
Ask HN: Things you created in 2015? - thecosas
What did you create this year that you are most proud of? Can be writing, software, hardware, product, project, anything. Go for it :-)
======
santaclause
[http://www.xmastimeapp.com](http://www.xmastimeapp.com) An app that lets
parents call their children posing as Santa Claus.

I posted it on Show HN the other day[0] but didn't get any comments yet. I am
not complaining though, considering the scope of this. I would be very happy
if someone would give us their thoughts though.

[0]
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10783251](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10783251)

~~~
drakenot
Did you produce this video yourself or was it done by an outside firm? It
looks really professional!

What is your backend/technology stack like for supporting the video chat?

~~~
santaclause
The video was produced by a an outside firm, yes. A professional video
production company.

Regarding the technology stack, I'll start by saying that it is not
SIP/RTP/ICE which may surprise some people. We had prior experience of that
(previous consulting for a major telco), but choose to not go that route.
Those protocols are seriously overcomplicated (design by committee...) and the
only benefit it would give us is interoperability - which is often important,
but not for this project.

So call control, media stream and NAT punch-through protocols are entirely
custom. Might sound crazy, but if I tell you the server is less than 3k lines
of code, and was written in two weeks, maybe not so much?

The call control server is done in Erlang - turned out well so far as we've
live-upgraded the servers several times without interrupting any calls. We use
iOS apns VOIP notifications for notifying the other peer of the incoming call.

The UDP media stream is peer to peer and carries H.264 for video and AAC-ELD
for audio. Since the app is iOS only we could take advantage of the built in
hardware video decoder and audio libraries for that. Not to mention the patent
licenses for those technologies that come bundled with iOS. We had to develop
a jitter-buffer and audio-video syncing solution on top of that of course -
that's the most complicated part of the client side.

Edit: I should add that we do not support Symmetric/Carrier grade NAT
traversal in this first version. Since it's not possible to establish a direct
peer-to-peer connection under such conditions we'll need to add server side
support for forwarding the media. That's going to be a major challenge for
next year.

------
highsea
WhenToExchange - Know the right time to exchange your money.

[http://whentoexchange.com](http://whentoexchange.com)

I’ve been working on this for the past serveral months, an idea I came up with
as I was trying to figure out my vacation schedule for the next year and plan
a budget for the various countries I thought of visiting. It’s a website that
calculates the best time to exchange one currency for another accounting for
the various exchange rates involved.

LogCroc - Because Crocs like Logs

Analyzes server logs for events, exceptions and displays a realtime dashboard.

[http://logcroc.com/?eat=demo](http://logcroc.com/?eat=demo)
[https://github.com/mpolyak/logcroc](https://github.com/mpolyak/logcroc)

------
yungGeez
I decided to create a twitter app that allows people to post 140 character
rap, and challenge other people. I wasn't able to test because of a lack of
users / ability to promote due to low funds.

[http://tweetabar.xyz](http://tweetabar.xyz)

The site pretty much explains how it works, and was supposed to be used as a
"Coming Soon/I need Testers" medium, but failed completely haha.

I suck at front-end btw.

------
arunpn123
I built a voice-activated switch to toggle the lights in my bedroom:
[http://arunpn.com/projects/voice-activated-light-
switch/](http://arunpn.com/projects/voice-activated-light-switch/). More than
the project itself, I am happy that I got into the habit of working on side-
projects regularly. Now I have a couple of projects going on to keep me
entertained.

------
bewe42
I decided to dedicate my free /side-project time to my own biggest itch: how
can we improve the way we learn and remember? In particular, I think the way
we teach & learn software development could be greatly improved.

As a first step, I created
[http://www.codingbrain.com](http://www.codingbrain.com). It's a knowledge
management app that integrates with your markdown notes.

I too posted on HN without much feedback
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10464525](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10464525)

However, I think codingbrain tries to do too many things at once and I have
plenty of sub-ideas which I plan to implement in 2016

~~~
sail
You put a lot of effort into this. What makes you believe it's important to
consciously remember things we learn? Maybe the knowledge is supposed to seep
into our bones.

Maybe it's enough to record, find something when we need it, but not
necessarily remember it. What proof do you have that remembering everything
doesn't come at a cost?

