Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48147195

Points: 3

# Comments: 0

I assume end to end encryption would help mitigate this. Breaking E2E encryption would require a client side update that could be hard to implement if the company has already gone belly up.

For context I am the developer of an app called Digital Carrot[1] that lets users create goals for themselves that are verified by data from connected services. For example someone might create a goal to go to the gym, which the app verifies by reading GPS data from your phone. Needless to say my app handles a lot of very sensitive data and the app's privacy policy prohibits me from accessing any of this data for any reason. I've been curious if there is a way to put some kind of legally binding clause in my privacy policy that would prevent a future owner of the app from just forcing all the users to agree to a new policy that lets them harvest all of this data for nefarious purposes. Does anyone know:

1. Is this possible? 2. Has anyone done something like this? 3. What kind of mechanism would you employ to enforce this?

[1] https://www.digitalcarrot.app/

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48026654

Points: 2

# Comments: 3

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47785038

Points: 11

# Comments: 1

One problem I personally have here is that I write code as a way to reason through and think about a problem. It's hard for me to grasp the best solution in a space until I try some things out first.

My first experience with it was a year ago and the tests it produced were so horrendously hard to maintain that I kinda gave up, but I imagine that things have gotten a lot better in the last year.

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47420767

Points: 39

# Comments: 79

It's a cross platform productivity app that lets you block apps, websites and games until you reach a set of verifiable goals such as walking 10,000 steps, physically going to the gym or finishing all your tasks on your to-do list.

I just finished the Android version a few weeks ago!

- Github: this would allow you to set goals based on reviewing PRs, closing tickets, reading GH notifications etc.

- Homelab/Zapier/IFTTT: this would allow some kind of funny things like turning off lights or locking locks if you don't complete your goals. I don't have any smarthome stuff, so this would be hard for me to personally build.

- Notion/Obsidian/Jira/Trello

- Google/Apple Calendar: this could help people focus on meetings instead of (for example) scrolling HN

This would also be possible for desktop, since I'm using browser plugins to block websites on Desktop at the moment. I don't think that this is possible on iOS, but there may be APIs that could enable something like it that I'm not aware of. As much as I like Apple's commitment to privacy, the way that they've locked down a lot of their APIs has been a real thorn in my side for enabling some of these more advanced use cases.

I'm a former Red Hatter, so I'm all too familiar with the revenue hits a product can take when they go open source, but I have no ambition to turn this into a big business, so I think that should be acceptable (unless revenue dips to zero).

Digital Carrot is a programmable and pluggable app blocker. It lets you block websites and apps on iOS, Mac and Windows until a set of conditions or goal is met. For example you can block Reddit, Instagram and Steam until your Apple Watch reports that you have walked 5000 steps.

The app works by collecting data via plugins that you can use to create goals for yourself. Goals are all represented by expressions that return true or false based on the data you provide. For example, if you want to create a goal to finish all of the tasks in your to-do list you could do something like `data.apple_reminders.due == 0`.

The blocking system is also pluggable. That means you can block items via DNS with services as Pi-hole[3]. It also means that the app is not just limited to website blocking! In fact you could write a plugin to control anything that is available via a REST, such as locking a smart lock on your snack cupboard or cranking up the AC in your office until you go outside.

Keeping security and user privacy is a top priority for this app (given that it's literally designed to collect information about you). Because of that:

- We do not collect or share any information that the app gathers. - Our sync feature is fully end to end encrypted using AES256 and the secure remote password protocol. - All plugins are sandboxed. They cannot access data provided by other plugins and have no external access unless granted by the user. - The app is transparent about the data it has. All of the data that is available to use for goals is browsable in app.

Like many of you, I've been dismayed by big tech's lack of concern for our privacy, so keeping these guarantees is personally very important to me. One of the fun things about this project has been that I can kind of flip the script by taking all of the information that has been gathered about me and use it to help cut down on the distractions in my life :)

Anyway, I had to walk 4km to unblock HN in order to post this, so I hope you find it helpful!

[1] Technical overview: https://www.digitalcarrot.app/docs/overview/

[2] Plugin repository: https://github.com/digital-carrot-app/plugins

[3] Pi-hole plugin: https://github.com/digital-carrot-app/plugins/tree/main/piho...

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46616919

Points: 39

# Comments: 11

It's just sort of amazing how badly the west dropped the ball on green tech. We're also working on importing an off grid solar system from china that will easily be a third of the price that we'd get from a US supplier.

One interesting thing that people don't realize with regards to the US tariffs is that a lot of goods flow through the US on their way to international markets. For a long time it has been easiest for us to buy stuff made in china from vendors such as Amazon in the US and have it shipped internationally from the US. Now with all of the tariffs we end up getting double tariffed for doing this (once when the goods enter the US and a second time when they ship to my country). As a result I'm seeing more and more people looking for ways to buy from China directly.