Ask HN: If you had the time, what software would you build?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10145285

by Nemant • 11 years ago

23 32 11 years ago

news.ycombinator.com

Just curious to know what most HNers have on their minds.

jchrisa• 11 years ago

I've been thinking about this for a while http://thenewstack.io/why-art-could-become-currency-in-a-cry...

unimpressive2• 11 years ago

A system that would tie software comments to 'blocks' of code. This way you would be able to automatically detect the problem where comments/in-software documentation becomes out of sync with the code it describes and correct it.

danieltillett• 11 years ago

Even better a system that would not let you check in code if the comments were not updated. Something simple like a section in the comment with a common tag, a checksum on the code, a check sum on the comment, and a human readable number that said how many lines the comment applied to. Something like:

//[common tag]-[code checksum]-[comment checksum]-25

This could be updated automatically and be backward compatible with current system. You would just need some sort of hook in git/etc to calculate and update the check sums and issue warning/errors if code checksum changed, but the comment checksum didn’t.

nstart5• 11 years ago

A stylistic detector for writing. Basically software that can answer the question of "was person X entirely responsible for a particular piece of writing". To be applied in forensics, plagiarism detection, and as an intelligent assistant to writers to ensure they maintain a consistent tone in their writings.

unimpressive2• 11 years ago

See I wanted to make the opposite of this, software that would obfuscate your writing style so that forensic analysis like that wouldn't work. It would be able to analyze a corpus and give you suggestions on how to sound more like say Leibniz or Hemmingway.

nstart5• 11 years ago

that's actually a really impressive idea (irony on username intended). Would be interesting to run an idea like that on the entire Harry Potter text and see what it would be like to change the tone to George R R Martin's writing style.

Interestingly enough, you'd have to first build something that can identify style right? So it would at least have to sit on top of a stylistic identifier? Or is there a better way around this?

Side note. I built a prototype of the stylistic identifier as a final year project. Never had time to pursue it afterwards.

viraptor3• 11 years ago

Where do I even start...

- graphical interface for neovim that looks exactly like sublimetext; ssh channel for working with remote neovim in local ui

- full range scanner / automatic database signal matcher for sdr

- browser+server framework for board games that can abstract the display and rules to the point where you can implement things from chess to warhammer

- sane backend for the chef server

- nicer interface / simplification for kvmtool so I could use it like unshare

- python static type analyser

- rc plane autopilot

- python modules security checker like sensiolab security:check for php

- some way of automatically namespacing apps started from home folder - for example any steam games

- everything that hurd needs to be as useable as linux at the moment

- a modern version of bullfrog's syndicate

- localised short-term weather forecast server using community supplied weather data (mini-wunderground-at-home)

nstart5• 11 years ago

browser+server framework for board games that can abstract the display and rules to the point where you can implement things from chess to warhammer

I've been wanting to do something like this for tabletop card games.

* Provide an open standard to define the design and optionally, logic related data for cards. I'll come back to this

* Provide an API for people to manage decks, draws, discards etc.

* Provide another API to manage distribution of cards amongst players via achievements or payments (collecting card decks basically)

The idea behind this would be to allow people to build card games that are either played online or offline (by allowing people to download card decks). Grand scheme of things would include a "github for card games" kind of system. Big dreams, shit execution on my part :D

viraptor3• 11 years ago

Actually I read in the news before that gwent (card game from witcher 3) has been implemented as a mod in tabletop simulator. I wanted to respond to you with the link (http://store.steampowered.com/app/286160) - and I discovered it actually supports any board game!

sangupta5• 11 years ago

"sane backend for the chef server"

Would love to understand more as I at times do think of writing a better chef.

viraptor3• 11 years ago

I believe that chef is really over engineered in many ways. They were thinking big... too big.

For example things like document indexer which is used in 99.99% of cases to search for "some.attribute == 'hardcoded value'". Most of the other cases are prefix searches. This can be done in a normal database. Document storage where what chef really needs is ~5 extracted fields and a json blob that only client deals with. (Again - database is better) Message queue to the indexer which only exists to get broken and be a limiting factor. (extracting even 100 fields from json is not a huge work - just insert them as database rows and prevent the indexing delay) They go after new technologies, where a very conservative stack would be more than enough.

