[HN Gopher] Ask HN: How do you come up with side project ideas i...
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Ask HN: How do you come up with side project ideas in 2024?
Hi everyone. For the longest time I've been wanting to get a few
ideas of my own that I've written down actually built up and
deployed. I wanted something that I could maybe make some beer
money off being useful for people, and something that could use an
actual back-end to improve my back-end skills. I wanted to
consolidate my Rust (or Golang) skills as well. But whenever I
write something down, I get a bit carried away when implementing it
and never really finish much. I also discard a lot of ideas because
they end up being too simple (and too front-end-ish overall). I'm
starting to think the root of the issue could be the ideas
themselves that are too lackluster. So I know this has been asked
before (I've combed over those old threads countless times and
they've been helpful), but I'm curious to hear more thoughts on the
subject.
Author : nidnogg
Score : 45 points
Date : 2024-02-13 19:24 UTC (3 hours ago)
| tacone wrote:
| I am developing a side project these days. This what I've got
| since now: 5-30 seconds deploy time, end to end type safety from
| db to the frontend, 100 lighthouse score, automatic let's encrypt
| certificates for my docker machines, 50kb total webpage payload.
| And of course nothing of real value done. I guess we are all on
| the same boat :)
| moochee wrote:
| I'm curious how to auto-renew lets encrypt certs, do you mind
| sharing the tips? Thanks
| natecham wrote:
| What are you using for end to end type safety? Currently
| enjoying the same on a side project with Postgres -> GraphQL
| (Hasura) -> Golang (genqlient) & Typescript (graphql-codegen)
| colechristensen wrote:
| It seems like you have more of a problem scoping things and
| finishing them.
|
| I would suggest going ahead with one of your ideas (if you can't
| pick, roll dice, pick a note out of a hat, etc) and take it to
| MVP.
|
| Finishing things can just be a habit, anxiety and perfectionism
| are the enemies of getting things done. You also don't know what
| will or will not be successful. Focus less on what you think will
| happen and more on getting things done. Do it once or twice
| before you worry about how good an idea is or how much potential
| it has.
| joshelgar wrote:
| Some starting points:
|
| - Find old datasets (hn.algolia.com "datasets", use huggingface,
| search arxiv)
|
| - Use weird search engines, e.g. exa.ai (searches based on
| embeddings vs. google's pagerank/keywords) + google dorks. weird
| input = weird output
|
| - mix 2 ideas you see - look at showcase channels on discord and
| pages on random frameworks, things people are building at
| Buildspace
|
| - Find old facebook groups with lots of grumpy members posting
| regularly
|
| These are just random strategies I use before I make things I
| post on twitter (https://twitter.com/joshelgar), but they work
| pretty well for coming up with fun projects.
| thih9 wrote:
| Thanks, these sound good. I don't understand the one about
| "finding fb groups with grumpy members" - what then?
| joshelgar wrote:
| Often 40+ yr old people complain about problems that you can
| solve e.g. vet technicians don't like veterinary software -
| you can fix that somehow.
| johncoltrane wrote:
| Like in 2023, 2022, etc. by having a real world need.
| sevagh wrote:
| >But whenever I write something down, I get a bit carried away
| when implementing it and never really finish much. I also discard
| a lot of ideas because they end up being too simple (and too
| front-end-ish overall). I'm starting to think the root of the
| issue could be the ideas themselves that are too lackluster.
|
| Idea is 5%, finishing is 95%. I say take one of your previous
| projects and see what it takes to call one of them finished. Do
| it. It will change your outlook.
| ozten wrote:
| > I also discard a lot of ideas because they end up being too
| simple
|
| No idea is too simple. Apple has been iterating on the iPhone
| timer for like 10 years.
|
| Ship a simple idea that people want and will use. Feedback will
| make it complicated and more work, don't worry.
| elevatedastalt wrote:
| My passion projects, I don't expect them to make money. I do them
| because I want to create something and because I think it's
| useful. For eg. I am working on a website that will be of great
| help to students and teachers of a certain field (keeping it
| vague for anonymity), and I have taken an explicit decision for
| it to be to be free and ad-free forever.
| oooyay wrote:
| Talk to people about what pains them and work backward from
| there. You'll probably find a thing or two where simple things
| can be done that'll have a big impact.
| mlboss wrote:
| What is the goal ? If you planning to monetize it then pick up an
| existing successful app. Strip down the functionality and cater
| to a niche set of users. Develop something very fast. Get on
| twitter and broadcast it, dm potential users.
