, inexpensive, off the self microcontroller board. But I could find one with wifi. My early prototypes used an Arduino UNO. That has awful RTC stability since is doesn’t use a crystal but rather an R/C oscillator for timing. I don’t think my customers want an extra app if there really is no reason. Why not use a built in web server? [0] http://www.finewordclocks.com http://www.finewordclocks.com
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
pnako 7y ago
“I have always wished for my computer to be as easy to use as my telephone; my wish has come true because I can no longer figure out how to use my telephone.” -- Bjarne Stroustrup
gatherhunterer 7y ago
The Casio A168WA-1 has an alarm, a stopwatch, an optional hourly beep, 12 and 24-hour clocks and a light so you can tell the time even when the sun is down. It costs less than $20 on Amazon. It may not be good enough for a tech billionaire but it doesn’t ask any questions. I may not have an executive position at Microsoft or an alarm clock that mines my data but I’ve got two dollars and a Casio. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=FuZNswuwAxM https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=FuZNswuwAxM
cabalamat 7y ago
> For some reason, my alarm clock requires that I install an app on my phone. And the app required me to create an account. That's his problem right there: getting an internet-connected "smart" alarm clock. Ditto for other internet connected appliances.
billfruit 7y ago
I am always surprised that most American alarm clocks run in mains power. In the 3rd world alarm clocks run on battery power, that saves a lot of complexity of having to deal with preserving the time in case of power disruptions, and they are fully functional even through power disruptions.
suigintoulain 7y ago
I have a feeling I know exactly what clock he's talking about. Costco sold a La Crosse wifi projection alarm clock where you can only set the time with the app, and the app has a hamburger-menu-icon-but-actually-a-handle gesture to delete whatever device you're having an issue with. Strangely, I'm having the same issue he did, where the wifi stops working and it loses the plot. I took it apart to see if the antenna broke, but it's got an ESP8266 module so that's not it.
al_be_back 7y ago
more like "I tried to adjust the time on my projector-cloaked-as-a-clock. I failed."
gambiting 7y ago
"The Wi-Fi connectivity is nice when it’s working (like it was during the springtime) since it means never having to adjust the time after a power outage or time zone change." I mean, isn't that exactly what the time adjustement signal is for? I have several watches which have this technology and they are precise like crazy - I don't understand why you'd need wifi for something so simple. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio_clock https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio_clock

372 points by niccl 7y ago

I don't know who I'm shaking my head at more: the person who bought this nightmare of an alarm clock, or the person who sold it.

vwuon 7y ago
That's what I was thinking. This guy is one of the most reputable software developers in the world, bearing the weight of the Windows Shell on his shoulders, with a career that spans decades... and he bought... an alarm clock with wifi? Was he drunk that day?
- rudiv 7y ago
  Let they whom has never purchased something on the internet while intoxicated throw the first stone.
- logfromblammo 7y ago
  I'd be fine with a clock with a wi-fi chip, provided that it have a hardware firewall that blocks everything but Network Time Protocol, and include a USB port for business such as updating firmware, updating zoneinfo, or changing IP addresses. Also, it might have been a gift from a well-meaning friend or family member.
  - pavel_lishin 7y ago
    I'd be fine with a clock that has a wifi chip, provided I didn't need to install a fucking app on my phone to change the goddamned alarm.
    - TeMPOraL 7y ago
      > I'd be fine with a clock that has a wifi chip, provided I didn't need to install a fucking app on my phone to change the goddamned alarm. It's worse than that. You have to create an account. I facepalmed reading that. I hate companies that create such garbage.
    - logfromblammo 7y ago
      Agreed. My phone already has an alarm clock app that sounds an alarm through the phone speaker. If someone tries to sell me a separate alarm clock hardware device that requires a smartphone app to accomplish basic functionality that is already available on the phone itself, I am liable to become very hostile and recount unflattering anecdotes about the salesperson's mother. It's a GDMF clock. We already have well-established user interface paradigms for clock-setting that require only two binary input buttons, in devices that cost less than $0.05 to manufacture. The use case for a network-connected clock is to never have to set the time manually, or update it for daylight savings. That is a feature you add to a clock that is already completely functional without a network. You can add a wifi password with just two buttons and a 16-segment LCD, if you are patient enough.
      - perl4ever 7y ago
        "You can add a wifi password with just two buttons" Reminds me that I bought a printer with wifi, which I didn't really want, but it didn't come with a cable, so then I found out you had to enter passwords by hitting an up or down button to scroll through all possible characters. Eventually I found a USB cable that worked with it.
  - JohnFen 7y ago
    > I'd be fine with a clock with a wi-fi chip Not me, if only because that's entirely unnecessary for a clock to do what I want a clock to do (including setting the time itself).
- joe_the_user 7y ago
  It's a head shaker. My guess would be that people sincerely and carefully design one particular consumer-facing item put so much effort into that design that they expect other consumer-facing items to also be worthwhile. I wonder if the people who actually design this crap would buy it?
  - jschwartzi 7y ago
    Having borne witness to the multitude of compromises and suboptimal design decisions that are required to bring a product to market with a bare-bones team at two hardware manufacturers now, I assume that everything described on the box will be shoddy, glitchy, and not work at all as described.
- pavel_lishin 7y ago
  It could have been a gift.
- tclancy 7y ago
  Could also be he bought the clock because he liked the look of it and never guessed the wifi part was required rather than optional.
- mikestew 7y ago
  I am neither as brilliant, nor my career at Microsoft nearly as long as Raymond's, but I am in no position to cast that first stone. My list of "should've known better" stretches temporally long, and quite wide in it's breadth of categories of bad purchases. Yes, some of them were alcohol-fueled. Sadly, most of them were not, thereby removing any excuse. I'm a little older than Raymond (I think), and I am probably just now reaching the point where I consistently think to myself, "nooo, you know full well how this is going to end." when faced with a bad potential purchase.
- jasonlotito 7y ago
  "The person who bought said clock was unaware of its lurking mysteries."
jlv2 7y ago
Or the engineer that designed it.
- jschwartzi 7y ago
  I can guarantee no sane engineer would have designed that. That was almost certainly designed by some marketer who didn't know the first thing about alarm clocks. The engineering team was probably outsourced, saw the requirements, facepalmed, and implemented them exactly as described. The project manager made sure the project was on-time by removing any workarounds for creating the account. And the clock team had a great dinner out to celebrate another successful product.

