Hey everyone,

First off, a Merry Christmas to everyone who celebrates, happy holidays to everyone, and happy almost-new-year!

Tim and I are very happy with the year devRant has had, and thinking back, there are a lot of 2017 highlights to recap. Here are just a few of the ones that come to mind (this list is not exhaustive and I'm definitley forgetting stuff!):

- We introduced the devRant supporter program (devRant++)! (https://devrant.com/rants/638594/...). Thank you so much to everyone who has embraced devRant++! This program has helped us significantly and it's made it possible for us to mantain our current infrustructure and not have to cut down on servers/sacrifice app performance and stability.
- We added avatar pets (https://devrant.com/rants/455860/...)
- We finally got the domain devrant.com thanks to @wiardvanrij (https://devrant.com/rants/938509/...)
- The first international devRant meetup (Dutch) with organized by @linuxxx and was a huge success (https://devrant.com/rants/937319/... + https://devrant.com/rants/935713/...)
- We reached 50,000 downloads on Android (https://devrant.com/rants/728421/...)
- We introduced notif tabs (https://devrant.com/rants/1037456/...), which make it easy to filter your in-app notifications by type
- @AlexDeLarge became the first devRant user to hit 50,000++ (https://devrant.com/rants/885432/...), and @linuxxx became the first to hit 75,000++
- We made an April Fools joke that got a lot of people mad at us and hopefully got some laughs too (https://devrant.com/rants/506740/...)
- We launched devDucks!! (https://devducks.com)
- We got rid of the drawer menu in our mobile apps and switched to a tab layout
- We added the ability to subscribe to any user's rants (https://devrant.com/rants/538170/...)
- Introduced the post type selector (https://devrant.com/rants/850978/...) (which will be used for filtering - more details below)
- Started a bug/feature tracker GitHub repo (https://github.com/devRant/devRant)
- We did our first ever live stream (https://youtube.com/watch/...)
- Added an awesome all-black theme (devRant++) (https://devrant.com/rants/850978/...)
- We created an "active discussions" screen within the app so you can easily find rants with booming discussions!
- Thanks to the suggestion of many community members, we added "scroll to bottom" functionality to rants with long comment threads to make those rants more usable
- We improved our app stability and set our personal record for uptime, and we also cut request times in half with some database cluster upgrades
- Awesome new community projects: https://devrant.com/projects (more will be added to the list soon, sorry for the delay!)
- A new landing page for web (https://devrant.com), that was the first phase of our web overhaul coming soon (see below)

Even after all of this stuff, Tim and I both know there is a ton of work to do going forward and we want to continue to make devRant as good as it can be. We rely on your feedback to make that happen and we encourage everyone to keep submitting and discussing ideas in the bug/feature tracker (https://github.com/devRant/devRant).

We only have a little bit of the roadmap right now, but here's some things 2018 will bring:

- A brand new devRant web app: we've heard the feedback loud and clear. This is our top priority right now, and we're happy to say the completely redesigned/overhauled devRant web experience is almost done and will be released in early 2018. We think everyone will really like it.

- Functionality to filter rants by type: this feature was always planned since we introduced notif types, and it will soon be implemented. The notif type filter will allow you to select the types of rants you want to see for any of the sorting methods.

- App stability and usability: we want to dedicate a little time to making sure we don't forget to fix some long-standing bugs with our iOS/Android apps. This includes UI issues, push notification problems on Android, any many other small but annoying problems. We know the stability and usability of devRant is very important to the community, so it's important for us to give it the attention it deserves.

- Improved profiles/avatars: we can't reveal a ton here yet, but we've got some pretty cool ideas that we think everyone will enjoy.

- Private messaging: we think a PM system can add a lot to the app and make it much more intuitive to reach out to people privately. However, Tim and I believe in only launching carefully developed features, so rest assured that a lot of thought will be going into the system to maximize privacy, provide settings that make it easy to turn off, and provide security features that make it very difficult for abuse to take place. We're also open to any ideas here, so just let us know what you might be thinking.