|
| First ideas usually suck. It is the second, third, fourth ideas
| that will get traction.
|
| Thinking of unique idea is usually a kind of procrastination.
| There are lot of apps that just suck. Copy the idea and make it
| better, faster, cheaper, intuitive. DM potential users.
| sufficer wrote:
| Have a hobby. Then develop or invent a way to program something
| for that hobby.
| carterschonwald wrote:
| I need to do this more. The challenge is figuring out hobbies
| that I find stimulating that are also social. Though I guess
| having a cute dog hits that.
| thih9 wrote:
| Anecdotally, I have been doing that for a number of years and
| hobbies, without any of my launched projects becoming popular.
| I guess you also need to actively promote what you're doing and
| focus on getting/reaching an audience - unlike me right now.
| blueboo wrote:
| It's ok not to finish. Starting, discovering, untangling, solving
| root node problems can be rewarding and worthwhile. Not every
| moment's labor has to feed into a SaaS launch.
|
| Follow problems that bother you and subjects that fascinate you.
| Those criteria are far more important than product viability or
| even becoming fluent in tech-du-jour
| tacone wrote:
| Beside the jokongly answer gave above, a bunch of ideas:
|
| Look for something that sucks (for example, a decent and free
| restaurant QR menu web app) and make a better one.
|
| Look for an extremely difficult thing and implement a minimal
| proof of it.
|
| Look for overpriced services and make a free/cheaper version.
| (for example: how to create a "add to my calendar" event link
| that can be sent in a email)
|
| Another thing: write. Write your stupid again and iterate on it.
| Ask GPT about your it. Ask your friends. Look at it again after
| two weeks. Make project drafting a project per se. Do it again
| and again for different ideas. Steal other people ideas, make
| them better.
| KomoD wrote:
| > Look for something that sucks (for example, a decent and free
| restaurant QR menu web app) and make a better one.
|
| This is a great idea, there's a lot of things that people want
| and that exist but suck.
| samsquire wrote:
| I just hope that within 6 months to 1 year you'll have found and
| built something you really enjoy working on and learn from, even
| if unfinished. Keep going. Positive conviction and optimism. Have
| faith. I hope you don't think negatively about your ideas and
| potential because that won't help.
|
| What do you find extremely satisfying working on in programming?
|
| Do you write all the time? It works for me! I keep journalling my
| ideas in a markdown README.md file publicly on GitHub since 2013.
| While I was writing I felt inspired by an idea and actually felt
| I desired to try write some code to implement this idea.
|
| I encourage you! You can write your thoughts down and do small
| achievable things repeatedly.
|
| I recommend using replit to get an environment quick and ready
| for programming in. When I was a child I wanted to be an inventor
| because I liked the idea of creating things.
|
| My interest is low level things such as JIT compilers, database
| internals and distributed systems.
|
| see my profile for what I've done with this strategy and my
| programming side projects.
| internetter wrote:
| As lame as it is, I don't make side projects until I have a
| reason to make a side project. My steps are as follows
|
| 1. Have problem
|
| 2. Look into preexisting solutions for problem
|
| 3. Analyze each solution to see if it fully solves the problem in
| the way I need
|
| 4. If none do, make side project
|
| Sometimes, I have many side projects. Sometimes, I have none. My
| GitHub activity graph reflects this.
| mrweasel wrote:
| That sound rather healthy, not lame.
|
| I get a lot of ideas for project at work, maybe my hobby
| prototypes get turned into something we run in production,
| maybe it doesn't. It's all good, it's about the process and
| learning for me, not really about making money.
| fuzztester wrote:
| >That sound rather healthy, not lame.
|
| That comment of yours about your parent comment also sounds
| healthy, not lame :)
| jonathankoren wrote:
| Sounds like you're just trying to make money, and preferably
| fast.
|
| Stop. You're doing it wrong. Money is the crassest reason to do
| anything.
|
| Stop the fucking hustle. Make art.
| nidnogg wrote:
| Not really, I phrased it as maybe some beer money precisely
| because it's not the ultimate reason. I'd prefer to have
| something useful/interesting/worthwhile first, with some money
| later if possible.
| 65 wrote:
| I only make things I need for myself.
|
| I have a list that just seems to never end of things I want to
| make for myself. Even simple stuff like a web based notes app
| where I store my own data. Or the RSS reader I made for myself. I
| don't care about making money or getting users at first. I make
| it for myself, and if it's production ready I'll let other people
| use it.
