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Ask HN: Plans for side projects in 2014?

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Re: Ask HN: Plans for side projects in 2014?

#22

Post by relevate »

All my past side projects have dabbled at the surface of a new or interesting technology. I hope to do at least one project which can take me deep into a specific language/framework so I can get a good feel for all the features in a specific technology.

Re: Ask HN: Plans for side projects in 2014?

#24

Post by erichurkman »

japhyr wrote: post #4

This year I ended up focusing on an open resource for teaching and learning Python, http://introtopython.org . In 2014 I hope to bring that project to an appropriate level of completion. After that, I'd like to go back to another project I started, http://opencompetencies.org . This project aims to help educators build and maintain their own sets of education standards. These projects have been well-received so far.…

Open Competencies sounds like an awesome idea. Curriculum is not as open or transportable in the US education system as it should be, particularly at secondary schools. Too many teachers are reduced to teaching to exams, because that's the only thing their school district has time or resources to focus on.

It would be fantastic to see more educators relying on (crowd, open, ...) sourced plans, and rely less on the mediocre textbooks and resources that most districts provide.

Re: Ask HN: Plans for side projects in 2014?

#25

Post by zem »

i'd like to start a blog that tries to recapture the spirit of the old "acorn user" magazine [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acorn_User], focused squarely on the hobbyist programmer, but not shying away from accessible write-ups of complex topics. a sampling of articles i remember off the top of my head:

1. pacman style game developed from scratch, with a discussion of sprite animation and techniques to make a monster chase your character through a maze

2. software + hardware guide to connecting a beep-when-you-whistle keychain (remember those?) to one of the input ports and make your computer do interesting stuff when you whistled

3. graph an arbitrary f(x, y) = 0 function via numerical methods (trace the intersection of z = f(x, y) with the xy plane)

4. basic text adventure with a discussion of representing a map via a graph, using an array to simulate pointers

5. an introduction to forth for basic programmers

the key point is that these were both complete projects, and jumping-off points to explore the topic in greater depth. as a kid i found it very inspiring, and learnt a lot from it.

Re: Ask HN: Plans for side projects in 2014?

#27

Post by goldenkey »

bdcravens wrote: post #20
goldenkey wrote: post #13

Thank you all for the ideas, I will be grinching the best and brightest in return for 0 shares of my future company.

So I should try to come up with the best sounding, longest to implement, but in reality most unprofitable idea and hope you burn 9 months on it?

Wait, these were quick ideas? I need to rewrite my grinch playbook.

Re: Ask HN: Plans for side projects in 2014?

#29

Post by basicallydan »

bichiliad wrote: post #11
basicallydan wrote: post #9

I plan to release an app for londoners, focused on finding good pubs around tube stations. It's pretty funky: http://dribbble.com/shots/1326115-London-Pub-Crawl-Interacti... Plus I want to play with creating a few games. I have 5-6 simple ideas I'd like to spend a couple of weeks at a time trying out that I'll be putting on my blog at http://danielhough.co.uk

Out of curiosity, what did you use to prototype the interaction?

No prototype there my friend, that's the real thing, although a few builds out of date. I recorded it in the iPhone Simulator using Quicktime and then turned it into a GIF using photoshop.

Re: Ask HN: Plans for side projects in 2014?

#30

Post by japhyr »

erichurkman wrote: post #24
japhyr wrote: post #4

This year I ended up focusing on an open resource for teaching and learning Python, http://introtopython.org . In 2014 I hope to bring that project to an appropriate level of completion. After that, I'd like to go back to another project I started, http://opencompetencies.org . This project aims to help educators build and maintain their own sets of education standards. These projects have been well-received so far.…

Open Competencies sounds like an awesome idea. Curriculum is not as open or transportable in the US education system as it should be, particularly at secondary schools. Too many teachers are reduced to teaching to exams, because that's the only thing their school district has time or resources to focus on. It would be fantastic to see more educators relying on (crowd, open, ...) sourced plans, and rely less on the me…

Thanks for the encouragement!
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