News for hackers. Stuff that matters.
Re:Shouldn't Robots Be Doing My Taxes By Now? by ableal on Tuesday April 17, 2012 @12:51PM (#3853532)
Beware answered prayers.

Over in my corner, we have a State provided income tax simulator and filer. Not too pretty, but correct and useful; it's done in Java and runs under Windows, MacOS and Linux.

It's been so successful that most tax returns are nowadays filed with it, and quite a few public offices where people used to queue up to file their (paper) returns have been closed. There was never much of a setup/tradition of filing by mail like in the U.S.

Over the last couple of years, they've improved data cross-referencing to the point where I can get most of my form pre-filled from the government.

Re:Shouldn't Robots Be Doing My Taxes By Now? by zyphlar on Tuesday April 17, 2012 @01:18PM (#3853760)
The horrors of Java! It's a single app, and it's cross-platform... oooooh.

Now sit down and let me tell you a tale of Intuit.

Re:Shouldn't Robots Be Doing My Taxes By Now? by tnorthcutt on Tuesday April 17, 2012 @03:11PM (#3854440)
Beware answered prayers.

I don't understand. Are you saying that your scenario/reality is a bad thing?

Re:Shouldn't Robots Be Doing My Taxes By Now? by trafficlight on Tuesday April 17, 2012 @01:52PM (#3854004)
And what's the downside to that?