| jamal-kumar wrote:
| It sounds like you're fine with coming up with ideas but having
| issues with sticking to them? Maybe start a company and put a
| monetary stake in these side projects. Even if they aren't
| explicitly profitable side projects, it still puts in some
| imperative.
|
| Also don't be afraid to be the only person using some kind of
| project tracking implementation like a kanban or whatever with
| milestones and self-imposed deadlines.
| dusted wrote:
| Unless your hobby is making money, I don't think you'll make
| money trying to make money.. Except maybe by working an actual
| job.
|
| It seems most side-projects that turn into money-generating
| projects are made by people who got some idea they're passionate
| about, rather than people looking for a way to make money (unless
| their passion is actually the making-money part itself).
|
| For myself, my side-projects revolve around stuff I think is
| neat, probably the only thing that ever had some potential to
| make money (and actually did a little bit until I realized making
| money was not my hobby) was the finalkey.net password manager.
| tlow wrote:
| I think you're asking many questions here:
|
| 1. How do I finish something?
|
| 2. How do I create something other people will find useful?
|
| 3. How do I monetize my hobbies?
|
| 4. What should I make with Rust?
|
| What answers do you think you need? Maybe you already have the
| answers. If you wish to do something, do it.
|
| I would suggest only a framework that is essentially to think in
| prototypes.
|
| 1. Focus on quantity, not quality. Make 10-20 things.
|
| 2. Think simply. Do some small planning at the outset. Don't
| expand scope.
|
| 3. Release early and often. - Set a schedule, follow it. Release
| whatever you have when the time is elapsed.
|
| 4. Define your goals and measure results in some objective form.
|
| 5. After you complete this cycle, find a combination of what you
| enjoyed and what others are using/enjoying and iterate again.
| BigParm wrote:
| If I lived ten lifetimes I would never run out of things to
| build. Each project suggests five new projects along the way.
|
| It's harder if you think about building for the masses. It's easy
| if you think about building for yourself.
|
| But yeah everyone gets creative block sometimes when you're not
| on a roll already.
|
| It's actually crazy the breadth and depth of research that is out
| there. And in computers, it's not like math where it's proven to
| end here with this proof or whatever. People are just writing
| papers about something they made. There's tons of room to get in
| there and do something new.
| fuzztester wrote:
| >If I lived ten lifetimes I would never run out of things to
| build. Each project suggests five new projects along the way.
|
| Heh. Same :)
|
| And with combining existing different app ideas or features
| into new ones (meaningfully), it gets even better. No dearth at
| all. An excess, actually, as you said.
|
| >It's actually crazy the breadth and depth of research that is
| out there.
|
| Totally. Speaks to my point above.
|
| >And in computers, it's not like math where it's proven to end
| here with this proof or whatever.
|
| Ha ha, true. But there are also corollaries, which can
| sometimes become theorems in their own right.
|
| Joint QED, bro :)
| mortylen wrote:
| I have also started several side projects and never finished any
| of them. The problem for me was that when I solved the most
| important problems, I lost interest in it. This year I'm trying
| something new and I hope to overcome this barrier. So I can
| imagine your situation. I wish you to choose a project that you
| will enjoy and find fulfilling and see it through to the end.
| aaronbrethorst wrote:
| The last software side project I built and launched is a simple
| iOS app that you can find here: https://www.zone2.app
|
| I came up with this project the same way that most come to me: I
| solved a problem that I had and then polished it enough that I
| could release it publicly. I also wanted an excuse to learn
| SwiftUI and it felt like a good place to do that.
|
| I haven't made much money off of it, but that's fine because I
| really only built it for myself.
| jbs789 wrote:
| For what it's worth, I find it interesting that the focus is
| "side project".
|
| I just try to solve problems. Lots of problems have already been
| solved satisfactorily if not perfectly. And many more need
| solving but I don't have the skills. So I'm looking for the set
| of problems that need solving that I might be able to help with,
| and focus on that, but it's a really small set.
| breadchris wrote:
| Care less about the idea, and more about the effort. When your
| goal is to work on something that makes you personally happy, it
| is something you return to everyday organically. The effort you
| put in doesn't feel like work. Even if you don't reach your goal,
| what you have learned makes the next objective/project that much
| easier. The more you learn, the faster you can iterate, whatever
| the task may be.
| jnovek wrote:
| ^ This human gets it!
|
| In my experience cool ideas are happy accidents that tend to
| show up as a side effect of doing something else. The more
| stuff I make, the more likely I am to have a good idea.
