I did enable IPv6 in one ISP of one small country :-)
Country jumped lots of positions in IPv6 adoption
Ask HN: What is the most impactful thing you've built?
311–320 of 759 posts
Re: Ask HN: What is the most impactful thing you've built?
#312I built a dirt-simple phone service for people to call and scream[0]. It went viral and got mainstream media attention. My partner was not wild about the hours a day I spent moderating 3-second recordings of random strangers screaming.
[0] Just Scream (https://justscream.baby)
Re: Ask HN: What is the most impactful thing you've built?
#313My first internship had me and my then flat-mate (he was independently selected for the only other internship spot, neither of us knew about the other’s application, while overseas on Erasmus study, which is uncanny) adding “pay this invoice with online payment” (PayPal/Stripe/…) functionality to a product that handled time-tracking, tax reporting, and invoicing for Freelancers, with a enthusiastic user-base of SMB/sole-traders and a high UX-bar.
It was the number one UserVoice request and we were incredibly lucky to have the entire feature ownership to pair develop (with minimal but stellar oversight from the tech lead) and it had a huge multiplier effect on the product offering overall.
I’m very grateful for being in the right place in the right time and it’s contributed a lot to the “valuable code is the code that your users are benefiting from” lesson that constantly reminds me that book-smarts are nothing without a solid understanding of user needs.
Re: Ask HN: What is the most impactful thing you've built?
#314Atomic v2 (pending) - OSS Clockwise alternative with fine control and training of AI assist for time blocking & get together w/ 1:many + outside user - this will be impactful
Re: Ask HN: What is the most impactful thing you've built?
#315Over the last 4 years I built a label design and print app using Electron/React. It has 5000+ desktop users and will reach 7 figures in revenue in the next year. I recently launched a new thermal label printer brand named mydpi. Right now I'm selling a 300 DPI direct-thermal version to compete with DYMO and low-end Zebra. In a month I'll launch a thermal-transfer version with bundled ribbon/labels. I never thought I'…
I just watched the entire label live video demonstrating the features. Looks super solid and easy to understand. Great UX all around. Nice work.
Re: Ask HN: What is the most impactful thing you've built?
#316When we were all WFH'ing during Covid, I couldn't stand listening to presenters saying "Next slide please" over and over. We use Google Meet at work and it doesn't provide any way to give others control of your desktop or slides. So I built a Chrome extension that allows multiple users to control a Google Slides presentation from within Google Meet. It's only got about 2K installations, but people have simulated almost 250K slide clicks with it in the past 3 years. So this is probably my most impactful contribution, especially on my own mental health having to never hear "Next side again".
Homepage: https://fonner.gitlab.io/shared-slides-clicker/
I wrote a blog about some of the trickier parts of building it here: https://jedfonner.com/2020/11/06/shared-slides-clicker/
Re: Ask HN: What is the most impactful thing you've built?
#317A nights & weekends project that has since become a worldwide federated database and software infrastructure.
Took ten years of managing it alone, but it’s been in the hands of a pretty capable team, for the last few years.
It was/is a free project, designed to Serve a pretty challenged demographic. It has turned out to be quite successful, for a number of reasons; many of which have little to do with me, as the new team has taken it to the next level.
It is not hyperbole, to say it has saved lives.
I’m leveraging that infrastructure as a component of the app I’m developing, currently.
Re: Ask HN: What is the most impactful thing you've built?
#318Honestly, I have built nothing impactful in an 30+ year career. It's mostly been working on my own or other people's ideas that didn't pan out or that I got disillusioned with, or building internal systems that a few dozen people use. I'd estimate that the vast majority of the code I've written is not running anywhere at all today.
why not find something that you would find rewarding to work on, even if it's on the side? the things i've done that feel impactful are little tools i've made to help the people i know
Re: Ask HN: What is the most impactful thing you've built?
#319Added a "reply" button to Wikipedia discussions; design was later picked up by the Wikimedia Foundation and properly productionized. Probably saved a lot of people some time, because what you used to do was open the source code for the entire discussion, scroll down to find the comment you were replying to, and insert your comment after it in the code.
Re: Ask HN: What is the most impactful thing you've built?
#320I worked on a system for querying letters from prison inmates that would allow advocates to detect and respond to abuse by guards or fellow inmates.
While I don't think I had a huge impact compared to other contributions, nor did it scale to billions of users, I like to think that it helped at raise awareness about abuses in a dark corner of the world. It is still in active use.