glitchc 7y ago

An alarm clock with a wifi chip to phone home your sleep/wakeup times. Maybe they should pay the OP to buy the clock if data is the real monetary transaction here.

paol 7y ago

A fitting entry for https://twitter.com/internetofshit https://twitter.com/internetofshit

commandlinefan 7y ago

> I’m thinking maybe of plugging the clock in at exactly midnight. Good plan, but unfortunately you’d need to be able to set an alarm to know when it was midnight.

TeMPOraL 7y ago
You can travel to another continent, set it there during the day, and bring it back.
- vidanay 7y ago
  But what about time dilation?
- commandlinefan 7y ago
  No, he has to plug it in where he wants it to run at exactly midnight there, because he can't change the time, either. You have a problem-solvers mentality though!
  - TeMPOraL 7y ago
    Power banks are a thing. I bet it uses either USB charger or something trivially hackable to be powered off 5V/2A!
    - NullPrefix 7y ago
      Some clocks use switching of AC polarity as a time keeping source. There was a big event in Europe sometime recently where lots of clocks went out of sync, because power grid was doing some resyncing and was not constant 60Hz

edgarvaldes 7y ago

>They say that a broken clock is correct twice a day. This one can’t even manage that. It's hilarious, but also sad.

mikestew 7y ago
That saying hasn't been true for a long time, if one is speaking generally. I have a house full of clocks, and only one will tell the correct time twice a day if it is in "stopped clock"[0] mode. The rest of them don't tell time at all in that mode. [0] "Even a stopped/broken clock is right twice a day."
robocat 7y ago
It really depends on how it is broken. I bought a digital clock home from the US, and it synched it time using the mains frequency, so it was 20% slow, so it would show the right time once every 0.6 days or so. There might have been a pin to control 50Hz vs 60Hz but I couldn't find docs. Instead I bought a 60Hz generator chip, and figured out how to solder it in to make the clock keep time. Unfortunately they used the positive and negative parts of the AC cycle to control the LED display (saving half control lines by using diodes). So although it kept time, I couldn't read the time on the display. Note that my time is more valuable, I suspect I will invest many more days making it work!

emptybits 7y ago

A fun and cringeworthy post. Thanks. But why withhold the make and model of alarm clock? 1. Maybe others could chime in or assist. 2. Brands that sell fragile and frustrating garbage like this should be exposed.

choward 7y ago
3. Increase my confidence that the article is actually real. I have no way of verifying anything in this article so as far as I'm concerned it's fake. I need a picture or at least a make and model so I know the alarm clock in question actually exists.
- BoiledCabbage 7y ago
  And maybe Raymond Chen is completely fine with 'choward' of Hacker News not believing him.
  - cgrealy 7y ago
    Yeah... he's Raymond goddamn Chen. He's not even aware of our existence. :)
    - choward 7y ago
      Doesn't ring a bell. Am I supposed to know who he is?
      - cgrealy 7y ago
        He's the author of The Old New Thing... he was heavily involved in the development of Windows and he's generally highly regarded in software development circles. He's been around for a long time.
    - perl4ever 7y ago
      I thought the name sounded familiar, but looking on Wikipedia, there are two Ray(mond) Chens (one is a Federal judge) and neither of them seems to be this guy.

pkamb 7y ago

Why would you buy this clock or allow it in your home?

annoyingnoob 7y ago
You allow it in your home so that you do not offend your family member that gave it to you.

tibbydudeza 7y ago

An alarm clock that needs WiFi and an app to control ????. This all reminds me of John Siracusa and his fixation with the perfect toaster oven .. something tells me he would buy one with WIFI and smartphone app if it was available.

rhinoceraptor 7y ago
If you need a laugh, here's the list of his reviews: https://www.cardsagainsthumanity.com/toasters/ https://www.cardsagainsthumanity.com/toasters/

kempbellt 7y ago

What is the value add for a wifi-enabled alarm clock? Truly, what do you get from supposedly being able to program it from your phone? You have to download yet another proprietary app, go through a tedious syncing process to connect with the device, learn another GUI (unusable in this case), and cross your fingers, hoping that it works. Is clicking a couple physical buttons on an actual device such a strain? If you're frequently setting multiple alarms, as many people do on their phones for various reasons, does it benefit you to use this rather than just using your phone?