| lagrange77 wrote:
| That's the spirit!
| breadchris wrote:
| we love happy accidents
| heavyset_go wrote:
| Have problem -> solve problem -> release solution so others with
| the same problem can solve it.
| DarrenDev wrote:
| What industry do you work in? What sort of company and team do
| you work for?
|
| Is there really nothing you can think of from a business or work
| perspective that you need, that could be better, that your
| colleagues or managers need?
|
| Really?
|
| A couple of hours ago I posted a list of 7 tools I wanted in my
| particular area. I'll be posting this to LinkedIn tomorrow where
| I expect some real debate to kick off amongst my followers.
|
| https://darrendevitt.com/7-fhir-tools-businesses-need/
|
| It took me 5 minutes to write this list and every one of them is
| a product that companies I work with would pay money for.
|
| It's not something I think about often - I'm already working on
| another app - but I'm active in my field and I ask questions, so
| seeing what's missing is not difficult.
|
| What's missing in your field? It's that simple.
| pavel_lishin wrote:
| It really sounds like you don't have any problems coming up with
| ideas; it sounds like you have problems either finishing
| implementing your ideas, or discounting them out of hand because
| you think they're too simple or front-endish. Would they solve a
| problem for someone? Then stick with it!
|
| My current "side project" will never make me beer money; it's a
| one-off character sheet page/app I'm developing as a favor to a
| friend. In exchange, he's probably going to write some music for
| me in the future. But I don't really care about that; it's an
| interesting project to work on, there's a clear feedback loop (in
| the form of a Discord channel where I regularly publish an
| updated version and the other players tell me what they like,
| don't like, and need next), and it's actually solving a real-life
| problem.
| postatic wrote:
| You can also buy a side project
|
| https://www.sideprojectors.com
| thewizardofaus wrote:
| I come up with solutions to solve my own problems. You get better
| at finishing things the more you finish things.
| kebsup wrote:
| My biggest side projects come from being almost mad that a
| certain project does not exist.
|
| For example, I've seen a lot of gif memes on the internet, in
| which the text was always very badly jumping around and it was
| very difficult to make them. So I've spent a few hundreds of
| hours making https://gifmemes.io. (actually as my bc. project :D)
|
| Another project I'm working on right now comes from my
| frustrations with language learning apps. I don't care about
| leaderboards/scores/trophies/chatting with ai or whatever. I JUST
| want to learn enough vocabulary to be able to listen to podcasts
| and watch Netflix in German. So Anki might be good, right? But it
| just was so combursome to use, creating the cards or finding good
| decks. So I'm creating https://vokabeln.io, it's like Anki, but
| "AI" enhanced. Sentences, word explanations and audios are
| generated, so adding new words is super easy.
| spdustin wrote:
| Okay, gifmemes.io is brilliant. Great work!
|
| Edit: bought the iOS app instantly. My daughter's gonna cringe
| audibly, heh.
| kebsup wrote:
| I feel slightly bad when people buy the app. The web app is
| so much better. I made the app with my brother to teach him
| programming and capitalism. :D
| mft_ wrote:
| Interesting; I experienced similar frustrations with various
| German-teaching apps, but I actually want something even lower
| friction: I'd like someone else to have selected (e.g.) the 200
| most important nouns, the 75 most important verbs, and the 100
| most important 'conversational glue' words - and sell me that
| set, ready to go in a flashcard app.
| kebsup wrote:
| In Vokabeln, the default word list is by the words'
| frequencies from some corpus and also includes the A1 level
| from Geothe institute. What I've found funny is that some of
| the A1 words were not present in the 40 000 word corpus,
| those were mostly classroom specific.
| poisonborz wrote:
| I think the only singular driver of such project is YOUR needs.
| There are gazillions of seemingly obvious tools that should exist
| but either no one developed it yet, or the ones existing are
| decades old and outdated. Nothing else will drive you than your
| own carving for that Thing to be created. Everything else -
| internet cheers, karma stars, donations - will be just a side
| effect that keeps you maintaining it. I wouldn't think about if
| it's "too simple" or what tech you end up using.