~~~
bewe42
I meant "find something when we need it" and remember it to be the same. I'm
not trying to create a photographic memory. Short term memory is limited, and
it requires repetition for something to sink into long-term memory.

How often have you looked something up (e.g. "how do I cherry pick in git?")
only to forget it and then 2 months later to look up the same information
again? For this we take notes.

I'm working on reducing the need to re-do the same process again and again, to
making learning and remembering more efficient.

------
krapp
I built Space Invaders in C++ and SDL. It's the closest thing to a game i've
actually completed so far.

The actual implementation isn't that great, it's lacking a few things but most
of the gameplay is there, but my goal was mostly learning the peripheral stuff
and throwing every tutorial I came across at it.

I posted a Show HN for it two weeks ago[0] but it was never commented on. I'm
not complaining about that since, given the scope of some Show HN projects,
it's not likely to be impressive and I wouldn't have expected much positive
feedback, but i'm still proud of it.

[0][https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10708248](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10708248)

------
joegreen
I've always wanted to create at least a small working Java library that could
be potentially useful to someone and put it into the Maven Central repository
to learn the whole process. I've finally managed to do it in 2015 by creating
the LambdaFromString[0] library that can convert a string with code to Java 8
lambda at runtime :-) Surely not a rocket science, but still makes me feel a
little bit proud.

[0]:
[https://github.com/greenjoe/lambdaFromString](https://github.com/greenjoe/lambdaFromString)

------
coderKen
2015 - The year I went really deep with JavaScript

A minimal drawing application, my first foray into html5 canvas -
[http://andela-unkwocha.github.io/canvas-project/](http://andela-
unkwocha.github.io/canvas-project/)

AngularJS todo list - [http://andela-unkwocha.github.io/Calender-
TodoList/#/](http://andela-unkwocha.github.io/Calender-TodoList/#/)

Calender reminder all in AngularJS - [http://andela-
unkwocha.github.io/calendar-app/#/](http://andela-unkwocha.github.io/calendar-
app/#/)

Friendship calculator - [http://andela-unkwocha.github.io/friendship-
rating/](http://andela-unkwocha.github.io/friendship-rating/) made with
ReactJS and coffescript - was fun

I also tried gaming with Pure JavaScript - [http://andela-
unkwocha.github.io/frogger-game/](http://andela-unkwocha.github.io/frogger-
game/)

Created my portfolio website - [http://udo.com.ng](http://udo.com.ng)

Learnt a lot this year and fell in Love with JavaScript, it was an awesome
year!

------
jrwan
Merry Christmas Everyone!

I created HitByWords this year, an iOS app which helps people explore news
with Google Trends.

This is totally a passion project since I got a day job and only can spend my
spare time building it. Due to serious time and budget constrains, I am only
able to develop this app piece by piece. Though I am very enjoy the process :)

The motivation to build this app is I read news everyday but sometimes I
cannot relate some reports. But I feel if a report is published by a credible
news source, the event or accident is supposed to be crucial for some people
in the world and I should feel sympathy. Like today an astronaut phones wrong
number from space and I found people in London, Birmingham and Manchester have
high interest in "Tim Peake" through Google Trends, which makes me feel this
is a real thing.

I still have a lot of ideas to implement and try to make this app a better
tool to explore news.

Hope my explanation is clear enough since English is not my first language.

Questions, comments, and suggestions are welcomed.

[0] [http://www.hitbywords.com/](http://www.hitbywords.com/) [1]
[https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/hitbywords-browse-
explore/id...](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/hitbywords-browse-
explore/id955325252?mt=8)

------
andersthue
No doubt that I am most proud of (cannot say I invented it, more correct would
be that I stumbled upon) the agile and Maker centric TimeBlock method
[http://timeblock.com](http://timeblock.com)

We started using the method Jan 5'th 2015 and now we have a SaaS app with
paying earli bird users and more users of the method not using the app.