PhasmaFelis 7y ago
If someone wants to make a "smart" alarm clock, I'd really like to see one that actually has a ten-digit keyboard with dedicated function buttons, instead of trying to cram all time and alarm functions onto three buttons and a switch. It can't possibly be expensive. Pocket calculators cost $5.
- Johnny555 7y ago
  I saw an alarm clock like that in a hotel once -- it had a cheap 10 digit keyboard and poorly debounced keys, setting the time was harder than using the backward/forward button style, because typing "12:00" ended up as "11:11" more often than not, it took many tries and a firm press to get the time set correctly.
- cardiffspaceman 7y ago
  I have the most awesome alarm clock. It has an LED display, a radio, and it plugs into the wall for power. It has a knob for tuning the radio and a small slide switch for adjusting its band. It has assorted other affordances on its outside that I will skip over. The best features are the following: It has a battery-backed time-keeping chip which means it has never needed to have the time reset due to any loss of power to its main power supply. It has a piezo alarm that will sound if the main power is out and the alarm is on and triggered. It also has a slide switch labeled "DST -on DST -off" so in theory I would never have to +/- the time EVER once it was on the right time zone. I found it in a outlet-style store when I was looking for a WWV clock and this clock answers all my clock needs without needing WiFi, Bluetooth, any other antenna (for AM/FM radio it might be using the power cord, but I don't need that). It doesn't need to be told a password and I don't need to set up an account. I think it was marked down to $10 when I bought it.

Entalpi 7y ago

Reminds me of every time I use a new microwave. Or dishwasher.. Common appliances dont need to be soo different just to stand out to be honest.

perl4ever 7y ago
I bought a cheap Sharp microwave because I'd been accustomed to the way Sharps work since childhood, but I was disappointed they seem to have messed with the interface for no good reason. It's not quite as weird as one atrocious GE I remember, but they still fixed what wasn't broke. The numbers are entered from the left for some reason.

Johnny555 7y ago

Who would buy an alarm clock that needs an app to set it? As soon as I saw that I needed to install an app (and create an account!?) just to set my alarm clock, I've have sent it back. Though I guess I do have an alarm clock that needs an app to set it since my only alarm clock is my phone. But if I bought a standalone alarm clock, I'd want it to be really stand-alone, not dependent on my phone.

falcolas 7y ago
Dark patterns on the packaging that obscure the need for a cell phone app. I've seen this kind of thing show up all the time.
- vengefulduck 7y ago
  So why not return it?
  - Nition 7y ago
    He did.
- Mountain_Skies 7y ago
  Ran into something similar with a resistance band workout system. To access the how to use videos, you must sign up for an account. To sign up for an account, they must verify your phone number via SMS. Why on Earth does a set of resistance bands need your contact information? I sent the whole thing back. Maybe if companies start hurting due to restocking costs, they'll stop.
- steelframe 7y ago
  > packaging that obscure the need for a cell phone app There have been a handful of posts on this theme. The idea being that food labels disclose the raw facts about things like high-fructose corn syrup and saturated fats. Likewise IoT packaging should do the same. https://www.troyhunt.com/what-would-it-look-like-if-we-put-warnings-on-iot-devices-like-we-do-cigarette-packets/ https://www.troyhunt.com/what-would-it-look-like-if-we-put-w... https://www.symantec.com/blogs/expert-perspectives/why-we-need-security-and-privacy-nutrition-label-iot-devices https://www.symantec.com/blogs/expert-perspectives/why-we-ne...

u801e 7y ago

I think the only clocks I need to manually adjust are the ones in my cars and the microwave oven. Everything else sets itself based on NTP or radio signal (for the radio clocks).

mark-r 7y ago
Do your radio clocks still work? The US government was reportedly going to turn off the transmitters this year, but came through at the last minute to keep them online. I have 4 car clocks, 2 oven clocks, 4 wall clocks, and 2 bedside clocks that need setting manually. My phone and PC are automatic, luckily.

deckar01 7y ago

> January 1, 2018 If your system clock is too far behind, SSL certificates will fail validation. I suspect during QA the certificates were valid for the reset date, but the current certificate is not.

deckar01 7y ago
Two downvotes and no replies. Set your system time several years in the past and see what happens to secure sites. I encountered this issue several times as a PC repair technician. We would turn a computer on after summer break and find its CMOS battery had died and the system date had reset. The computer was unable to browse sites secured with SSL certificates. The start time of those certificates were in the future relative to the system time, so the system thought they were invalid.

mindingdata 7y ago

I actually went back to an old school casio watch recently because my Fitbit refused to connect to my phone. It had the incorrect time on it and you cannot set the time on the watch itself (Must be via the phone app). I get that a fitness tracker is kinda worthless without syncing the data up. But I was happy just seeing my daily steps and being able to tell the time and I couldn't even do the latter.

