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A live streaming platform dedicated to code

devv.tv

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Re: A live streaming platform dedicated to code

#11

Post by swirlycheetah »

chippy wrote: post #4

I love the idea. Something like this will happen soon. There are some games developers who live stream occasionally on Twitch.tv. The results are generally visual, and feedback quick. I wonder how much they interact with the viewers / chat. If they can take feedback from and incorporate ideas or fixes. When I've tried streaming, I've found it hard focusing on the chat side and coding at the same time - it's probably…

Thanks for the kind words. Your final paragraph is the exact issue I'm working on solving now.

The general gist I'm getting is that people often feel insecure about streaming their coding sessions due to perhaps not feeling confident in their skills, workflow, tools or various other issues.

I'm planning on chatting to some established streamers to understand their process and analyse what's currently missing which I could help them with. I then need to chat to some programmers who have never streamed before to understand what stops them from doing so and if anything can be done about that.

If you've got any thoughts or feedback they'd be much appreciated.

Re: A live streaming platform dedicated to code

#12

Post by minimaxir »

A couple months ago, someone asked "Why isn't there a twitch.tv for programming?": https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8039299

I believe my answer still holds true. Programming isn't as well-suited for constant live streaming because:

a) The viewer can't leave the stream in the background (as you would television)

b) A very large amount of dead air where nothing is happening and the streamer needs to fill dead air. (even worse if you have to debug something)

c) It would require a very optimized overlay that makes it easy to see the code at sub-1080p resolutions. (almost no screencast even now does this because it impacts usability)

d) The presenters need to be socially engaging; given the demographics of people who are the best coders, this is not a guarantee.

In the meantime, I've done some code streaming Hello World PoCs just for fun, with a few optimizations to solve the problems above. They haven't gone well (need to fix a sound desync issue) but there is potential: http://youtu.be/DWRI_7HgZwk

Re: A live streaming platform dedicated to code

#15

Post by bjansn »

My co-founder once put 1.5 hours of coding on YouTube. Quite some enthusiastic responses on YouTube and HN. Recently we got the idea of streaming more code sessions. Didn't execute on it yet. You find his video here: http://youtu.be/cYrbc-g6R-U

Judging from the responses there is a place for a platform that shows long coding sessions as a tool for people to learn. With all the online courses available today, these kind of video's are a nice way to facilitate further learning and practice.

Re: A live streaming platform dedicated to code

#16

Post by swirlycheetah »

thenomad wrote: post #3
swirlycheetah wrote: post #2

Person behind devv.tv here. I built this landing page at the end of the last Ludum Dare compo/when Notch began streaming his Doom build. I'm currently trying to think of ways to attract developers to stream. There seems to be lots of interest in people wanting to watch good quality streams but I feel the challenge lies in providing these good quality streams. I plan on streaming myself building the MVP in the near fu…

Neat! This seems like a really good idea. I'd recommend focusing on a particular niche of developers who all gather in one place, and who have a strong interest in learning more and watching others code. Game developers would spring to mind but I'm sure there are other even better groups for what you intend. Then, if you can persuade one or two of the stars of that community to use your platform, you should get a dec…

Thanks for the encouragement. One of the first places I actually went with my idea was /r/gamedev (https://www.reddit.com/r/gamedev/comments/2ekkeg/im_thinking...) where I got some really useful feedback. The feedback helped me tweak the features I'd listed and understand some of the problems faced which I want to tackle.

Re: A live streaming platform dedicated to code

#17

Post by orta »

I've been streaming a second monitor most weekend for the last month on thing ranging from writing blog posts to building iOS apps. The hard thing has always been trying to separate config files & notifications from user-visible streams.

I think it would be interesting to have the stream be text input aware, so that it can showcase the text currently being selected or edited in a way that highlights it better. That and/or either having window specific zooms. I know up-front what the interesting Apps I'll be working in are.

Also, it's a real hassle to keep open a chrome instance to chat, allowing XMPP or IRC would mean I could have a native app for communicating with the streamers.

Re: A live streaming platform dedicated to code

#18

Post by awalton »

minimaxir wrote: post #12

A couple months ago, someone asked "Why isn't there a twitch.tv for programming?": https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8039299 I believe my answer still holds true. Programming isn't as well-suited for constant live streaming because: a) The viewer can't leave the stream in the background (as you would television) b) A very large amount of dead air where nothing is happening and the streamer needs to fill dead air.…

I concur wholeheartedly. I've watched people code on streams during game jams and even then I was quickly bored to tears. Most coding is even less exciting than coding games.

Some tasks just aren't well suited to streaming, and coding is one of them.

Re: A live streaming platform dedicated to code

#19

Post by chippy »

orta wrote: post #17

I've been streaming a second monitor most weekend for the last month on thing ranging from writing blog posts to building iOS apps. The hard thing has always been trying to separate config files & notifications from user-visible streams. I think it would be interesting to have the stream be text input aware, so that it can showcase the text currently being selected or edited in a way that highlights it better. That a…

Twitch uses IRC for their chat, what platform are you streaming on / using?

Re: A live streaming platform dedicated to code

#20

Post by swirlycheetah »

orta wrote: post #17

I've been streaming a second monitor most weekend for the last month on thing ranging from writing blog posts to building iOS apps. The hard thing has always been trying to separate config files & notifications from user-visible streams. I think it would be interesting to have the stream be text input aware, so that it can showcase the text currently being selected or edited in a way that highlights it better. That a…

I've had this mentioned a few times that video is perhaps not the best medium to share something like a live coding session. I can understand that and I've got some interesting ideas to play with around alternatives at some point.

I think in terms of a devv.tv MVP it'll probably be video embed to begin with though.

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