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> as simple as "with open(...) as f: f.write(data)"

Save where? With what redundancy? With what access policies? With what backup strategy? With what network topology? With what storage equipment and file system and HVAC system and...

Without on-prem, saving a file is as simple as s3.put_object() !


>> Without cloud, saving a file is as simple as "with open(...) as f: f.write(data)" + adding a record to DB.

> Save where? With what redundancy? With what access policies? With what backup strategy? With what network topology? With what storage equipment and file system and HVAC system and...

Most of these concerns can be addressed with ZFS[0] provided by FreeBSD systems hosted in triple-A data centers.

See also iSCSI[1].

0 - https://docs.freebsd.org/en/books/handbook/zfs/

1 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISCSI


Except running ZFS on FreeBSD would certainly require dedicated devops person with very specific skillset that majority of people on market dont have.


I don't think any of those mattered for their use case. That's why they didn't actually need S3.


With s3, you cannot use ls, grep and other tools.

> Save where? With what redundancy? With what access policies? With what backup strategy? With what network topology? With what storage equipment and file system and HVAC system and...

Wow that's a lot to learn before using s3... I wonder how much it costs in salaries.

> With what network topology?

You don't need to care about this when using SSDs/HDDs.

> With what access policies?

Whichever is defined in your code, no restrictions unlike in S3. No need to study complicated AWS documentation and navigate through multiple consoles (this also costs you salaries by the way). No risk of leaking files due to misconfigured cloud services.

> With what backup strategy?

Automatically backed up with rest of your server data, no need to spend time on this.


> You don't need to care about this when using SSDs/HDDs.

You do need to care when you move beyond a single server in a closet that runs your database, webserver and storage.

> No risk of leaking files due to misconfigured cloud services.

One misconfigured .htaccess file for example, could result in leaking files.


> One misconfigured .htaccess

First, I hope nobody is using Apache anymore, second, you typically store files outside of web directory.


Why nobody should use Apache? I rediscovered it to be great in many use cases. And there's llms to help with the config syntax.


Performance not great compared to nginx.


>> No risk of leaking files due to misconfigured cloud services.

> One misconfigured .htaccess file for example, could result in leaking files.

I don't think you are making a compelling case here, since both scenarios result in an undesirable exposure. Unless your point is both cloud services and local file systems can be equally exploited?


With bare-metal machines you can go very far before needing to scale beyond one machine.


It sounds like you’re not at the scale where cloud storage is obviously useful. By the time you definitely need S3/GCS you have problems making sure files are accessible everywhere. “Grep” is a ludicrous proposition against large blob stores


I mean you can easily mount the S3 bucket to the local filesystem (e.g. using s3fs-fuse) and then use standard command line tools such as ls and grep.


I inherited an S3 bucket where hundreds of thousands of files were written to the bucket root. Every filename was just a uuid. ls might work after waiting to page though to get every file. To grep you would need to download 5 TB.


It's probably going to be dog slow. I dealt with HDDs where just iterating through all files and directories takes hours, and network storage is going to be even slower at this scale.


You can't ever definitively answer most of those questions on someone else's cloud. You just take Amazons word for whatever number of nines they claim it has.


Not needing to ask the questions is the selling point.


Bro were you off grid last week. Your questions equally apply to AWS, you just magically handwave away all those questions as if AWS/GCP/Azure outages aren’t a thing.


Until it goes down because because aws STILL hasn't made themselves completely multi-region or can't figure our their DNS.


You can restore the old fridge


Unless you have a fridge assembler from that same factory with the same materials also on ice, modern tools, techniques, and methods would make this an exercise in futility with regards to an apples-to-apples like-new comparison. We don’t even use CFCs anymore, for one.


You're sidestepping the point with valid re-herrings. If the old refrigerator's compressor hardware were left unchanged, possibly repairing the thermostat or contactor causing the malfunction, cleaning the air exchanges, and replacing the seal: based on the OPs own usage chart would have consumed equal if not less energy noting it was a dual compressor model.


Are we making an accurate comparison considering the internal cooled space of older fridges versus newer ones? Many older refrigerators were smaller, so the same power consumption for a smaller internal volume isn’t telling the whole story, but I digress.


Food delivery exists outside of the US too fyi


Yes they do but if I want to grab something to eat I just go downstairs and have a supermarket or a restaurant within 5 minutes walk so there's that.


