Coding without a laptop: Two weeks with AR glasses and Linux on Android

The part that makes it so tough is monitor arms come in standard sizes and are nowhere near long enough or extend far enough for me to sit comfortably. My dad modified my desk for me years ago to mount a monitor arm on wooden blocks, but it means I can't move the monitor much.

Being able to wear glasses and ditch the monitor entirely would be a game changer for me. I know next to nothing about AR though, being as I assumed, perhaps wrongly, it isn't something that would work for me.

Edit: Thank you for the replies. It means a lot. I've got some options to explore here now thanks to you.

FWIW, I use a monitor arm that's mounted on the front left side of my desk (my dad also modified my desk so this would work) so I can pull it as close as I need. It does mean I can't push it back to a normal monitor distance but I'm the only one using my PC so that's not a problem. Oddly enough, I recently got cataract surgery so now I have a lens that makes me focus further away, but now text is too small to read at that distance so I have to use readers to focus closer and use the arm.. seems a little silly but it mostly works out.

  >  I wish they were sold in a store that I could just walk into and try them for a minute.

Being a lanky kinda guy I could never find clothes in my sizes in store but it was still quite helpful to see the difference between certain materials and would often lead to buying a more expensive version than another. Without the stores, it just seems to make a market of lemons[0], and I think that's kinda apt given general consumer frustration. You can't rely on reviews and you can't rely on images or even product descriptions...

How the fuck am I supposed to know what I'm buying?

My hypothesis is that some bean counters saw that sales were plummeting in stores and concluded that they should then close them. Having the inability to recognize that the purpose of the store had changed, despite them likely using the stores in the new fashion themselves. Hard to make effective decisions if the only viewpoint you have is that of a spreadsheet...

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Market_for_Lemons

You have all the pieces but you're not putting them together.

Bricks and mortar stores cost money just to exist - rent, rates, staffing, etc. - and that's why they can't compete on price with online stores, which can just be giant warehouses with shipping. The online arms of some physical stores can benefit from the same economies as totally online businesses, leading to cheaper prices online even for companies with a physical presence.

How can a physical shop make any money if they are just treated as a gallery for browsing before the buyer heads to Amazon to get the item 10% cheaper? It's not bean counting, it's basic economics.

How the fuck are you supposed to know what you're buying, indeed - patronise physical businesses because you recognise the value in their existence, and understand that that's worth paying an additional premium for.

  > Bricks and mortar stores cost money just to exist

> I've constantly wondered why this doesn't really exist.

and if you understand that real stores are more expensive to run than online stores, then the rest seems obvious?

Places like that did exist in the past - they were the places we had to go to buy things. Online prices are lower so people bought online instead and drove most of them out of business.

Perhaps I'm missing something?

Could you please provide enough detail here in your example, that we can discuss and quantify what that value is, so we can compare it with the cost of running the store?

Let's say we have an "all the XR glasses" store that lets visitors try on different XR glasses and see what fits, and the visitors then later buy them from Amazon because the glasses are cheaper there.

p.s.: on multiple posts, you've taken non-personal comments extremely personally (e.g. stuff like 'how dare you say something I already know [because I am smart], thus assuming I don't know it and am dumb'), and attacking others as well, almost as if the topic is you, and not your comment. Just to head that off at the pass: I'm interested in discussing what you said, not in discussing myself or you. You're a smart person. Let's focus on substance.

  >>>>>> Malls offered a lot more business value than just facilitating direct purchases. They do a lot to build brands, loyalty, and advertise to customers.

If you wish for a thorough analysis then my answer is "This is Hacker News". Such an expectation is excessive and out of scope of the platform.

I am happy to have my statements rebutted and critiqued but not by accusation of failing to account for widely understood and basic conditions. If you believe I am improperly evaluating the costs of these, then that is another matter and I am happy to have those discussions. Even if these are the conjecture of two rational and reasonably informed people without direct and detailed analysis. If you wish to seek out research and do detailed analysis I not only will not stop you, I'd encourage you. This would be a great way to counter my comment and have a high likelihood of changing my belief/understanding of the environment.

  > p.s.: on multiple posts,

Frankly, because not operating under this belief generates fighting, degrades conversations, and derails conversations. As others might more succinctly say "this isn't Reddit." I am only trying to be explicit in stating why such retorts are low quality.

It appears that frequently people do not realize the assumptions that their responses makes.

  > I already know [because I am smart]

The push-back is not "because I am smart" but rather "because I am not incredibly ignorant."

I do not want to conflate the two. They are significantly different. The reason "I already know" is conditioned on my intelligence being above that of a child. This is what generates the insult and the more aggressive follow-up after they doubled down. It is not conditioned on being above average, nor being in the "smart" category.

Let's look at the original response

  >>>>> Bricks and mortar stores cost money just to exist

Mind you, my original comment also demonstrates awareness that these physical stores have operational costs. My critique makes no sense otherwise, as there would be no reason to even close these stores if they were free to operate. So this contributes to the reason danparsonson's response is inappropriate and insulting. It is in bad faith (the faith being I'm not malicious nor unreasonable).

I think you should also look back to how I responded much differently to 20after4. I did equally push back at their first point which is equally egregious. But I move on and engage with the rest. Their comment has additional substance and isn't entirely contingent upon excessive naivety, whereas that is all there is to danparsonson's (their third line completely ignores my entire thesis of physical locations providing value other than direct sales and is itself making the same error I am criticizing: hyper-fixation on measuring operational value through direct sales). So they get different responses.

  > Let's focus on substance.

If that were so, you would not have had multiple people ask you for clarification or specifics.

> Malls offered a lot more business value than just facilitating direct purchases. They do a lot to build brands, loyalty, and advertise to customers

Thanks, I think what you are missing is that it appears, based on the evidence, that the "more business value" examples you cite are often not enough to keep stores open, hence all the store closings.

This was obvious to multiple people, so the assumption on the part of multiple people was that you had some theory or model or analysis or evidence to add which would say otherwise. It appears that is not the case. Indeed, you were given the opportunity to demonstrate by example, but did not take it.

p.s.: In seeking a better conversation, I've omitted the part of your response dealing with you or me as a primary topic.

  > If that were so, you would not have had multiple people ask you for clarification or specifics.

  >  examples you cite are often not enough to keep stores open, hence all the store closings.

  > This was obvious to multiple people,

Responding this way also is inappropriate to my comment too. My comment would lead to the claim that stores closed because they failed to adapt to a changing environment. This would consequentially lead to exactly identical settings.

If you want evidence for why you might want to believe this, look at Sears. A store that famously had a mail based catalogue. Their failure to adapt to internet markets is widely discussed as from a hindsight perspective it seems crazy that they didn't dominate. They were literally doing an "online store" before the internet existed. You can also look to Blockbuster, which is also famously written about.

The point is that what's obvious post hoc isn't obvious in situ. Sears made a great blunder underestimating the popularity of online stores and continuing operating as normal (not adapting). Given that one of the leaders in the market made such an "obvious" blunder, I don't think we can rule out that others didn't similarly miscalculate.

If you think this is not the case, cool! Argue that! But you should justify it. Say why I'm dumb. Evidence it. But I'm not going to accept your claim if it is premised on people being oracles. They aren't now, we have evidence that they weren't then, so I don't have reason to believe that happened. It also doesn't align well with the order in which businesses failed nor align with explaining why certain ones are still around. You miss that my claim has such an explanation. But you need to actually think about what I said...

I welcome you calling me an idiot. But if you're going to do it, put some serious effort into it.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post_hoc_ergo_propter_hoc