Ask HN: Haven't worked for a while, best guide/advice to start a hobby project? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: Haven't worked for a while, best guide/advice to start a hobby project?

#41

Post by danschumann » Wed, Dec 25, 2019, 4:19 AM UTC

always work on the step you know you can take next. There are lots of unknowns in every project, but there are usually a few knowns. Usually the problem is not pulling the trigger to move forward on the knowns. You will have to re-write, you will have to backtrack, you will end up wasting oodles of code and time, but steps backwards are steps forward when learning is a part of it, and learning is always a part of it.

Re: Ask HN: Haven't worked for a while, best guide/advice to start a hobby project?

#42

Post by keithnz » Wed, Dec 25, 2019, 4:19 AM UTC

I know this pain of being undecided on what to choose. Though the difference being I do have a core stack I build with, it's just when I do hobby projects I often want to try something new and end up exactly feeling like you feel, too much choice! But I've always found when I have a problem, I work better, so if you have MVP idea, flesh it out, define it best you can, then force yourself to choose. If you can't choose, use Node / Vue. It's all javascript and no matter what choices you make later, building something significant in javascript is going to serve you well. If you need a database, choose postgresql, getting some core sql skills is very useful, even if you end up moving to nosql dbs. If you need cheap hosting, try digital ocean. This is a bit different from my core stack, but I have built things with those things, and they are fine, not necessarily the best but have a lot of transferable knowledge and plenty of people use them so there is a LOT of info on how to do most anything you will want to do.

Re: Ask HN: Haven't worked for a while, best guide/advice to start a hobby project?

#43

Post by suhail » Wed, Dec 25, 2019, 4:33 AM UTC

If I were you...

1. Start with something simpler & work on building up your fundamentals. Build momentum & confidence.

2. Recognize your struggle is part of the journey of learning. When you read and don't understand a word, you look it up. Take the time to fight through the abstraction & learn some core concepts when you don't know what something is. It's ok to get distracted & go down a mini rabbit hole.

You may need to learn 5 things that seem unrelated to the task at hand. Those 5 things aren't a waste, you'll likely find the concepts useful later. I always did.

Consider not using some frameworks to remove some of the magic.

Build something you want so you finish it.

Re: Ask HN: Haven't worked for a while, best guide/advice to start a hobby project?

#44

Post by Ididntdothis » Wed, Dec 25, 2019, 4:35 AM UTC

ernsheong wrote: post #15

Forget tech stacks. Just pick the simplest idea you can think of that you would actually use yourself , that seems to not be a complex software product. And do it! I can assure you that the simplest of products will not result in the simplest code / stack. It is important that you also personally want to use this thing, because when the going gets tough, you will stick with it.

And really finish it. Most learning is done while reducing bug count. Prototypes are easy in comparison.

Re: Ask HN: Haven't worked for a while, best guide/advice to start a hobby project?

#45

Post by zoom6628 » Wed, Dec 25, 2019, 4:42 AM UTC

Been there myself. My solution is forget all those frameworks. Just build something from scratch using as little bling as possible. Maybe even just python+bottle for a web app. That should take less than one hour to get a result. The. Do tasks in one hour chunks that get results. E. G. Add argparse and command line help, add a logo to displayed html page.... And so on till you have broken thru.

Good luck.

Re: Ask HN: Haven't worked for a while, best guide/advice to start a hobby project?

#46

Post by whalesalad » Wed, Dec 25, 2019, 4:45 AM UTC

I’ve been having fun with learning how to talk to raspberry pi accessories using the i2c bus. I’m specifically playing around with Elixir and the nerves framework. It’s fun to reverse engineer someone else’s Arduino or Python code and use it to inform my Elixir code. When I say fun it’s a huge pain in the ass and progress is extremely slow but I’m able to talk to my GPS and accelerometer at this point. It’s kinda refreshing from the typical web development stuff.

In your case I think you’re creating a lot of anxiety by making the assumption that you need to be perfect right out the gate. I do this to myself as well, so perhaps I’m projecting. Slow down! You’ve already recognized an area you know you can improve in, that’s the first step. Don’t push yourself so hard to get everything perfect. Focus on learning one thing at a time and apply them to real problems. You’ll keep certain things and identify things you can do better in the next project. Wash. Rinse. Repeat.

Re: Ask HN: Haven't worked for a while, best guide/advice to start a hobby project?

#47

Post by mysticmode » Wed, Dec 25, 2019, 4:48 AM UTC

As someone said below, your anxiety or too much analysis has to be look at it in another level.

But as far as tech stack goes.. This is my opinion.

There is a lot going on, lots of new tools, technologies and resources coming along. But it is totally fine with what programming languages you are comfortable with at the moment IF you are going to do a side/hobby project.

Anyhow, you will have to iterate it a lot on the go. Honestly, some parts of it can be fun and some others wouldn't be. But you have to keep up with it in order to do the release.

So, I'd put this Addy Osmani's quote here: "First do it, then do it right, then do it better".

All the best!

Re: Ask HN: Haven't worked for a while, best guide/advice to start a hobby project?

#48

Post by _august » Wed, Dec 25, 2019, 4:51 AM UTC

This is a real hurdle to starting projects. Spend a day researching stacks. Keep it simple. Go with tech that you know.

My current stack is:

  * Creat-React-App
  * Node/Express Server

This keeps things super simple and basic, and I can extend it with Mongo / GraphQL / etc etc.

If you know python and want to use Vue, you could do:

  * Simple Vue frontend
  * Flask API

Worry about things like SSR, routing, etc, afterwards when you have something basic running. It's MUCH easier to iterate, than it is to start something. So make the starting part easy.

Re: Ask HN: Haven't worked for a while, best guide/advice to start a hobby project?

#49

Post by j45 » Wed, Dec 25, 2019, 5:00 AM UTC

First, rediscover how to build for fun. Highly recommend playing as a beginner with JavaScript in 30 days and p5.js.

If you like a vue, take a paid vue course that costs $20 or so per month. The material will be vetted, you won’t have to piece as much together.. and can ask lots of questions.

Re: Ask HN: Haven't worked for a while, best guide/advice to start a hobby project?

#50

Post by HAL9OOO » Wed, Dec 25, 2019, 5:02 AM UTC

Thanks for all the replies guys! It's going to take me a while to read through all of them and process them. I guess this is the benefit of having eyes looking at your post on Christmas Eve, people feel like helping :).

Happy Holidays Everyone~

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