Yes it does, and at least for me locally it's all done by motorcycle or E-Bike.


dabbawalas have existed for a century


Also discovered flask in college but was a year away from finishing a marketing degree.

I'm now a SWE with just a marketing degree!


I am a SWE without any degrees. :D I dropped out to... study.

Yeah, our education system sucks that much.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zDZFcDGpL4U


Not sure I see the relevance


"We waz smiths", I think.


Glad I'm not the only one who was bored enough in class to do this.


It was Latin...


My brother did this in his geometry class and passed out. The nurse called my mom and asked if they should send him home to which she responded, “hell, no!”


I browse HN daily and have never seen it


https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43433030 (submitted 3 days ago, ~370 points).

It is fine to not see it, however, that is why I am giving you the link, although someone else already posted it 6 hours ago (from now).


I was also one of those vocal "never mac" people until I actually used one.


Was he ever convicted on conspiracy to murder?

Because in my opinion the ethics of operating a drug ring is not as black as white as you state.

The existence of drug rings is an inevitable outcome from the war on drugs and I would argue the blame lands on the politicians who maintain the status quo that incentivises the creation of the black market for drugs.


What are the obvious reasons?


I guess the expensive energy in Germany, lots of red tape and nimbyism, and not enough state subsidies which is what these companies were hoping for when they were fishing for places to open fabs.


There's also the fact that every single fab opened outside of Taiwan reduces Taiwan's national security.


Is Taiwan's national security the major concern here? I assumed everyone was just bluffing at that until they can get their own supply.

Getting dragging in to an East China unification war because you can't squeeze lighting in to rocks on time is a tragedy.


> East China unification war

Are you from China? I find this phraseology very odd


Who cares? the situation is the same regardless: china wants taiwan, taiwan doesn't want to be a part of china, and the single largest factor blocking china from taking taiwan is TSMC. Not the american navy, not sanctions, not anything else. If TSMC weren't a factor they could simply destroy the island and move in.


This is too simplistic.

The ROC has not had any formal military alliance with the United States since 1979. TSMC was not founded until 1987, didn't start producing chips until 1993. It was not even publicly traded until 1994 (and that was only on the Taiwanese stock exchange; it was listed on the NYSE in 1997).

The reason the PRC hasn't done it is because it would make no sense politically or economically. They have a lot more to lose and a lot less to gain than Russia did in 2014 (Sevastopol was/is seen as integral to the Russian navy...there is no parallel with Taiwan as the PRC has plenty of excellent ports on the mainland).

And the continued existence of Taiwan gives the PRC a convenient excuse to sabre-rattle.


No formal alliance, but in reality, if you look up the proportion of Taiwanese-made chips used by the US military in... everything - aircraft, missiles ,tanks, planes, everything - invading Taiwan would probably cripple the US military's production capabilities so it's probably kicking off a proper war with USA.


It would be a headache but it wouldn't be the end of the world. At the end of the day there are other fabrication plants to manufacture microprocessors. And it's not as if China invading Taiwan would suddenly make all of the existing supply stop working.


I care because I am interested in how language reflects and shapes beliefs and I have never seen that phrase before.


> Are you from China?

No? I'm from the UK if it matters but i have no particular allegiance to east, west or chip manufacturing facilities.

East China / West Taiwan is for lack of a better word, a meme. Unification war i guess i dredged up from 40k

Either way my point stands. Every country that has supported Tiawan is scrambling to get chips online domestically because they don't need to get involved in the start of WW3. To claim otherwise is just disingenuous.


No, the world outside PRC don't believe Taiwan should be "unified" against its will. The fact that Tiawanese industry is quite important is more of a gain factor, not polarity.


Do they believe enough to go fight a war over it?

If we assume everyone can make their own hardware at home.


Taiwan forms the first Island chain that currently keeps China's navy constrained.

Loosing Taiwan is tantamount to accepting Chinese military hegemony in SEA and East Asia. No need to export ideology, it's more like if I put up tariffs against Chinese goods to protect domestic business and then a few PLAN warships park up right next to my trade corridors.



As long as TSMC is the major chip hub.


> Is Taiwan's national security the major concern here?

Yes. It’s called “semiconductor shield”. As long as China cannot manufacture chips like those made in Taiwan, it will thread carefully.


Well, your guess is off the mark.


Care to explain why?


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