Two of the companies using the method (besides us), attribute their growth
directly to TimeBlock.

~~~
hanniabu
Increase the font size for mobile (s4) of the "sleep better..." text block at
the top...it's about a third the size of the other text

~~~
andersthue
Thanks, looking into it!

------
sideproject
This year, I took my side project HelloBox a bit more seriously

[https://www.hellobox.co](https://www.hellobox.co)

It's a tool for creating a community. Its premise was "Create your own
HackerNews".

I've re-designed a bunch of things, re-branded it, and am now planning to turn
it into a business next year. We'll see. :)

~~~
tschlossmacher
That's awesome! I think that's great taking a side project into something
more. Are you using meteor.js? I'd adjust your above the fold look -just my 2
cents

------
DanBC
I was part of a group of people that created the new suicide prevention
strategy for Gloucestershire, England.

[http://www.gloucestershire.gov.uk/CHttpHandler.ashx?id=64216...](http://www.gloucestershire.gov.uk/CHttpHandler.ashx?id=64216&p=0)

------
imakesnowflakes
I taught myself Haskell and built a tool that searches and download movie
subtitles. [1]

Taught myself angular.js and built Ceasium [2]. A tool for freelance
programmers that can do minimal project/time management. It also has notifiers
for watching HN and Reddit threads. If you run a bundled python script, it can
even monitor multiple Reddit inboxes.

It actually helped me find work.

[1]
[https://hackage.haskell.org/package/hastily](https://hackage.haskell.org/package/hastily)

[2] [http://z-petal.com/ng-ceasium/ceasium-html5-angularjs-app-
fo...](http://z-petal.com/ng-ceasium/ceasium-html5-angularjs-app-for-
freelancers.html)

------
andwaal
[http://frikjoring.no](http://frikjoring.no) an website to show trips to go
ski touring in Norway. My hope is that this page can become "the" page to
visit when planing a trip.

All content is provided by the users, so not a loot of content yet, but
hopefully it will catch on, got a long way to go here.

My first site actually launched, so kinda proud of getting it out there. So
much more work than expected when starting up.

Entire site is created on a JS stack with React on the client and node on the
backend.

------
Klathmon
Actually "finished" a project for once.

I made [https://stitchpics.net](https://stitchpics.net) which is a website
that converts an image into a cross-stitch pattern entirely client side (with
some help from my mother-in-law for the idea)

Made it to try out Polymer and at this point I'd say that I'm not all that
happy with Polymer's performance, but it is nice to work with components on
the web.

The code is available at
[https://github.com/Klathmon/StitchPics](https://github.com/Klathmon/StitchPics)

------
henryscala
I created a opensource software with the name suosuoban. It is an illustrating
tool, with ideas coming from this paper [http://www-
ui.is.s.u-tokyo.ac.jp/~takeo/papers/watanabe_uist...](http://www-
ui.is.s.u-tokyo.ac.jp/~takeo/papers/watanabe_uist2007_bubble.pdf). It is in
[https://github.com/henryscala/suosuoban](https://github.com/henryscala/suosuoban).
It is implemented in QT, so it can be run in multiple OS.

------
devarist
[https://devarist.com](https://devarist.com), an app for keeping a daily work
diary. Another "scratched my own itch" app built specifically to do what I
needed but it's been building a user base quite nicely over the last few
months. I recently added Slack integration so that you can work with your
diary from within Slack.

------
jathu
I made Annex, my first iOS app.
[http://jathu.me/annex/](http://jathu.me/annex/)

It made it on to the front page of Product Hunt and reached top 100 in
productivity, so I'm pretty happy!

One thing I learned is that after the media hype dies down, visits/downloads
drop A LOT! I knew this from articles I've read before, but seeing it happen
is something else (and sucks).

------
Wonnk13
I created my first Android app as a side project. I have a ton to learn both
in terms of Java and the Android framework.

[https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.github.idc...](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.github.idclark.forgetmenot&hl=en)

------
rrrrrraul
I built [http://highbetastocks.com](http://highbetastocks.com) as a way to
scratch my own itch (was too lazy to have to login to my brokerage account
every time I wanted this info). And in the process learned a little bit of
Meteor js ^_^

------