The server API is public, so I started working on a replacement using only python/flask/postgres. I got maybe 80% implemented (ignoring the enterprise namespaces). Then got discouraged because I discovered some API flaws which I thought were just too big - for example the API call to update and create a new node is exactly the same, which can make terrible mess by accident. (seen in real deployment) In the end I just started using salt which I think is a better solution overall.

If you use chef and would like to continue, I'm happy to send you the repo. (email in my profile) If you don't - I can only recommend migrating to something better (salt, ansible, etc. - your choice).

imauld3• 11 years ago

Atom has a very similar UI to Sublime so this might interest you:

http://usevim.com/2014/11/26/neovim-msgpack/

thenomad• 11 years ago

a modern version of bullfrog's syndicate

You may find Satellite Reign interesting: http://satellitereign.com/

hanniabu2• 11 years ago

If I had the time and money I would build a running cat-like robot. I've always loved mechatronics, have a background in mechanical engineering, and just recently started programming so I'm dying to give it a shot. I know it's probably harder than it seems on the surface, but I have hope.

nstart5• 11 years ago

Heh. I always wanted to build a little robot that would sweep the house by itself :D.

hanniabu2• 11 years ago

If you can find a Roomba that someone is getting rid of, that should make it into a doable 3hr project or so by cannibalizing the brains and just modifying the body. But depending on if you enjoy building the brains or the body more then that may be a kill-joy and defeat the purpose.

imauld3• 11 years ago

At least you wouldn't have to waste time trying to give it emotions like a cat since we all know cats are indifferent soulless husks.

sangupta5• 11 years ago

A really nice and powerful command line shell in Java with all the Linux goodies specially for Windows.

why-el• 11 years ago

Why language-specific?

sangupta5• 11 years ago

For Java is portable across platforms and won't need root permissions to run. Just download the JAR and fire.

Also, am a Java developer :)

MacAsm• 11 years ago

It would be really nice. The closest we have, so far I know, is Cygwin (I don't what it's like now, I used it a long time ago)

sangupta5• 11 years ago

Am already working on it: https://github.com/sangupta/andruil - just a start.

bbcbasic• 11 years ago

Cygwin is pretty good. I am not sure how you can do much better it has a big range of command line programs you can run, vim, git etc. The next step beyond cygwin is to install a linux vm, then to dual boot, then to single boot and chuck out Windows :-). Can't bring myself to do that though as a C#-ie.

imauld3• 11 years ago

If I had the time (and let's be honest know how) I would patch Django to be able to do server push notifications out of the box.

anarazel• 11 years ago

A good open mail client with imap offline capabilities (right now mutt-kz (mutt with integrated notmuch) + mbsync).

Other than that a bunch more features for postgres.

ilaksh• 11 years ago

Distributed artificial general intelligence app, probably something like using deep learning with a virtually embodied agent.

A digital circuit IP or maybe separate USB dongle that does path tracing in hardware, maybe based on procedural generation from a built-in Forth.

Various business and government ideas built on Ethereum, promoted with the intention of displacing existing more centralized institutions with decentralized ones.

A backyard exchange website where people can rent out or share their backyards for tiny house 'parking' and/or high-tech gardening like aeroponics or aquaponics, or whatever they want besides being a big waste of space collecting dog crap.

A unification of computer science, programming, and math. Or, a metalanguage and representation tying together classical programming and mathematical notation with interactive and/or visual programming, with the common part reused in all types of informations systems.

A new operating system for virtual reality.

lojack• 11 years ago

A digital controller for my smoker that would control the temperature and smoke output so that I could start cooking before bed and be done by the time I woke up. Ideally it would keep a log of internal meat temperature and internal smoker temp through time. I know you can buy commercial products that do most/all of this, but I think it'd be a fun side project.

An isomorphic CMS built in react. This one I'll probably get to and leave as a proof of concept. I'm personally fine with over-engineering things for my amusement, but wouldn't want to subject clients to my woes. But, who knows — could end up working better than expected.

veddox• 11 years ago

A 'realistic' simulation of an ecosystem. Three years ago researchers managed to simulate an entire bacterium with every known gene and molecule, I'd like to scale that up. (Though one could not keep same level of molecular resolution when dealing with an ecosystem - too resource intensive.) Something to keep in mind for when I write my PhD thesis...

Rmilb• 11 years ago

A reference client for the Bitcoin Protocol written in a functional language or a LISP.

mzjs2• 11 years ago

A natural-language search engine that turns sentences into facts, and can then answer questions.

Ask HN: If you had the time, what software would you build?

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