Ask HN: My tools broke, and I am broke, what now?
I got some small freelancing work to do, I was going to deliver a milestone tomorrow, I was using my startup old workstation that was left on my house (after the startup ran out of rent money) to work on that, but the HDD failed about one hour and a half ago, and the diagnostic tools that come with OSX say that it is impossible to salvage.
I am broke, almost literally, in Brazil you cannot ask for bankruptcy as individual, if I could I would ask, I am in debt, have no income and I am struggling to pay rent and food.
And the work I had to do requires an OSX, I also own a laptop in its last throes (several parts of it already failed or are randomly working only sometimes) but it is one of those that came with a stupid bios locked to Windows 8, I tried very hard to install Linux on it and failed, I doubt I can install OSX (Hackintosh) on it.
Also my personal health is failing too and interfering with my work.
I am very, very unsure of what to do now... I feel like if I was cornered and physically threatened, if I fail to deliver tomorrow probably the contract will be cancelled (my health already me deliver some earlier milestones late and the client is already upset with me), but even if I DO deliver this milestone and the next ones, the payment won't be enough to repay my most urgent debts (like late rent payments) and replace the failing laptop, much less an OSX machine (beside being already expensive in US, in Brazil they are outrageously expensive, because of excessive taxation and currently unfavourable currency exchange rate)
28 comments
[ 3.1 ms ] story [ 55.7 ms ] threadI think I've got an older Mac mini here in the shop that we use occasionally for jobs that require Mac-specific things. If you can get a working internet connection and want to try, I'll get it hooked up and see if I can give you remote access to it. If you want to do that, send me an email (link is in my username profile).
Now I am wondering how to boot Linux on a Mac... I found a wonderful tool named "Mac Linux USB Loader" to create a Linux bootable with USB, but that tool is OSX only (since my OSX don't boot at all... it does not help).
Oh, and the Mac don't have a CD reader.
You'd need a second computer with extra drive space greater than or equal to the entire size of the hard drive in your Mac.
I think you've gotta find some local help with this. It's tough to do much about it from here with less than a day before your work is due.
I am not sure if it will work, but so far is the best idea.
Again, not sure if this will help but it's another option there.
If the government think it is a gift, it mostly works, but otherwise they will charge crazy taxes and be annoying to allow it to be delivered (thus the reason why stuff here is expensive, and why my startup had to pay a smuggler to get the now-broken Mac machine)
Also, OP could put a Bitcoin address in his profile.
Looking at your LinkedIn history, it looks like you've worked at several places before. Go back to one, connect with folks you know there, and rebuild things for a while.
I don't have a job for years because I could not find any. (not for lack of trying, I sent thousands of resumes, but went in total for about 10 interviews during my whole life)
But it sounds like stress/panic may be the real issue. (Your concerns and plans are all-over-the-map.)
You should seek someone local and friendly to talk to. They will be better at assessing the whole situation and providing a calm outside perspective. Ideally, this would also be someone who could provide a couch to crash on, if your current rent/residence proves financially unsustainable.
Your health and sanity are your "most urgent debts". Nothing else matters if those aren't in place. You may have to delay or step away from the kind of solo-contracting that's led you to a stressful situation. Taking simpler work, in a larger or more-traditional team/project, may help restore a more balanced outlook.
Good luck. You can survive a lot, if you take things logically, one-at-a-time.
Unfortunately I have no close friends, and all my aquaintances are in similar positions, sometimes worse (the closes "Friend" I have right now, has the same problems as me, plus is married and have a kid, and his wife is also unemployed)
Also I am doing solo freelancing because is the only thing I could find to have any income, I am sending resumes for years now, without any success.
EDIT: I am also suspecting my main issue is psychiatric (I think I may have a real case of ADHD), but the psychiatrists I went so far were all obviously bad (For example one talked non-stop, don't allowed me to tell him my symptoms, and then told me I had some anxiety disease...)
good luck!
And Brazil is having an economic hard time just like every other country in the world.
PS: I have an old MacBook Pro here, if you want, I can lend it to you.
1) Network, it's good to have friends. I'm sure there's an "apple" Scene, if you had a friend or two, you could use their hardware.
2) Use cheap hardware, PC/Linux.
3) Save to be able to handle emergencies and to have a backup machine.
If so, grab your code (as already discussed on other comments), and put that disk in the mac. Boot with command+r pressed, and you'll be able to install OS X onto the new drive.
Slightly off-topic: Since you specifically need OS X, Do you do iOS development?