SN release: API keys, purchase archived territories, inc boost min, bug fixes \ stacker news ~meta

SN release: API keys, purchase archived territories, inc boost min, bug fixes

9449 sats \ 46 comments \ @k00b 20 Mar meta

zaps forwarded to @ek (100%)

API keys
- You can request API access, see your settings, if you're interested in creating a bot like @hn.
purchase archived territories
- any archived territories are available for purchase by creating a territory with the same name
boost minimum is 50k sats
- it used to be 25k sats but as more people participate in zapping, small boost amounts become footguns
opt-in disable creating referral links on copy link from your settings
lots of bug fixes

Most of this work was done by @ek

View all commits here: https://github.com/stackernews/stacker.news/commits/master/

We've begun paying out open source contribution awards. View an up to date list of distributed awards here: https://github.com/stackernews/stacker.news/blob/master/awards.csv

Previous release: #466556 Complete list of changes: https://stacker.news/changes Q4 recap and Q1 roadmap: #381208

view all related items

223 sats \ 4 replies \ @random_ 20 Mar

What's the motivation behind requiring that one ask permission to generate API keys?

448 sats \ 3 replies \ @ek fwd 20 Mar

Good question!

The motivation behind it is to get our feet wet with people building on top of our API. It was already possible if you knew how¹ but not many people used it because it was too annoying (as one @anon kept pointing out) or not obvious that it was possible (?).

Now with this official API key support, more people might be interested in building bots like @hn or @nitter but we don't want to drown in support requests or deal with API abuse (too many expensive requests etc).

This formal API key request is intended to act as a rate limiter: With it, we know who wants to do what and can be more prepared for what's to come. It also limits the access to people who can come up with ideas that make sense from our perspective. So less "opportunistic abusers".

Also keep in mind that there are no guarantees that the API is stable. That's also a reason to limit it since else people might see this as a lot more stable than it really is, build on it without our knowledge and then get disappointed if their code breaks because we changed something on our side.

With this request, we can also establish a direct communication channel for such things or feedback and support.

If you use ~meta to request API access, others can also chime in on the ideas. But you don't have to use ~meta, you can also reach out to us privately via email, Telegram or SimpleX as mentioned in the info message:

copy session cookie from network tab and look up the GraphQL schema in the code or here ↩

147 sats \ 1 reply \ @random_ 20 Mar

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @ek fwd 20 Mar

Exactly! haha

Sometimes, things are more effective than they should be :)

21 sats \ 0 replies \ @davidw 20 Mar

You love to see it. I need to get my territories article out, before someone builds cool dashboards using the API. Note to self: do it, already

216 sats \ 2 replies \ @Scoresby 20 Mar

Wow: new update means I don't have to sneak peaks of where I am at on the leaderboard anymore. I'm not sure how I feel about this. There was a certain thrill in the uncertainty and a bit of (brief) exhibitionism in the checking...

212 sats \ 1 reply \ @k00b OP 20 Mar

Forgot about that one! Sometimes we want what we don't want.

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @BitcoinIsTheFuture 21 Mar

Yup it’s fun to look at it from multiple angles and try new approaches. Very fun and very agile!

1018 sats \ 7 replies \ @BenAllenG 24 Mar

I want to applaud your update to the dev README! I also want to say fuck docker! but I'm up and running, hopefully I can take a crack at this issue I saw the other day

100 sats \ 6 replies \ @k00b OP 24 Mar

I've learned to appreciate docker. It's gotten a lot better just over the last few years.

It can be a headache, but without it it'd be impossible to create a portable development environment.

0 sats \ 5 replies \ @BenAllenG 25 Mar

I get it, my local docker env was just totally borked and I had to completely purge and reinstall, it doesn't help my computer is geriatric and reaches 100% CPU usage spinning up sn :(

100 sats \ 4 replies \ @k00b OP 25 Mar

You can try a more minimal setup with

$ COMPOSE_PROFILES=minimal ./sndev start

0 sats \ 3 replies \ @BenAllenG 25 Mar

Sadly I haven't gotten it working consistently, I've tried spinning it up in it's minimal setup but my app container keeps failing

100 sats \ 0 replies \ @BenAllenG 25 Mar

If, no, when I get it running better for me I'll try to document my steps as best I can to help anybody that might need it

0 sats \ 1 reply \ @k00b OP 25 Mar

If you can share the error I can try to help. I'd pull the latest version from master too. It's had some minor fixes that might be relevant.

100 sats \ 0 replies \ @BenAllenG 25 Mar

Will do, I need to sign off for the night but I'll bring it up in the local dev discussions on GitHub first thing

132 sats \ 0 replies \ @TheWildHustle 20 Mar

The purchasing of archived territories is a great feature.

426 sats \ 0 replies \ @davidw 20 Mar

SN nowadays is like a ship-shipping-ship...

259 sats \ 1 reply \ @benthecarman 20 Mar freebie

you guys keep changing the min boost, feels like it should be a market rate eventually

238 sats \ 0 replies \ @k00b OP 20 Mar

True! This is just easier until it isn't.

114 sats \ 4 replies \ @grayruby 20 Mar

Any thoughts to adding scheduled posting? Undisciplined and I were talking earlier today and we agree that some of the folks not in the North American time zones don't get as much visibility on their posts. Being able to schedule a post for a different time might be helpful to them.

A couple issues I could see with this. Most engagement on posts happens in the first few hours so the posts still might not do as well because they aren't around to engage with early zappers and commenters. And it probably isn't best for SN for all content to move to a 12 hour north american time zone span.

Maybe a cost associated to scheduled posting would help mitigate too much traffic moving to peak hours.