
How I Ruined Office Productivity with a Face-Replacing Slack Bot - wjh_
http://blog.zikes.me/post/how-i-ruined-office-productivity-with-a-slack-bot/
======
mosselman
All you ruined was the fun of photoshopping his face into things.

Let me draw a parallel with a story of my grandfather, whom I never knew:
Apparently a great hobby of his used to be to collect sayings from people.
Whenever he'd meet anyone, let it be new or already known, he'd ask them if
they knew any new sayings. He wrote all of them down in his little book of
sayings. My father started picking up the hobby and they'd get excited when
they had learned a saying the other didn't know yet. They'd do this at diner,
around the fire place, you name it.

Then came my grandfather's birthday and one of the 'gifts' he received was an
encyclopedia of sayings, within it were almost all the sayings in existence.

Suffice to say the fun of collecting new sayings was gone, the interest in
sayings was gone and a great hobby got ruined.

So all I can see is that you took something that was a culture thing in your
team and you took a nice fat automated dump on it.

The tech is very cool nonetheless :)

~~~
autokad
before the internet, there was real capital in knowing jokes, and the same for
unusual facts. you wanted to know who was in that movie? you called your
friend who knew those things. now just IMDB it.

i suppose that is part of the reason for the appeal in the seemingly recent
interest in bar trivia nights. i think we are still working out the kinks in
the things we lost due to the internet.

~~~
fzeroracer
I think this is also why we see continuous growth in the Vinyl industry.
People like the internet, but they also want the option to go offline with
whatever they buy and have something tangible.

~~~
handedness
Continuous growth since the bottom, yes, but from a value that was
asymptotically close to $0 in the prior decade:

[http://diffuser.fm/files/2015/01/vinyl-
chart.jpg](http://diffuser.fm/files/2015/01/vinyl-chart.jpg)

------
jasonzwalker
I have to use Slack at work, and it is fun.

But when I'm trying to focus on programming, it is like being in an all day
long meeting without an agenda.

~~~
r00fus
My only recourse on some days is to shut down the app on my desktop, and let
my iPhone ping me if I get a DM or mention. @here messes it all up, but I've
found a way to at-a-glance determine if it's directed to me without losing
much concentration.

Has anyone else gotten a good way to merge things like slack/email with
Pomodoro or other focus hacks?

~~~
chimprich
Slack does have a "Snooze" and "Do Not Disturb" setting, in case you weren't
aware -> [https://get.slack.help/hc/en-us/articles/214908388-Do-Not-
Di...](https://get.slack.help/hc/en-us/articles/214908388-Do-Not-Disturb-and-
snooze-settings) .

This alone makes Slack far more useful for me than HipChat.

~~~
r00fus
Thanks for the reminder - I often forget to use those (or properly). Any good
ways you've found to automate pomo timer set/rest/reset through bots?

------
BJanecke
I'm so happy right now. There really are hackers(In it for the lulz) left in
the world :')

------
addled
About 15 years ago, I remember Zikes offering to let me borrow a web
development book he had finished reading.

I turned down the offer, thinking I had little use for such things.

Fast forward 10 years and I end up going back to school for programming and
slapping myself for not getting into it back then.

Can definitely see the difference that experience makes.

~~~
Zikes
Oh wow, 15 years ago? Did we go to school together?

~~~
addled
Yeah, I'll send you an email and we can catch up.

------
jnordwick
Excellent. This shows simplicity, good research, capable coding, and
creativity. Even the write up shows an appropriate level of detail.

+1 would hire

------
donquichotte
"I turned the face manipulation code into a runnable binary, which I intended
to wrap with a Slack bot."

So you turned your Python program into a single, statically linked executable?
May I ask how you did that?

~~~
orng
> So you turned your Python program into a single, statically linked
> executable? May I ask how you did that?

I think the author's application was written in Go which as I understand it
does static linking by default.

However, creating standalone executables from python is called freezing and
can be done using various tools[0].

0: [http://docs.python-
guide.org/en/latest/shipping/freezing/](http://docs.python-
guide.org/en/latest/shipping/freezing/)

------
planetjones
This kind of stuff fits the Hacker News bill perfectly!

------
jmkni
Side point, but what is going on with the scrolling on that page? Anybody else
find it caused performance issues?

That aside, great article!

~~~
Zikes
Thanks! Glad you enjoyed the article.

Sorry about the scroll problems, I really hate scrolljacking so I don't have
any JS for that on there, but I imagine that fixed background image could be
causing some problems. Would you mind sharing your OS/browser info so I can
investigate?

~~~
jmkni
No worries, Windows 10 Professional, Chrome 56, no issues on Edge/Firefox,
maybe it's a weird bug with this particular issue Chrome?

~~~
crowbahr
Got a nonstandard resolution maybe?

------
nunez
THIS IS AMAZING.

~~~
teach
It's one of the social norms on HackerNews that "low-value" comments like
"Love it!" and "THIS IS AMAZING" are discouraged. Although such comments are
polite to the poster, they add nothing but noise for all the other readers of
the thread.

Instead, it seems to be preferred that you simply upvote the post without
replying.

------
notadoc
Saving the world.

------
auggierose
Cool idea. Anyway, I am glad that "Scientists have detected a major change to
the Earth’s oceans" is higher on the front page, at least right now.

~~~
pavanred
I don't understand this sentiment. And, I am surprised to see it on HN this
often too. It's saying - I care about X, till problems with X are all solved,
any effort on anything else is snarked upon with judgement of wasting effort.

It used to be only on threads discussing an accomplishment of a space agency
of a poorer country, and a popular sentiment was if a fraction of their GDP
should be spent on science and technology till poverty is eradicated. Same
thing here, why one person should spend time on a personal project until we
resolve climate change. I understand prioritizing bigger problems with more
time, effort and money. But, ridiculing others for spending time and effort on
making/discussing something you think is not the most important is something
else.

~~~
auggierose
I don't see where I ridicule anyone with my comment.

~~~
minimaxir
It's a backhanded compliment that implies that silly hacks aren't worthwhile.

~~~
auggierose
Do you think that a silly hack is only worthwhile if it appears on the front
page of HN?