JohnFen 7y ago

> For some reason, my alarm clock requires that I install an app on my phone. And the app required me to create an account The larger mystery is why he didn't immediately return the clock as soon as he discovered this requirement.

drei109 7y ago
He mentioned in a comment that the person who bought it didn't know that an app was needed. So it was maybe a gift from someone else.
- wUabkSG6L5Bfa5 7y ago
  There's going to be a really awkward conversation at his next dinner party.
  - kempbellt 7y ago
    "Remember that nifty alarm clock you gave me last year? I finally got around to trying to set it up and....wow, what a piece of shit. I'm an engineer and I couldn't even get it working. After wasting an hour trying to set it up, I just threw it in the closet. Whatever engineer designed that thing probably doesn't even use it. It was a fun idea, but probably more useful for throwing at burglars. Thanks again haha" Any of my friends/family would be laughing along with me, and giving me shit for not being able to setup "something as simple as an alarm clock".
- JohnFen 7y ago
  Even so, he could probably have returned it. Even if he couldn't, though, that doesn't explain why he used it. It wasn't even a passive thing he could have overlooked -- he had to actively download an app!
- jasonmp85 7y ago
  If someone gave me something like this for a gift, I'd immediately sell it on Amazon, or possibly throw it in a Goodwill pile. If I'm feeling especially charitable, I'd go out to my local Good Recycler, who will probably want me to pay for the PCBs/backup batteries, etc. to be handled correctly, but it would be worth it. Under no circumstances would I—after realizing that it required an app to function—continue with setup. _That's_ what's baffling to me about this post. Why didn't he do the same? What the hell did he expect? All I want to know is "_what_ benefit did you think would come from using this that led you to continue with setup despite all of the obvious negatives?" Either that expected benefit is _huge_—in which case, why not mention it?—or he didn't anticipate any downsides—in which, I don't know, maybe pay more attention in the world. In any case, this post was essentially devoid of any meaningful information.

_bxg1 7y ago

A bit cheeky from a company that won't let you use your desktop computer without an online account

JohnFen 7y ago
You can totally use Windows without an online account. I do it.
- jandrese 7y ago
  Not that Microsoft wants you to know that. They make the offline account button/link smaller and harder to spot regularly. I've thought several times that they finally removed it only to spot it hiding in a corner in a grey link one shade darker than the background.
  - NullPrefix 7y ago
    They could be treating it internally as unsupported workflow too. Or at least untested workflow. Kind of like that issue where your CPU would be loaded 100% when you open start menu if you have cortana disabled.
- JTbane 7y ago
  In version 1809 there was a dark pattern that misled people installing Windows into thinking it was not an option.
- noja 7y ago
  Only if you know to disconnect the ethernet cable, then the local account option magically reappears.
jodrellblank 7y ago
It isn't "from a company" > Statements do not establish the official position of Microsoft Corporation. - https://devblogs.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/?p=25453 https://devblogs.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/?p=25453

rootsudo 7y ago

I do not know if Raymond is posting in HN or not. I've been seeing an increased number of his posts lately on HN.

lordnacho 7y ago

Not clear why you'd use your phone to connect to an alarm clock when the major phone OSes all come with an alarm clock app? I'd have thought phones had swallowed up alarm clocks along with maps, calculators, walkmen, etc by now.

JohnFen 7y ago
> I'd have thought phones had swallowed up alarm clocks along with maps, calculators, walkmen, etc by now. Nah. If we define "walkmen" as meaning "dedicated portable music players", then people are still using all those things. I see everything in your list being used regularly (except for paper maps -- although I used one of those last week). Not nearly as much as before smartphones, but still.

failrate 7y ago

My phone is my alarm clock. Why would someone desire a single purpose device for "alarm clock"?