There will be many more additions, but those are just a few we have in mind right now.

We've had a great year, and we really can't thank every member of the devRant community enough. We've always gotten amazingly positive feedback from the community, and we really do appreciate it. One of the most awesome things is when some compliments the kindness of the devRant community itself, which we hear a lot. It really is such a welcoming community and we love seeing devs of all kind and geographic locations welcomed with open arms.

2018 will be an important year for devRant as we continue to grow and we will need to continue the momentum. We think the ideas we have right now and the ones that will come from community feedback going forward will allow us to make this a big year and continue to improve the devRant community.

Thanks everyone, and thanks for your amazing contributions to the devRant community!

Looking forward to 2018,
- David and Tim

Hey everyone,

Merry Christmas to everyone who celebrates, happy holidays to everyone, and happy almost-new-year!

Tim and I wanted to reflect on the year devRant has had, and looking back, there are a lot of awesome things that happened in 2018 that we are very thankful for. Here are just a few of the ones that we thought of (this list is not exhaustive and I'm definitley forgetting stuff, so please comment about those!):

- After nearly a year in the making, the completely overhauled devRant web version was launched (https://devrant.com/rants/1255714/...)

- @linuxxx became the first devRant user to hit 100,000++! (https://devrant.com/rants/1157415/...)

- We once again pulled off the greatest April fools joke everrrr (https://devrant.com/rants/1311206/...)

- @trogus started making awesome devComics and http://devcomics.com was launched

- We added a feature to allow rant filtering by post type (https://devrant.com/rants/1354275/...)

- We made it so avatars could have expressions! (https://devrant.com/rants/1563683/...)

- We had a booth at TechDay New York and got to meet some devRant users! (https://devrant.com/rants/1394067/...)

- We made major backend architectural improvements - including spinning up a special high-powered-CPU web server to handle avatar creation and make the creation process much faster (https://devrant.com/rants/1370938/...)

- App stability: mainly Android - we fixed crashes, did a push-notif overhaul, and tried to continue making the apps better and more stable

- A record amount of devRant meetups were held, and we couldn't be more proud about that, and we thank every person who organized one! (just a few: https://devrant.com/rants/1588218/... https://devrant.com/rants/1884724/... https://devrant.com/rants/1683365/... https://devrant.com/rants/1922950/...)

We had a busy year, and despite some things going on for us personally and some setbacks around those, we think this was a very productve year for devRant and that we are going in the right direction. We're continuing to constantly evaluate feedback from members of the community to decide where to take the app next. We're fully committed to improving the devRant community in 2019 and we have a lot of ideas about how we can do that. We're working on some things, but we're not really announcing them yet, so please sit tight for those :) In the meantime, feel free to let us know what you'd like to see improved/added the most as we always like to get updated feedback from the community.

As always, thank you everyone, and thanks for your amazing contributions to the devRant community!

Looking forward to 2019,
- David and Tim

I'm happy the announce the official devRant bug/feature suggestion tracker, now on GitHub!

It just went live, and you can find it here: https://github.com/devRant/devRant

Going forward, please use that issue tracker for all bug reports and feature suggestions. We decided to move bugs/features reports to GitHub because we've had a lot of people tell us they'd prefer that method since it makes tracking issues easier, and we also think it will improve searchability and maintainability of current bugs and feature suggestions.

Since we're starting from scratch with it, if there's a bug/feature that you're interested in submitting, and it's not already there, then please go ahead and add it! Even if it's been suggested before in a rant, we want to get them in the GitHub issue tracker, so please add it there too.

Feel free to let me know if you have any questions, and we hope this new method makes it easier to see what bugs we're working on fixing and makes it easier to see and discuss possible new features!

Here's a follow-up to my New Year's resolutions rant six months ago:

( https://devrant.com/rants/1117379/... )

I've completed (or made significant strides in) 5 of my 7 resolutions:

1) Rid and keep my like free of toxic people.  This includes parents.

I have had a serious conversation with everyone who made my life worse and whom I wanted to keep around, outlining my issues with them and my expectations should they want to remain in my life.  I happily cut out everyone who refused to change their behavior, including my parents.  My life is quieter now, and much nicer.

