manicminer
Joined 11 years ago
Karma
144
Submissions
28
Member since
Dec 17
Recent submissions
Comment · 1 year ago
The Mikado Method
Comment · 1 year ago
The inability to comment on any line in a PR is a real pain. I’m disappointed to see the plans for this abandoned.
Comment · 2 years ago
I use this method and became converted after a long lived refactor branch caused merge hell, delayed a project for many months and caused all manner of bugs that we were fixing for a long time afterwards.
My very wise and experienced CTO said to me something along the lines of: "if you don't think it's possible to break a big refactor down into small steps, then you're probably not thinking hard enough". That has stuck with me.
I wrote a blog post on atomic development a while back which references the Mikado method. https://tomsouthall.com/blog/atomic-development.
Comment · 4 years ago
This is great
Comment · 4 years ago
PD2X.com | Javascript/React Developer, Junior/Mid-level | Full-time | 100% Remote UK-based
Looking for a junior or mid-level React developer based in the UK to work as part of a fully remote team on a suite of health-related applications in the field of personalised diagnostics. Mostly very new or upcoming greenfield projects. We are a small start-up with a growing team and influential backers.
Our front-end apps are built with Next.js and run on Vercel. We are early-stage so loads of scope for making a major impact on the products we're building. You'd have some oversight from a senior developer but otherwise would be expected (and encouraged) to be very autonomous. Super relaxed and flexible working culture.
If you're interested or have questions you can email me directly: [email protected].
Comment · 4 years ago
I found the write up of the Dazzle Walk itself to be a much more fascinating read http://walkspace.uk/2021/03/birmingham-dazzle-walk/
Comment · 8 years ago
Great suggestion. We'll look into it.
We do make money from booking commissions, but our commissions are much lower than those of the OTAs and more importantly go to a company that is trusted by and founded by the hotel industry.
Room Key's raison d'être is to lower the cost of hotel distribution for the hotel industry and to be an advocate for the traveler in what is a very confusing marketplace for the average consumer. Price confidence is severely lacking hence why consumers are often searching up to 6 sites before making a booking decision.
Very few people understand how the online hotel industry works and we would like to start to cast some light on that.
Comment · 8 years ago
A Firefox version is high on our list
Comment · 8 years ago
Thank you for pointing this out. We'll look at this and see if we can enumerate the OTAs on which Scout works as you suggest.
I can assure you that the extension collects only what it needs to do in order to function.
Comment · 8 years ago
For rates that are available to everyone, the hotel chains are generally contractually restricted from offering a lower rate than the OTA. Currently the Priceline/Expedia duopoly wields a huge amount of power which IMO is ultimately bad for the consumer.
The way that hotel chains can undercut the OTA price is via their loyalty programs. If you sign up as a member then you can very often receive a lower rate. All the major chains have been running campaigns around these loyalty rates recently and one study has suggested it may be having an impact [https://www.kalibrilabs.com/press-1/2017/10/26/new-study-fro...].
Due to our unique relationship with the hotel chains, Room Key (both our .com site and Scout) is the only hotel search engine that has access to these loyalty rates across multiple chains. This is how Scout is able to notify the user of a better rate in so many cases for the big chains. We'd love to expand to have more hotels join us and allow us access to their loyalty rates as well.
We've found through our research and user testing that OTA users fall broadly into two camps. First, those who believe, rightly or wrongly, that the OTA rate is always going to be cheaper. Second, those who use OTAs as a search engine to find the right hotel but then go and manually compare the OTA rate vs the rates available directly on the hotel's own site.
Usually the direct deal is better when you consider the entire package - lower loyalty rate + easier cancellation + points + free wifi etc. Being the customer of the hotel who has an interest in the quality of your stay vs a third party does count for something. I believe we'll start to see that count for more as time goes on.
Comment · 8 years ago
Nine months ago, an article "For Hotels, There’s No Room Left for Online Travel Agencies" sparked some interesting discussion on HN [1]. Many of the topics discussed informed the development of our new product, Scout.
The perception of many travelers is that the best hotel prices are to be found at the big online travel agencies.
The hotel chains have recently been attempting to alter this perception by offering lower prices when you book via their own websites. This usually requires membership in a loyalty program but they have streamlined sign-up so that you can become a member during the checkout process.
This channel shift is really important for the hotels because they lose so much in commission to the OTAs, not to mention market relevance and a direct relationship with the customer.
Room Key is a joint venture between six of the largest hotel chains in the world and has unique access to these lower direct rates.
We have just launched a new product called Scout, a Chrome browser extension that activates whenever you view a hotel at major OTAs.
Scout looks at the lowest rate being advertised by the OTA and then searches in the background to see if it can find a lower direct rate. If it does, it automatically displays a notification along with a button that takes the user to the hotel's own site to book the lower rate and get additional perks of booking direct (e.g. points, free wifi).
For now the hotels Scout works with are mostly limited to brands belonging to larger chains (Marriott, Hyatt, Wyndham, Choice, IHG). E.g. try looking at a Holiday Inn on Expedia and you're very likely to see a Scout notification.
The OTAs are currently limited to the major players (Expedia, Orbitz, Priceline, Booking.com, Hotels.com, Travelocity) but we hope to grow this list to include metasearch engines (Kayak, Trivago, etc) in the near future. We also hope to introduce the extension on other browsers.
Comment · 8 years ago
Room Key | Charlottesville, VA | Front-End Developer | Onsite
Room Key is a hotel search engine owned by six of the world's largest hotel companies. We provide access to member-only rates that other third party travel sites cannot.
We are developing and promoting our roomkey.com product. We expect several major features to be added this year. We are currently in the last stages of a migration from a legacy Backbone codebase to Preact/Redux/ES6.
To help us in these efforts, we are looking for an experienced Javascript engineer with a deep understanding of large-scale front-end web applications and a passion for good UI/UX. Any knowledge of Clojure(script) would be a major bonus.
We are a fast growing team with a great culture and working environment in the truly lovely city of Charlottesville, VA. We are only looking for on-site right now. We will cover your relocation costs.
Full details at https://www.roomkey.com/careers