pesfandiar
I created and launched a phone auto-responder app* as a side project (a basic
version of Grasshopper). Now actually trying to find paying customers seems
outside my comfort zone, but there is a lot to learn.

[*] [https://www.phonjour.com](https://www.phonjour.com)

------
mswen
[http://computationalimagination.com/interviews.php](http://computationalimagination.com/interviews.php)

A place for me to express myself through writing out of my own experiences as
well as interviewing really smart and interesting people like:

John Cook

Tim Hopper

Jon Krohn

Rob Trangucci

Łukasz Kidziński & Michał Warchoł

Thanks guys for sharing your insights!

------
drakonka
I created a snail brain for my snail simulation. There's still a lot of work
to do, but my snails have sensors, memories, and make decisions now. I was
pretty proud of getting the brain to the state where the snails could decide
to eat, mate, etc. on their own.

------
sccxy
Collected 40+ realtime weatherstations to one map.

Just for personal usage and for some friends.

Good to see where the wind is for surfing/sailing.

[http://siim.planet.ee/meri/](http://siim.planet.ee/meri/)

------
archagon
It's not released yet (app review couldn't get back to me in time for the
holiday freeze... grr), but I made an iPad music creation app called
Composer's Sketchpad. My goal was to develop a modern, interactive take on
sheet music that didn't require a ton of mental energy to reason about, and
that could also be used to notate things like guitar solos and complex rhythms
just as easily as any Bach choral. The app takes the form of a long scroll
view with time on the x-axis and pitch on the y-axis; a grid indicates
measures, measure subdivisions (time signature), and the notes of the equal
temperament scale. You draw notes with your finger or the Apple Pencil, and
you can start each note at any point and bend it to any pitch, with time and
pitch grid snapping tools available as an option. Playback is instantaneous
and defined by your current scroll position. There's a bunch of instruments as
well as a percussion set to choose from. Performance was a high priority, and
it runs acceptably well on my iPad 3.

Here's a brief demo clip. (Feel free to ignore the BG music; it's not directly
related to the actions demonstrated in the video. I still have some editing to
do.)
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cS4-Qho6Log](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cS4-Qho6Log)

I'm very proud of what I accomplished with this app, but I'm also ashamed of
how long it took me. The app was first conceived several years ago, and the
first serious commits were made early last year. Throughout 2014 and 2015, I
spent far too much time slacking off and avoiding work (though admittedly I
was travelling for a large part of it); my savings cushion prevented me from
seriously worrying about deadlines. As a result, about half the work for this
project was done in the last few months. I could have finished this project in
half a year at most, and it kills me to think of all that time wasted. (I
didn't have any other work during this time, though I did release a couple of
small side projects.)

I'm also worried about whether anyone will actually find this app useful. I
built it mostly for myself, and in using it, I've been finding that I can
suddenly write music a lot more easily than ever before. On the other hand,
it's missing most of the power features musicians expect from their music
software. There's no Audiobus support; no MIDI in or out (largely due to the
hacks required to get per-note pitch bending working); not even export at the
moment, though I intend to add MP3 export ASAP. The samples are pretty generic
MIDI sounds. It's intended to be a musical notepad, not a tool to create
production-grade music, and I fear that might be too small of a niche.

In any case, even if it doesn't make me a ton of money, I'm elated that I
created something that didn't exist in the world before. This is the first
tool in my life that's precisely tailored to my needs. It's going to grow with
me as I get new ideas. It's going to be used to write music that I could never
write before. Already I have a feature list several dozen items long for the
next few versions! Through this project, I've also — finally — proven to
myself that I could design and build a fairly complicated app almost from
scratch. I look forward to what I can do with this new-found confidence in the
coming year!

