

Show HN: I gave up on the project I'd been working on, so I open-source'd it - Jarred
https://github.com/Jarred-Sumner/Jantire

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christiangenco
To those that want to play with it:

1\. Download zip: <https://github.com/Jarred-Sumner/Jantire/zipball/master>

2\. cd into the directory and run "bundle"

3\. Sign up for the scribd API: <http://www.scribd.com/developers/signup_api>

4\. Get your API key and API secret: <http://www.scribd.com/account/edit#api>

5\. Add these to "config/initializers/rscribd.rb" along with your login
information on line 5 ('email','password')

6\. rake db:migrate

7\. rails c: c = Course.new(name:"Biology").save; User.new(email:
"example@email.com", password:"password", password_confirmation:"password",
teacher:true, first_name:"John",last_name:"Smith", courses:[c]).save

8\. rails s; open 'localhost:3000'

9\. Login

10\. ???

11\. PROFIT

Screenshots: <http://imgur.com/a/fIxNN#0>

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MatthewB
Dang..you've been working on this for a while. Why did you give up?

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Jarred
I gave up because it wasn't that useful and I can do something simpler that's
faster to create while making money off of it.

It would be much more useful if most textbooks had an API or if teachers
required for everything to be typed. The latter is not something that can be
asked because there isn't anything out there that's good enough for public
high schools to use (some students also don't have computers with a reliable
internet connection).

There were some minor UX issues with it as well, but that's mostly it.

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veyron
Have you looked into solutions with deeper integration? I am thinking of
WebAssign. iirc they work with the textbook publishers to give more integrated
problems (i.e. they would take a textbook problem like "What is the derivative
of cos(3 _x) with respect to x" and would make 3 a magic variable such that
each student would see a different problem such as "What is the derivative of
cos(4_ x) with respect to x" or "What is the derivative of cos(5*x) with
respect to x")

~~~
Jarred
I would create something better than a textbook before working with textbook
publishers. A decent chunk of the reason school is boring is a because of
their work.

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aymeric
Sorry English is not my mother tongue: what is a turn-in box?

~~~
davyjones
Turn-in as in "Please turn in your homework by Monday."

The box being referred to here is the digital version of a physical one.

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shimi
Check out what edmodo (<http://www.edmodo.com>) are doing. Same concept with
almost 4.5 million users.

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Rinum
I hope the project is of use to someone out there. Best of luck on your next
project!

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jontonsoup
No tests?

~~~
Jarred
Nope. Students don't type up their answers to tests and I wanted to keep it as
compatible as I could.

