Show HN: I built a quizlet clone in 2 hours

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32633110

by fishsticks89 • 4 years ago

10 12 4 years ago

news.ycombinator.com

Quizlet, a popular tool among high schoolers and college students used to study for tests recently made it's core functionality paid. In an era where Autodesk, Adobe, and Microsoft hold their proprietary software to their chests, it's exciting to see opensource alternatives come to compete with them. I'm 15, and I'm excited to do my part to keep education free for everyone.

https://openlearn.vercel.app

fishsticks894• 4 years ago

(https://openlearn.vercel.app)

radiojasper2• 4 years ago

As somebody who has no idea what Quizlet is, I have no idea what you expect me to enter in the textare you're showing after clicking Get started. I've entered some text and clicked Learn, only to be presented with an error stating not enough terms. Terms of what?

jaredsohn• 4 years ago

Quizlet is flashcards where you match a term with its definition to help memorize them. Amusingly, a Basic version of this was the first software I ever wrote (back in 1992)

This site would benefit a lot by having some example data prepopulated on the site itself. For now, copy/paste the below text and set the top-left to use commas:

California,Sacramento

Wisconsin,Madison

Georgia,Atlanta

North Dakota,Bismark

South Dakota,Pierre

Massachusetts,Boston

radiojasper2• 4 years ago

Aha! Thanks a lot for that.

fishsticks894• 4 years ago

I completely agree; the biggest issues on my issue tracker regard better labeling the site and making a more explanatory homepage. You create terms split by the character in the top left, and then (ideally), learn teaches them to you.

e.g.

do, act, drive ago, agere, egi, actus

love, like amo, amare, amavi, amatus

dare audeo, audere, ausus sum

hear audio, audire, audivi, auditus

fall, perish cado, cadere, cecidi, casus

sing, sound cano, canere, cecini, cantus

You first get multiple choice questions, then short answer questions. Later, we want it to show you the flashcards first so you don't have to read through a boring list of terms. Critically, it keeps you from learning more than five novel terms in a row, which is proven to help immensely compared to flashcards.

If you want to learn more, google retrieval learning.

yessirwhatever2• 4 years ago

I know you’re 15, but I’ll talk to you like an adult.

I’m no fan of Quizlet, but to call this a “clone” is outrageous. It’s like sticking four wheels on a wooden board and calling it a Corolla clone.

At best you can say that you made a flash cards toy app that can read data from Quizlet.

Also, take a look at Anki.

Intentionally misleading is not marketing, nor is it “hustle”, it almost always smells like a scam even if that’s not your intention.

fishsticks894• 4 years ago

I made a flash cards toy app that can read data from Quizlet. I made a shitty MVP, and I'm watching people use it, and I'm seeing where they stop. With Anki, I stop immediately. No real world user is installing software like that on their device, the homepage just screams virus to someone unfamiliar with opensource. This is where I was after two hours; check back in in two weeks.

yessirwhatever2• 4 years ago

That’s all fine, but you didn’t need to straight up lie. You cannot really justify it. Good luck to you with it, but know that you don’t need to lie. It’s not a clone.

With Anki, I stop immediately. No real world user is installing software like that on their device, the homepage just screams virus to someone unfamiliar with opensource.

That’s a huge generalization. I’m a really world user and I use it heavily. I know many non-technical friends who use it as well. It screams virus for the ignorant. Don’t appeal to the lowest common denominator.

Quizlet’s killer features is that they have text books that are ready to use, and lots of decks that are ready to use. Your app will break if they stop allowing exporting data.

tothrowaway• 4 years ago

On behalf of HN (which I have no authority to speak for) please disregard that bizarre rant by our resident curmudgeon.

If you really did all that in 2 hours, that's quite an accomplishment! But I think it's a little early for a Show HN. It's tough to use without any kind of instructional text. Repost when you've got a more usable interface, and I think you'll get more traction here.

I really like how you don't require people to register. I do the same thing for all my apps, and it's great for getting people hooked. No one likes a sign up form. Just store people's data in a cookie, or localstorage until they make the decision to sign up.

Your Anki comment is spot on. When I downloaded it (a few weeks ago actually), I spent 5 minutes making sure that website was _really_ the Anki I heard about on HN.

asuth was around 15 when he built Quizlet and now it's (somehow) worth a billion. There's plenty of room for a newcomer in the market especially since Quizlet started putting things behind a paywall. Good luck!

IndigoIncognito• 4 years ago

Yea, you're kind of right, Anki isn't very user-friendly and has a massive learning curve for "today's" standard, I wouldn't say people don't install software anymore or that Anki looks like a virus.

Anyway this is really impressive for 2 hours, well done!

If you don't mind me asking, are you taking any exams, is this the reason you made it?

fishsticks894• 4 years ago

https://imgur.com/Ztwkv7k Opensource is not just for developers No non-dev user is going to figure this out

enterdev• 4 years ago

I think it's great that you've developed an app with Svelte and you're using OAuth 2.0 login with Firebase. It's awesome that you actually published something!

Things I don't like: The design, the lack of information on how to use it, it seems to be broken in Firefox - or maybe I just don't know how to use it.

Show HN: I built a quizlet clone in 2 hours

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