marcosdumay 7y ago
There is a lot of value on your alarm clock not receiving messages and phone calls, and not having any other interface that isn't related to reading the time or waking you up at the correct instant.
bargle0 7y ago
I want an alarm that's independent from my phone. That way if I lose, break, or forget to charge my phone, I still have an alarm.
fzeroracer 7y ago
Separation of concerns. Phones operate as a sort of monolith which is dangerous because if your phone fails, it takes down all of your services. Phones are also designed to be replaced fairly often which can mean redoing your alarms and so forth. It's one of those things you really don't realize until your phone suddenly dies on you and you have to scramble to get a replacement.
- failrate 7y ago
  I have a Nokia drawer in my kitchen.
BorgHunter 7y ago
Some years ago, I recall there was a bug in iOS which caused alarms not to update correctly when DST started (or ended), resulting in lots of oversleeping as alarms failed to alarm when expected.[0] Personally, I have a problem with my cheapish Android phone where it will suddenly and for no apparent reason decide it's been moved to UTC, and move the time ahead to UTC. It forgets about this delusion when I restart it. So far this has only happened in the middle of the day (and all it's done is mess up the period it's supposed to be silent during, when I'm at work, thus the downside so far has been a couple annoying dinging noises at my desk). Also, I have a fancy alarm clock which alarms by gradually lighting up the room, instead of by blaring loud noises. I find this a more agreeable way to wake up in the mornings. I also like having a dim, but legible time display on my nightstand to glance at when I wake up in the night, rather than having to press a button on my phone, which is then way too bright to look at in my dark bedroom. Finally, apart from software bugs, single-purpose alarm clocks are quite cheap and reliable. Although it is not in my bedroom anymore, I still have an alarm clock that was my bedside alarm clock when I was in elementary school. It's thirty years old by now, yet it still works perfectly. The alarm function still works (although it's quieter than it once was). The display still is flawless (although it's dimmer than it once was). It's a simple, reliable device. My phone...isn't. [0] https://www.theguardian.com/technology/blog/2010/nov/01/iphone-dst-alarm-bug-europe https://www.theguardian.com/technology/blog/2010/nov/01/ipho...

levismaina 7y ago

The inmates are running the asylum.

drdec 7y ago

My alarm clock has the most brilliant feature - a two position slider for activating and deactivating DST. Took me less than a second to make the change this weekend.

noblethrasher 7y ago

I've complained about this before [1], but I once bought a $70 (USD) Microsoft Arc Mouse that required you to both register an MS account and download an app just to be able to turn off the obnoxious synthetic clicking sound that was enabled by default. I made a second trip to the store that day just to return the the thing. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11390494 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11390494

NetBeck 7y ago

He said he thinks the WiFi chip might be broken. I wonder if the thing is trying to connect to an NTP server.

jandrese 7y ago
I'm guessing he upgraded his Router to something with more modern encryption and the new chip doesn't support it. This is a huge problem with IoT shit, getting trapped with obsolete protocols because updating all of your old devices is impossible. Or you have to run an old network specifically for the IoT garbage and firewall it off heavily from the Internet, after doing god knows how much research into each device to figure out what cloud services they use.

iamaelephant 7y ago

As much as I love Raymond I have completely run out of time for people who buy unnecessary "smart" devices then complain about them. 6 years ago I would understand, but by now we all know this stuff is junk. Yes, all of it.

city41 7y ago
We recently got a new fridge and my friends and family were all amazed I didn't choose a "smart" fridge. "But you're in tech, why wouldn't you want a high tech fridge?", "Because I'm in tech."
- matwood 7y ago
  Agreed. My washer and dryer are close to 20 years old. They each have a few buttons, and the 'computers' are mostly mechanical (think egg timer). I'm dreading when they break because anytime I have looked for simple, basic models like I have they no longer seem to exist.
  - GhettoMaestro 7y ago
    That's why I bought a Kenmore HE3. I can buy most parts for $<50 on Amazon (or eBay in the worst case).
  - artursapek 7y ago
    My mother and father in law have these, they specifically sought them. They're these old brown Maytag machines. Really nice and easy to use. If I ever replace the ones that came with my house I'll probably look for the same kind.
  - JRKrause 7y ago
    If you are really worried just drop a few dollars on spares for all the internal parts. Most everything can be found on Amazon. It's hard to imagine drying enough clothes to wear out the heater element more than three times in the average human lifespan.

jacknews 7y ago

OK I'm going to be the contrarian here. Now I agree, having to make an account to use your device absolutely sucks, why on earth would you need that? And it sounds as though the user experience of connecting to the clock also sucks. BUT, if this is done correctly (eg wave nfc phone near your clock, and the appropriate app fires up and connects automtically etc), then I see this is a good future. In this clock example, you wouldn't need to 'advance the hour' for DST - the phone would just set the correct time automatically with a swipe. My phone becomes a universal remote. No longer those crappy LCD screens (or just LED lights), and weird buttons on every applicance that I have to learn to use. Not to mention they are expensive parts of the device, and take a lot of development effort. Also those screens and buttons are always the first to break, and are totally unrepairable except by ordering a spare from the manufacturer (if they still make them). Unlike say a broken valve in a washing machine that can often be repaired or replaced with a commodity equivalent. So, I'm going to say that using phones as a standard appliance interface is potentially a huge UI improvement, cost-saver, and reliability/repairability improvement - if it's done well. Or of course a dystopian nightmare if done badly.

