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Show HN: I made a website that converts YT videos into step-by-step guides

stepify.tech

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Show HN: I made a website that converts YT videos into step-by-step guides

#1

Post by aka_sh »

Hey HN,

I've been working on this side project for the past month. It generates a step-by-step tutorial guide for YouTube videos that you can follow along without watching long videos. Best suited for tutorial videos but can work for other videos aswell. No BS. Just straight to the point.

The guides are generated from pure transcript so you don't have to worry about it being AI. It's my first project as a total beginner. Something I had to do inorder to get out of tutorial hell.

Please let me know if you have any suggestions or if you face any problems or bugs. I would try to fix them to the best of my abilities and as soon as possible.

I would appreciate your feedback on this. Let me know what you think!

Show HN: I made a website that converts YT videos into step-by-step guides
stepify.tech

Re: Show HN: I made a website that converts YT videos into step-by-step guides

#4

Post by ejang0 »

This seems like something people on HN have asked for before. I clicked on one Recent video about how to create a simple Flask app in 5 minutes and the instructions seemed good on a cursory view.

I tried entering a new video but I got a Heroku application error. Maybe it's a limits thing.

When I look at the Recent videos, a lot of them are not for instructions/tutorials. Perhaps people do not understand the purpose of this project. Maybe they are just testing it out with non-tutorial content.

Maybe you could add representative videos towards the top so that people would get a better sense of the use of this project?

I don't know why this isn't more popular here. It's a good idea. (Maybe it has already been implemented elsewhere?) Reading is much faster than watching a video for many instruction-based tasks. Good luck!

Re: Show HN: I made a website that converts YT videos into step-by-step guides

#5

Post by mbesto »

Super interesting. I recently went down the DIY rabbit hole for solar, electricity, etc. I tested out https://stepify.tech/video/O8eVxRVwlnw and looks decent:

1. It took about ~45 seconds for the page to load once I put the URL in. You should have a loader on a page showing that the website is "doing something" while the AI transcribes.

2. It would be great to sync the chapters in the YT video with the guide details.

3. Even more advanced would be the specific items like "Drill holes, insert expansion bolts, and secure the inverter to the wall using nuts and washers." showed a timestamp and thumbnail with a link to the video part.

4. It would be great to have a checklist functionality (maybe this is the "pro version"). I often do something, get halfway and then need to scrub the YT video to find the specific place where he talks about the action item.

EDIT:

5. IMO iFixit has the best "guide" formatting: https://www.ifixit.com/Guide/How+to+Recover+Data+From+a+MacB... if you could somehow generate this by the video, that would be insanely useful.

Re: Show HN: I made a website that converts YT videos into step-by-step guides

#6

Post by aka_sh »

toddmorey wrote: post #2

Love how the AI turned “drop a comment below” into a project step: “Seek feedback from stakeholders or viewers by encouraging questions and comments for further engagement.” This is from a bathroom remodel video.

Sorry for that, I'm looking into it. The problem is for videos that have no transcript. Maybe it's because i'm feeding it the description of the video for now. I'll find some workaround for this. Thanks!

Re: Show HN: I made a website that converts YT videos into step-by-step guides

#7

Post by aka_sh »

toddmorey wrote: post #3

This is a great & useful resource! So many guides on YouTube are unfortunately padded with so much silliness and fluff. Would be great to link out to time codes if possible.

Thank you! Great suggestion. I'll try adding timecodes ASAP.

Re: Show HN: I made a website that converts YT videos into step-by-step guides

#8

Post by aka_sh »

ejang0 wrote: post #4

This seems like something people on HN have asked for before. I clicked on one Recent video about how to create a simple Flask app in 5 minutes and the instructions seemed good on a cursory view. I tried entering a new video but I got a Heroku application error. Maybe it's a limits thing. When I look at the Recent videos, a lot of them are not for instructions/tutorials. Perhaps people do not understand the purpose o…

Yeah, you just said what was on my mind since I launched it. The code I wrote is for tutorial videos. Non-tutorial video responses are just gibberish. The representative videos on the top is a great idea. I'll look into it.

Can you tell me more about the video you entered? Did it have a transcript? How many hours long was it?

Re: Show HN: I made a website that converts YT videos into step-by-step guides

#10

Post by aka_sh »

mbesto wrote: post #5

Super interesting. I recently went down the DIY rabbit hole for solar, electricity, etc. I tested out https://stepify.tech/video/O8eVxRVwlnw and looks decent: 1. It took about ~45 seconds for the page to load once I put the URL in. You should have a loader on a page showing that the website is "doing something" while the AI transcribes. 2. It would be great to sync the chapters in the YT video with the guide details.…

Great suggestions! I really appreciate your feedback. I'll work on implementing these as soon as possible.
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