3) Take care of myself for a change!

I've started this, but with work, a monster, etc. it's been almost prohibitively difficult.  Minimal lasting progress despite considerable effort.  I will make more time for it and make it happen. (I was down 12 pounds at one point! Though this isn't just about weight.)

4) Stop putting up with things I don't have to.

If I don't like something optional, snip snip!
I no longer wait patiently (fuming) for slow-moving people.  If something prevents me from being productive or going about my day, I no longer let it.  Carpe diem; calcitrare culus! I have been much more productive and energetic because of this.

5) Actually enjoy things I enjoy.

Okay, this one is very difficult.  Whenever I'm not working, I feel like I'm wasting my time.  However, I have made a conceited effort every day to take time off and do something that sounds fun.  Sometimes that's more work, but usually it's music, a game, a book, exercise, or bed.   I'm still working on actually enjoying my time away from work, however, but I'm making progress!

7) Finish de-googling my life.

I no longer use a gmail account (except a work-provided account), nor do I use any of their services unless absolutely necessary (and I do so through TOR).  My phone still has Google Play Services; however, I'm working on finding a replacement that I can @Root.  (Suggestions welcome!)

------
The two resolutions I haven't yet addressed:

2) Find a well-paying job that isn't also toxic.

My job has gotten less toxic of late, with the boss actually listening and everyone writing up feature requests (with co-sponsors) instead of just dumping them in my lap.  I perform an effort analysis on them, and everyone discusses them as a team to determine which actually deserve development time.  This is tens of times better than before.  I also no longer have to be at the office.  In fact, I haven't been there in months -- and don't even remember the alarm codes haha.  I may also be getting another developer, though I suspect this is actually a lie.

6) Finally buy a harp. I've wanted one since I was 3 ffs.

I haven't done any research yet on which harp(s) I should buy.  Also, I have no idea where I would keep it, so I may defer this until we move, or just get a tiny one (lap-sized and cute!) to practice on. Probably both!

------

It's been six moths, and I'm happy with my progress. 😄

//
// devRant unofficial UWP update (v2.0.0-beta7)
//

After "Active Discussions" (implemented in v2.0.0-beta5), it was time to implement the last missing app section, "Collabs".
This is the biggest update since the start of the public beta, over 100 changes (new features, improvements, fixes).

Changelog (v2.0.0-beta7):
- Support for Collabs
- Notifs Tabs
- & more... read the entire changelog here: https://jakubsteplowski.com/en/...

Microsoft Store: https://microsoft.com/store/apps/...

I'm really happy to announce that the unofficial UWP client has now 100% of the features available on the official Android and iOS apps (if we don't count Push Notifs 😝 but they will arrive soon too).
It took several months of hard work, but I made it... it's here, it reached the level I wanted to reach since the beginning of this project (May 2016) (if we don't count Push Notifs).

I did it a lot of times, but I think they deserve it everytime, I would like to thank all the people who made this possible, all the active users, who opened issues, suggested features, or just used my app and had fun, posted positives (and negatives, motherfuckers, just kidding, maybe) reviews on Microsoft Store etc.
The entire community who made me want to do this project.
You're amazing guys!

Of course this is not the end of this project, I want to bring the app out of the beta and support it until I will be able to do it, releasing updates almost simultaneously with @dfox and @trogus.

Planned to be done:
- Support for Anniversary Update
- Push Notifs
- Custom Themes
- Close the 15+ issues (features requests, fixes) on the issue tracker on GitHub
- Ranti by @Alice: Your devRant Assistant <- I really hope it will become a thing :)
- Your future suggestions -> post them here: https://github.com/JakubSteplowski/...

Thanks for the attention,
Good ranting!

