Submission timeline
2007–2026One slot for every year since HN launched. Height is that year's peak points; orange marks a 100+ point or 50+ comment breakout. Select a bar to open its strongest thread.
First comments on top threads
HN comment orderDesign docs are one of my favourite things about software engineering. If code is the bricks and mortar, then these docs are the blueprints. I know this is fairly controversial, but our jobs isn't just to write code. Navigating organisations and achieving consensus between a lot of teams/technologies is a huge part of it. Design docs are a way to get all of that out of the way _before_ writing thousands of lines of code. The review process nets significantly…
Design doc culture at google is why I left the company. I wrote a very high level doc shortly after joining the company outlining a fairly trivial task (one that has been performed many times across other product areas). A colleague virtually took me aside and told me "this is not how we do things here". Which was kind of a wake up call as he told me to make sure to 'evaluate many more ways to get this done'…
The first top-level comment from each of the four biggest threads, in HN’s own order. Excerpts are shortened; open a comment for full context.
- Breakout years
- 2
- Total points
- 812
- Total comments
- 372
100+ points or 50+ comments
reference only — not used in Hall rules or ranking
reference only — not used in Hall rules or ranking
Every submission
| Date | Title as submitted | By | Points | Comments |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2020-07-06 | Design Docs at Google | cramforce | 2 | 0 |
| 2020-07-10 | Design Docs at Google | cramforce | 3 | 0 |
| 2020-07-22 | Design Docs at GoogleFirst breakout · Best thread | thesephist | 459 | 187 |
| 2023-09-16 | Design Docs at Google | ttanay666 | 1 | 0 |
| 2024-05-05 | Design Docs at Google | kiyanwang | 2 | 0 |
| 2024-05-06 | Design docs at Google (2020)Hall induction · Latest 20+ point return | BerislavLopac | 345 | 185 |