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99 Bottles of OOP now available in Python

(sandimetz.com)
249 points mattcollins | 3 comments | 15 Nov 24 15:39 UTC | HN request time: 0.699s | source
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teraflop ◴[19 Nov 24 21:02 UTC] No.42188051[source]▶
HN's automatic title editing strikes again. The title of this submission should presumably be: "99 Bottles of OOP now available in Python".
replies(5): >>42188093 #>>42188430 #>>42193789 #>>42194129 #>>42194814 #
Stratoscope ◴[19 Nov 24 21:45 UTC] No.42188430[source]▶
Note to anyone who submits an article: If the title gets mangled like this, edit it.
replies(2): >>42189749 #>>42193751 #
codetrotter ◴[20 Nov 24 00:54 UTC] No.42189749[source]▶
It definitely took me quite a bit of time from I joined HN until I learned that if you edit your submission title then you can override the automatic edits that HN makes to the title you originally submitted.

And I would guess that likewise there are still a lot of people that don’t know this.

Also, sometimes one might not realize that the title got changed until it’s too late to edit the title of the post.

replies(1): >>42194292 #
1. amelius ◴[20 Nov 24 14:42 UTC] No.42194292[source]▶
I wish HN could just take the url and then fetch the title of the page.

That would save quite a hassle, especially on mobile.

replies(2): >>42195959 #>>42197117 #
2. jdminhbg ◴[20 Nov 24 17:04 UTC] No.42195959[source]▶
In this case, the missing '99' isn't a typo, it's deliberate by HN to eliminate clickbaity headlines like '7 Ways To Be A Better Programmer.'
3. layer8 ◴[20 Nov 24 19:09 UTC] No.42197117[source]▶
That would be prone to title injection by malicious pages. ;)

More seriously, HN should instead display an instruction after submitting, informing that the title was changed and that the submitter should check the change and edit if necessary. The issue is that most submitters either don’t seem to notice that the title changed or don’t hit on the idea that they can edit it after the fact.