mark-r 7y ago
Knowing how these devices are produced, what do you think are the chances of having one done well vs. done badly? In theory you make a good point, but in the real world we just aren't that lucky.
bipson 7y ago
You mean the (approximately) three "weird" buttons to adjust date and time? No, no and again no. The future were I need a smartphone to set my clock is not a good one for me, however you put it.
- jacknews 7y ago
  the clock could come with cheap (and replaceble) IR remote for your button fetish - no need for that on the clock itself - buttons are nearly always the first point of failure IMHO, closely followed by screens. Also you need to learn to use whatever limited UI /menus they've managed to cram into such limiting UI hardware, rather than the whole richness and usability of an app. Not so bad for an alarm clock perhaps - until it has multiple daily//weekly alarms with custom sounds, custom snooze schedule, custom lighting profile, etc, etc - ah but a reason it doesn't have any of this stuff is because it would be too difficult to cram into a 3-button UI. Anyway, a limited hardware UI is also much more problematic for many other appliances. Better just to do away with it completely (saving cost, improving reliability) and use a phone or cheap tablet which are ubiquitous these dayss, or even a new market for cheap dedicated universal smart remotes. PS downvoting me (twice!) because you don't agree wiith my point is fairly childish I think, and should be reserved for insulting , nonsensical and troll posts, etc. IMHO.

hyperman1 7y ago

Going slightly OT here, but I wonder: Is Raymond doing the old new thing for free or does he get some MS company time for it. On one hand, he clearly does hardcore technical stuff on the job so he can't have much time. The blog meanders between hard core windows programming and human interest stuff. All that says hobby project. But it runs on microsoft infrastructure, he must put in a lot of time to write the posts and curate the discussions. The marketing value for microsoft must be non-trivial. So that says company provided resources.

freeone3000 7y ago
If any of us want to write a blog post, we can, and it gets the same support. His is better than most of ours. :)

miki123211 7y ago

I see a lot of people here denigrating devices that need mobile apps to function. While it may be frustrating for some, be aware of the accessibility implications of this approach. Most devices are simple enough that the only way to access them is via buttons and a screen. If you can't see the screen or have problems pressing the buttons, you're screwed and need to get a device made especially for you. This has been the case with blind people for years, and such devices usually cost about 4x the normal ones. Mobile apps, if done properly, allow such people to use the devices. Sure, an app as an alternative interface is usually a better idea, but the point still stands.

cpmsmith 7y ago
The "if done properly" is carrying a lot of weight there, though. Keeping on top of accessibility that way is a challenge in apps that are their companies' entire business, to say nothing of apps that are companions to a "real" product.
- miki123211 7y ago
  even if not done properly, a semi-accessible solution is better than a totally inaccessible one. A friend of mine has a hi-fi set that, obviously, doesn't have a built-in screen reader and the menus are complicated enough that she can't use it on its own. However, a crashy, semi-accessible app lets her use it somehow. I don't think anyone at the company cares about accessibility. Sure, it would be better if someone did, but that's still better than a (touch)?screen and menus with three levels of nesting that wrap around and remember your position.
JohnFen 7y ago
> While it may be frustrating for some From my point of view, it's not a "frustration" issue, it's a privacy/security issue.

Someone1234 7y ago

If his alarm clock is a "HeimVision" (which it sounds like it could be from the description) holding the brightness for a long time will allow adjustment of the time. Unfortunately the WiFi light will never stop blinking.

jasonmp85 7y ago
Wow just looked up this product and… there is no need for WiFi. Hell, I just bought an in-wall sunset/sunrise timer to control some grow lights for my plants in the winter. Works great, literally a simple board and backup battery in a wall switch. If you want your room to brighten for wake, I don't know, invest in some actual home automation? I've got a dimmer on my master cans and it is _trivial_ to do this sort of thing, except with much larger benefits overall and a much more robust/supported ecosystem. Sigh…

stevenringo 7y ago

Is this a Microsoft product?

everdrive 7y ago

You can still find traditional alarm clocks in thrift stores. They're often $2-$5 and work fine!

nkrisc 7y ago

Shopping for a radio recently I passed up loads of crap that I believe would have met the same fate as his clock. Internet enabled shit that will probably die once an LED goes out. I ended up getting a nice, solidly built radio with a wood cabinet that has a volunteer knob, an AM/FM knob, and a tuner knob. No app required. The one quality of life feature it does have is a little light that lights up when you've hit a signal on the tuner. This is nice because the exact position required for a station can drift. I assume this is due to atmospheric effects and other interference.

Turing_Machine 7y ago
For anyone who, like me, was wondering what a "volunteer knob" is, I suspect it's an autocorrecto for "volume knob". Took me a second to get it.
- nkrisc 7y ago
  Dang it, I completely missed that and now I can't edit it. Doesn't everyone's radio have a volunteer knob?

baggy_trough 7y ago

Just get the simplest, cheapest clock (the $6 ones on Amazon). [Clock Set] [Alarm Set] [Hour] [Minute] is the ideal UI we want. I had a fancier Sony clock that was designed to make it impossible to set the time. I couldn't figure it out, so I threw it away. Ridiculous!

eps 7y ago

For some reason, an operating system that I paid money for and installed on my very personal computer that I also bought for my own buckazoids insists that I create an online account to be able to log in locally. I'm going to repeat that: in order to use my super-duper computer I had to create an account with Microsoft. How ridiculous is that? * Yes, I know I could've faked the machine being offline, then clicked through some gray-on-gray links in 3px font and I'd be granted a reprieve. But, please, as much as I like reading about Windows quirks on Raymond's blog, he is not exactly in position to complain about a device needing an online account to operate.

