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Ask HN: What is the most impactful thing you've built?

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Re: Ask HN: What is the most impactful thing you've built?

#721

Post by depth_bliss888 »

I designed and wrote most of FindYourSpot.com, a tool for finding the best place for you to live based on your interests. A subsidiary of Microsoft wrote about us in an email newsletter and we went semi-viral for about 5 years beginning in 2000. One cool thing was if a person answered the first question on our quiz, 70% would finish the 10 page quiz composed of 70-130 data points.

I also designed software for managing auctions, which was in use for 15 years.

Did a similar thing for youth livestock shows which has now been in use for 30 years.

Re: Ask HN: What is the most impactful thing you've built?

#723

Post by p0d »

Thousands of teachers still use a booking system I made 14 years ago, freeperiod.co.uk. I worked in a school and created a website to replace the booking sheet in the staffroom. This was at a time when teachers were being encouraged to bring their non-IT classes to the computer rooms

I can't remember how freeperiod became a thing that schools paid for. I think some other schools showed an interest and that's when I thought about charging. At that point I sent a letter out to lots of schools which bore some fruit and it grew from there.

There is something special about making something that goes on to shape your life. I still feel to shy to call myself a programmer. Or maybe too ashamed as I am sysadmin at heart ;-)

My advice would be don't assume the obvious. School's have timetables, why would they want a booking system? They want a booking system as historically timetables were for teachers and students, not for rooms.

Re: Ask HN: What is the most impactful thing you've built?

#728

Post by egberts1 »

csomar wrote: post #660
egberts1 wrote: post #495

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is simple. Too many malicious and privacy-violating JavaScript abounds, especially after being boiled down to seemingly-indecipherable WebAssembly bytecode. And a typical enterprise NIDS would not be able to see beyond those encrypted packet containing JS over 2-way-signed TLS/SSL, or HTTPv3 (QUIC) (or a few other E2E protocols). Since JavaScript won't be banned (unlike Adobe Flash/ActionScript, BTW Adobe's JavaSc…

My understanding is that JS/WASM is sandboxed within the browser environment. It does have some access (say Camera) but only if you allow it. Care to develop more on the potential attacks here?

too many to count.

Most recently,

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S09505...

Re: Ask HN: What is the most impactful thing you've built?

#729

Post by pawelkomarnicki »

I feel like my app Howdy (https://howdy.cubitoo.com) has the most POSITIVE impact from all the things I have built lately — it's something that improves my life, my family's lives, and my friends'. I am not only using it myself but also super proud to do so and ABSOLUTELY LOVE working on it.
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