Top all-time · #16069
Phil Freo
Personal blog · philfreo.com/blog · on HN as philfreoprogrammingcareer
Phil Freo's personal blog at philfreo.com covers programming and career. Since 2009, 4 different Hacker News readers have linked it 22 times, most often “The last 20% before shipping”. It is still writing: the last post was on 2025-11-10, and you can follow it by feed.
Too few sampled comments (1) to say how often HN recommends it.?
Why HN links it
HN readers link Phil Freo's post for a Python example of letting users upload files straight to S3 using CORS, without the upload passing through the app's server.
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 1 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
Phil Freo is a product person, engineering leader, and builder. VP of Product & Engineering at Close.
Most-linked posts?
- The last 20% before shipping2 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2015-05-23
- How to allow direct file uploads from JavaScript to Amazon S3 signed by Python2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2012-12-10
- Solve multiple problems at once2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2015-03-14
What Hacker News says?
I've been hired as Engineer #1 at two startups (both doing well). I wrote some thoughts recently about how I was recruited into that role: https://twitter.com/philfreo/status/1012171080834969601 On the hiring side, I also incorporated some hard lessons learned about growing our Eng team from 2 to 14 here: http://philfreo.com/blog/when-who-how-to-hire-an-engineering...
Comment linking /blog/when-who-how-to-hire-an-engineering-team-including-hiring-remotely/
on “How to Hire Your First Engineer”Submitted Honestly.com – Not acting so honestly as a story · 395 points
HN discussionNice. I wrote something similar [1] after noticing that it's easy for developers to make this mistake too (especially more junior developers) -- once your proof of concept works, you still are far from shipping. [1] http://philfreo.com/blog/the-last-20-before-shipping/
Comment linking /blog/the-last-20-before-shipping/
on “I wrote the SQL query in 5 mins. Why does my engineer say it will take a month?”Submitted How to allow direct file uploads from JavaScript to Amazon S3 signed by Python as a story · 78 points
HN discussionI don't do NLP, but I'd love to see if anyone else is hiring in Florida... I'm a frontend/backend web programmer http://philfreo.com/
Comment linking /
on “Ask HN: Who's hiring (take 3)?”Submitted Why is this so hard... Apple as a story · 64 points
HN discussionI thought this was great. I typed up a few summary notes that I can refer back to on it: http://philfreo.com/blog/interesting-ted-talk-on-motivation/
Comment linking /blog/interesting-ted-talk-on-motivation/
on “Dan Pink on the surprising science of motivation [video]”Submitted The problem with pull requests / code reviews as a story · 19 points
HN discussionNice! I've been wanting this feature for a long time: http://philfreo.com/blog/the-problem-with-pull-requests-code...
Comment linking /blog/the-problem-with-pull-requests-code-reviews/
on “Expanding Context in Diffs”Submitted Solve multiple problems at once as a story · 11 points
HN discussionYou can use S3's CORS support to allow your users to upload directly to S3 without even touching your server. Downside is that it can be hard to debug and it requires your users to use JavaScript -- but otherwise it's a big win. See http://philfreo.com/blog/how-to-allow-direct-file-uploads-fr... for a Python example.
Comment linking /blog/how-to-allow-direct-file-uploads-from-javascript-to-amazon-s3-signed-by-python/
on “Eighteen months of Django”Submitted Solve MUltiple Problems at Once as a story · 3 points
HN discussionSubmitted How to unit test AJAX Requests with QUnit and Sinon.JS as a story · 3 points
HN discussionSubmitted Don’t punish old trials and former customers as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted Why you should Archive your emails when you’re done with them as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted The last 20% before shipping as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted My mobile workstation setup as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted Quick notes from Startup School 2012 as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted The last 20% before shipping as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted My IKEA standing desk as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted My End of 2012 Review as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted An Objective Process for Product Reviews as a story · 1 points
HN discussion