0x00000000 7y ago
I actually thought the post was going to be a metaphor at first. Especially the part about the barely-functional clusterfuck of a UX.
throw12221999 7y ago
Based on his blog I get the impression that he probably totally agrees with you, this post could be one diplomatic way of saying it.
- diminoten 7y ago
  The clock may not have actually ever existed, not that it matters.
bochoh 7y ago
I just did a new online install of Windows 10 professional and the offline account option was still there.
- pm7 7y ago
  Professional might be different. I can personally confirm this issue on Home, version 1903-v2.
- taneq 7y ago
  I did an install of Windows 10 Home (or whatever it's called) about six months ago and the offline account option was there then (albeit hard to spot, the page is designed to look like it's mandatory but there was a skip option). Unless they've removed it in the past six months it should be there. Edit: As a cousin post mentions, this option may only be available if the computer is not connected to the internet. Which is annoying as heck.

scarejunba 7y ago

I like my smart clocks (Google Home devices). They needed a phone to set up, but then stay synced. I don't adjust the time. I didn't even realize DST changed until after the gym. Alarms worked correctly. Reminders I set the day before worked correctly. This is what I want life to be like. Changing clocks is a bullshit problem. It's not worth thought.

raxxorrax 7y ago
Don't you have radio clocks? A single transmitter has a range up to 2000km. Perhaps more depending on the frequency. There are also GPS solutions, although those are more error prone.
- scarejunba 7y ago
  They're cool. My dad had one. The Google ones do other things too so I prefer them.

not_a_cop75 7y ago

On the bright side, it's not being used for a botnet anytime soon.

hollander 7y ago

I have two radio controlled clocks. One checks each night at 2 o'clock with the radio time, and then sees it is probably 0.1 second ahead. Apparently this analogue clock can only adjust time forward, so each night it has to do a 12 hour cycle (minus 0.1 second). This means 50% extra battery use. Plus it's annoying when you're up at that time. All is quiet and then you hear this strange squeeking sound. The other clock is digital, so adjusting time is easier, except that it forgets to do this when changing to and from summertime. The only solution is to unplug the power cable. Why this clock doesn't know this is a mystery. It only has to check once a week. I don't know how this radio signal works, but can't they send info about winter- or summertime along with the time?

jrockway 7y ago
The signal does contain a DST flag. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WWVB#Announcement_bits https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WWVB#Announcement_bits The reality is, at least in the Eastern US, that you probably don't successfully receive the signal often enough to ever get the DST bit. When I lived in Chicago, I used WWVB clocks and they worked fine, when I moved to New York, I never got them to sync. I also have a bunch of chips for receiving the signal and they have never worked. You have to use the new phase modulated signal, and nobody sells chips for receiving these. (Naturally the older AM receivers are a cheap single-chip solution. So would a receiver for the phase-modulated data, but nobody feels like making one, so you are stuck.)

cabaalis 7y ago

The account deal is becoming pervasive and annoying. This is a common interaction I have at a local pet store: "That'll be $15. What's your phone number?" "No." ... strange look for a moment, finally followed by just taking my $15 and not knowing who I am or being able to easily track me.

siphor 7y ago
i started giving them 303 867-5309. tons of accounts at every store (replace w/ ur area code).
- variaga 7y ago
  I was using 123 456-7890 as my Vons' loyalty # for a while. "Thank you mister... Tester #2? You have $98,427 in savings this year".
  - wruza 7y ago
    I actually abused this once. A local general store required a phone number to “reactivate” my discount/bonus card and I went to free sms service to register it. My next visit was paid by a collective bonus of everyone who did the same. I think that every time someone registers a number+card, all bonuses from this number go to “new” card. Never worked again.
- JohnFen 7y ago
  I much prefer telling the store "no". That way, they they'll at least get the occasional reminder that there are customers who hate this sort of thing. The funny thing is that in many stores that have "loyalty programs", when I tell them I'm not signed up and am not interested in signing up, they'll just use a different loyalty card number instead (I assume it's the clerk's, but I'm not sure).
  - perl4ever 7y ago
    You can't assume they will do that everywhere. I was in CVS, and it seems like rather than discounts for "loyalty" they have jacked up their prices if you don't have the card. They said they would look me up by my phone number, but when they didn't find me, that was it, no discount. I said fine and left the overpriced batteries behind. I don't know why grocery stores don't seem to care, whether it's corporate policy, or employee culture.

eledumb 7y ago

I just bought a new refrigerator and it comes with an app. I installed the app out of curiosity, the first thing the app demands is that I allow it to track the location of my phone at all times. The app's been deleted.