Hey Guys :)

I'm new to devRant and I already read a lot of interesting stories and jokes and now I would like to post the first thing myself. :D

I would like to present you my new Android app "WhatsBirthday", which I made in order to solve a big problem of mine, friends (and probably the whole world xD). I have (as a Google User) all my contacts (with their birthdays) in the cloud and from there on my calendar. Sadly the Google calendar doesn't allow notifications for the contacts birthdays (I mean whyyy?!). And even if I take a look at my calendar, I always have to write these annoying birthday WhatsApp message to the people ... and these both were the problems I wanted to solve with my app.
So if you join the app, it will start a service (an Alarm / Alarmmanager for the professionals) which will take a look at the contacts every day at 6 am (can be set in the app). For each contact whose birthday is today, the application will send a push notification which if clicked will directly open the contacts WhatsApp chat and prepare a standard message with the name filled in, which could (in theory) directly send. For sure the app won't sends any messages by itself, but it gives you a template you can start working with.
And for sure, you can edit the template in the app & specify the messages for family and friends, which you can choose to use with the notification buttons.

So yeah, that's is and I hope I've aroused your interest ;) if you would like to download it: https://play.google.com/store/apps/...

I would be super happy if you could give me some feedback, it's one of my first apps and I would definitely like to improve it! Tanks in previous! :D

And I would like to say sorry for my bad English skills, I'm a German student :O if the translations in the app are not good, please tell me! ;)

I just launched a small web service/app. I know this looks like a promo thing, but it's completely non-profit, open source and I'm only in it for the experience. So...

Introducing: https://gol.li

All this little app offers is a personal micro site that lists all your social network profiles. Basically share one link for all your different profiles. And yes, it includes DevRant of course. :)

There's also an iframe template for easy integration into other web apps and for the devs there's a super simple REST GET endpoint for inclusion of the data in your own apps.

The whole thing is on GitHub and I'd be more than happy for any kind of contribution. I'm looking forward to adding features like more personalization, optimizing stuff and fixing things. Also any suggestions on services you'd like see. Pretty much anything that involves a public profile goes.

I know this isn't exactly world changing, but it's just a thing I wanted to do for some time now, getting my own little app out there.

today is one the worst day of 2018, after this

https://devrant.com/rants/1571445/...

I was looking through the websites which were made in the company last year, and while looking at a website I said: "this website is looking total shit, what the fuck is this".

Guess what, the guy who made the website was there and more worst he's my senior, I'm currently doing a project with him. He was not happy with this comment ( I thought the guy who made this left the company ). I totally fucked up.

Now I will search for another job. I can't bear this.

I have a discord server where I'm writing the bot. I'm making games, utilities and other activities.

It's a very small server because I have not been actively recruiting players, but if you would like to join, here is the link. I would be happy to make some devRant commands and integrations.

https://discord.gg/sEnwGdjB

Right now, we have Blackjack, connect 4, crossword, and trivia. There's also a "stock market" where you buy shares of other players (rather than stocks).

It's early. There's some stuff to do but I'll admit, not a ton just yet. Maybe a few bugs, testing team is considerably small. But it is good fun and I am actively working on it. Maybe join and play while you're "working" from home :)

## Building my own router

So after poor luck with mPCIe in my miniPC I decided to go with USB wifi solutions. So I got the https://aliexpress.com/item/... , hooked it up and started setting things up. Took me a day to figure out that firewalld (CentOS7/8 firewall) is not directly compatible with raw iptables commands. Damn it! But hey, a lesson learnt is time well spent!

Installed named, dhcpd, hostapd, disabled NetworkManager for my wifi card, etc.. And had to learn another lesson -- if a netowrk interface is bridged then iptables sees the bridge rather than the raw interface. That's another 2 hours well spent :)

In the end I have a working AP!!! It's still hooked in to my router via RJ45, but it does work and does work quite well!

Here's some comparison for now:
via router (2.4): https://speedtest.net/result/...
via router (5): https://speedtest.net/result/...

via miniPC (2.4): https://speedtest.net/result/...
via miniPC (5): <TBD>

Not that bad, aye?

All in all I'm happy with my decision to build a miniPC based router. Now I have the modularity I wanted so mush and a complete control on my networking! Can't wait for wifi6 USB dongles to be released :)