| darkest_ruby wrote:
| One day I woke up and decided that my side project isn't going to
| be a software product, but rather a book on writing software. So
| I have been writing it for the last year
| andher wrote:
| I've been doing side projects for a bit, and they've been a
| combination of things I think are just cool and relate to hobbies
| I like, or solve some kind of problem I'm having, or are cool
| things I've seen other people talk about (either twitter or in
| person meets or something)
|
| The one I've been working on for a while is solving PITA leetcode
| style interview prep. I just don't do well in prepping without
| some kind of mock environment. To reference from a previous
| comment I made:
|
| " I'm building https://comp.lol. It's AI powered mock coding
| interviews, FAANG style. Looking for alpha testers when I
| release, sign up if you wanna try it out or just wanna try some
| mock coding. If its slow to load, sorry, everything runs on free
| tiers right now. I really dislike doing leetcode prep, and I
| can't intuitively understand the solutions by just reading them.
| I've found the best way for me to learn is to seriously try the
| problem (timed, interview like conditions), and be able to
| 'discuss' with the interviewer without just jumping to reading
| the solution. Been using and building this as an experiment to
| try prepping in a manner I like.
|
| It's not a replacement for real mock interviews - I think those
| are still the best, but they're expensive and time consuming. I'm
| hoping to get 80% of the benefit in an easier package.
|
| I just put a waitlist in case anyone wants to try it out and give
| me feedback when I get it out
|
| Gonna apologize in advance about the copywriting. Was more
| messing around for my own amusement, will probably change later"
| waprin wrote:
| My biggest piece of advice is work backwards from where you plan
| to share it. If you want people to care about what you make, it
| needs to be built for a certain type of person, and you need a
| way to reach that type of person. Ideally you can repeatedly
| reach that audience.
|
| Otherwise, you're going to do all this work, and then you're
| going to think of where to share it, and at that point you'll
| probably wish you had thought of this key step in advance.
|
| Stuff built for "everyone" will rarely work because "everyone" is
| too broad an audience and too hard to reach.
|
| Similarly, while Hacker News is a good place to post a project,
| it's very easy to get lost in the sea of /new and get zero
| attention, which could set yourself up for disappointment if
| that's your only distribution channel. It's better to have a
| smaller channel you have a higher probabilty of reaching -> think
| a small Discord, a small subreddit that's easy to get on the
| front page of, a small Facebook group, a small old-school forum.
| If you're part of any community on X/Mastodon that can work but I
| wouldn't stress about it if you're not, as there's many
| alternatives.
|
| Hopefully, these are all communities that you want to be a part
| of and are active in. A lot of self-promotion can be forgiven in
| communities if you're otherwise an active member who contributes
| in many non-promotional ways.
|
| The repeatability is important because that lets you iterate.
| Even if you front-page Hacker News, that's great, but you'll get
| a ton of traffic for a few hours but then you go an improve
| things and want another pass of attention, you can't really
| front-page again soon.
|
| Of course, the most important thing is to stay motivated and keep
| pushing. I personally get motivated by other people caring about
| my project, paying for my project, etc and you sound similar
| based on your question, so that's why I'm giving you tips on
| accomplishing that. But many other people get motivated just
| because it's a really interesting challenge or it solves a huge
| problem in their life. Know thyself and what motivates you and
| pick a project you won't quit.
|
| I will also note that you seem to want two contradicting things.
| You want to improve your Rust and you want to make money. For a
| given project, I'd focus on one goal or the other. And if you
| want to make money, frontend development is often important, HN
| condescending attitudes towards frontend notwithstanding.
| However, if your goal is just beer money just a popular repo
| might get that with Github sponsors.
|
| Finally, you said you discard ideas because they're too simple.
| That is the most backwards logic you stated. You should be
| discarding ideas that are too complicated. Simple is great.
| Simple is the dream. Simple is unfortunately almost never easy.
| But one illuminating exercise is go back to popular Github repos
| and go to their very first commit and you'll see very often they
| started absurdly simple. As an example, DHH wrote the Rails
| frameworks in a couple weeks and a thousand lines of code and
| that became the dominant web framework for a decade. If your
| project gets popular , the complexity will inevitably arrive,
| there's no need to start looking for it from the start.
| _boffin_ wrote:
| - What are the things that frustrate you
|
| - What are the things that make you go, "hmm, that's interesting"
|
| - What are the things that you wish that were, but aren't
|
| - What do you want to learn about
| alain34 wrote:
| For me, it is often out of necessity for my day job or personal
| needs. I needed a cheap way to validate bank accounts through
| modulus check. I created BankAccountChecker
| https://www.bankaccountchecker.com I was looking for a way to
| share photos with my elderly parents that live abroad. I create
| Memories https://m.emori.es At the moment, i am looking at a way
| to aggregate bank statements to do tax return. I am creating
| https://www.bankaccountstatements.com
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