NullPrefix 7y ago
Return the fridge. If you don't return it, you're telling the company you're okay with this.

annoyingnoob 7y ago

That is a real Internet of Shit story. Fuck it, put a chip in it.

codedokode 7y ago

> For some reason, my alarm clock requires that I install an app on my phone. It is weird that a person working in IT pretends not to know why the clock reqiures an app. Of course to vacuum personal information, geolocation and hardware identifiers of all devices nearby.

caf 7y ago

This is firmly in the category of "not sure if it's satire or real".

WalterBright 7y ago

> The Wi-Fi connectivity is nice when it’s working (like it was during the springtime) since it means never having to adjust the time after a power outage or time zone change. I bought one of those "atomic clocks" 20 years ago that pick up the time from some government radio station. It's always dead on correct, and adjusts automatically for DST. There is no user interface, put a battery in and hang it on the wall. Best clock I ever bought.

dzhiurgis 7y ago
Ours picks time up from across the border with no way to adjust that
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
justin66 7y ago
The NIST radio stations that serve those radios have been under threat of defunding recently. So far, so good. https://www.voanews.com/usa/us-politics/time-may-be-running-out-millions-clocks https://www.voanews.com/usa/us-politics/time-may-be-running-...

jccalhoun 7y ago

I wish he would name the brand.

xg15 7y ago

I think it's useful to view connectedness in "smart" devices in the same way we view ads: They are as much a consumer feature as ads are about "informing users about business opportunities" - in truth, both are part of the payment for the service or good. As such, it's in the interest of the vendor to smuggle "smartness" into as many products as possible, whether or not there is consumer demand for it - or even if there is explicit desire not to have it.

perl4ever 7y ago

I have an alarm clock that's probably over a decade old, and I think I had a similar one 20 or 30 years ago. The controls are a large "alarm/snooze" button, small "Time", "Hour" and "Min" buttons, and an on/off "Alarm" slider. The display is a segmented red LED display, with one round light indicating PM (just turns off for AM) and one round light on the opposite side indicating the alarm slider is on. It runs on AC power, with a 9V battery backup. Hopefully they won't stop making them, since I don't think there is anything you could add or take away. There are not many devices where the logic of the controls is so simple and standard you could almost design a clone from memory.

oh_hello 7y ago

My Nest thermostats have become more trouble than they are worth. The learning feature constantly overwrites temperatures I have manually set in the schedule with garbage. Somehow it has learned temperatures I never set. It's infuriating. Time to shut off the smart features.

matt_the_bass 7y ago

I make wordclocks as a side project[0]. Mine connect to the internet via wifi to update the time. The user only needs to set the time zone offset since there is no location lookup. The clock has no app and doesn’t require an account. At start up, is has a softAP that you connect to with your phone so that you can give it your wifi credentials via a simple self hosted web server/form. Why use internet for time? Simple, I couldn’t find a stable RTC on a small, inexpensive, off the self microcontroller board. But I could find one with wifi. My early prototypes used an Arduino UNO. That has awful RTC stability since is doesn’t use a crystal but rather an R/C oscillator for timing. I don’t think my customers want an extra app if there really is no reason. Why not use a built in web server? [0] http://www.finewordclocks.com http://www.finewordclocks.com

deleted 7y ago
[deleted]

pnako 7y ago

“I have always wished for my computer to be as easy to use as my telephone; my wish has come true because I can no longer figure out how to use my telephone.” -- Bjarne Stroustrup

gatherhunterer 7y ago

The Casio A168WA-1 has an alarm, a stopwatch, an optional hourly beep, 12 and 24-hour clocks and a light so you can tell the time even when the sun is down. It costs less than $20 on Amazon. It may not be good enough for a tech billionaire but it doesn’t ask any questions. I may not have an executive position at Microsoft or an alarm clock that mines my data but I’ve got two dollars and a Casio. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=FuZNswuwAxM https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=FuZNswuwAxM

cabalamat 7y ago

> For some reason, my alarm clock requires that I install an app on my phone. And the app required me to create an account. That's his problem right there: getting an internet-connected "smart" alarm clock. Ditto for other internet connected appliances.

billfruit 7y ago

I am always surprised that most American alarm clocks run in mains power. In the 3rd world alarm clocks run on battery power, that saves a lot of complexity of having to deal with preserving the time in case of power disruptions, and they are fully functional even through power disruptions.

suigintoulain 7y ago

I have a feeling I know exactly what clock he's talking about. Costco sold a La Crosse wifi projection alarm clock where you can only set the time with the app, and the app has a hamburger-menu-icon-but-actually-a-handle gesture to delete whatever device you're having an issue with. Strangely, I'm having the same issue he did, where the wifi stops working and it loses the plot. I took it apart to see if the antenna broke, but it's got an ESP8266 module so that's not it.

al_be_back 7y ago

more like "I tried to adjust the time on my projector-cloaked-as-a-clock. I failed."

gambiting 7y ago

"The Wi-Fi connectivity is nice when it’s working (like it was during the springtime) since it means never having to adjust the time after a power outage or time zone change." I mean, isn't that exactly what the time adjustement signal is for? I have several watches which have this technology and they are precise like crazy - I don't understand why you'd need wifi for something so simple. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio_clock https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio_clock