

Ask HN: Review my holiday project - kd5bjo

I realized yesterday that I wanted this for myself, so I decided to spend a little bit of extra effort to make it usable by anybody:<p>http://resolution-tracker.appspot.com/
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jacquesm
Nice one. And nice of you not to call it a 'start-up'.

It's really nice to see useful little projects like this take shape so
quickly, do you have a way to track the user if they should wipe their machine
/ switch browser ?

~~~
kd5bjo
There's no session info at all; the id in the url is a reference to a backend
data store object. That's why I have the bookmarking call-to-action the first
time you see the calendar page.

As it's built on appengine, it wouldn't be too hard to tie everything to a
google account. I actually wrote about half of that, but it got dropped
because I decided I preferred a more polished, less featureful project.

~~~
jacquesm
Elegant. Seriously that's one of the best executed small projects in a long
long time. It's like a little jewel or a good pocket magic trick.

I hope it will take off, it's a really nice example of how it's done. I'll try
to live up to your standards the next time I release something.

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webdance
I have to thank you so very, very much for this application. It is changing my
life, no joke. I'm an adult with ADD and perfectionism. Everything I've ever
succeeded at has been a last-minute adrenaline-filled fire drill. My hopes for
this year are things that can be accomplished only through slow-and-steady
actions, repeated daily.

Your tracker is the first thing that has ever worked for me. Even after just 8
days, I can tell that this is different from every other new years. I can do
bits and pieces of my daily goal whenever I find time, and your app keeps
count. I can keep my goal in mind without having to remember the numbers or
play head games. There is nothing complicated, no 'options' to vacillate over,
no pretty pictures or quotes to distract me and no features to figure out. The
calendar--like Seinfeld's 'Don't break the chain' is a tremendous visual
motivator.

I'd be happy to pay ala shareware.

------
kd5bjo
Clickable link: <http://resolution-tracker.appspot.com/>

~~~
zackattack
Why on earth aren't the links in the first post clickable? Bad bug

~~~
alanthonyc
Not a bug. From the FAQ:

 _"You can't. (This is to prevent people from using this method as a way of
submitting a link, but with their comments in a privileged position at the top
of the page. If you want to submit a link with comments, just submit it, then
add a regular comment.)"_

~~~
zackattack
That's dumb. So many "tell HN" threads or "Ask HN" threads require you to post
a link. And people already abuse the first post privilege in some cases
anyway.

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arthurk
Entering something other than a number in the "times" field results in the
following error:

Traceback (most recent call last): File
"/base/python_lib/versions/1/google/appengine/ext/webapp/__init__.py", line
509, in __call__ handler.post( _groups) File "/base/data/home/apps/resolution-
tracker/1.338888254051474539/resolution.py", line 69, in post r.threshold =
int(self.request.get('threshold', 1)) ValueError: invalid literal for int()
with base 10: '_ '

~~~
kd5bjo
This should be a bit better now; it kicks you back to the original page with a
generic error message.

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jacquesm
If you allow people to tie in an email address when they're overdue with their
goals than you've got a really nice hook to slip in some commerce at a much
later date.

~~~
jeromec
I was going to say the exact same thing. I don't trust myself to remember to
check in; I'd rather be prodded by default. What I'd like to see in an upgrade
would be the ability to add goals to any date, and have the option to have
email reminders go out before and/or with overdue goals. I might even pay a
dollar per month for that "advanced" feature, and I'd be sure to use the
service because I hate wasting money.

------
jeromec
Super simple, yet functional to the purpose. Nice.

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Shamiq
So, the object in the URL is b64 encoded. It says "resolution-tracker"
followed by something, then Resolution followed by something.

Also, make error messages pretty, please:

<http://resolution-tracker.appspot.com/view?id=d>

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MicahWedemeyer
Nice little app. Kudos on launching it.

As you're seeing, as soon as you make it usable by anybody, people start
complaining about form validation and usability issues. You should decide now
how much effort you want to put in.

~~~
kd5bjo
I built it for me, and it's sufficient for what I need. As I have other
projects demanding my time, I'm planning on only fixing bugs, and not adding
any new features.

For the most part, this was an exercise in taking a project to completion,
which I've always had trouble doing. I think that I succeeded in that, and I'm
not particularly interested in turning it into yet another ongoing, never-
finished project.

~~~
MicahWedemeyer
Good thoughts. Too many pies, not enough fingers is what gets a lot of us in
trouble.

Consider open sourcing it on github, and if anyone asks for anything just
reply with "patches welcome" You'll probably never get anything from it, but
who knows?

------
sjf
Oops:

> You need to check in -2 more times this week to meet your goal.

~~~
kd5bjo
Fixed.

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dejv
pop-up message with bookmark info is little bit confusing, it took me a while
to find close button.

~~~
kd5bjo
I've changed it so that any click on the message will make it go away.

~~~
arthurk
Could you also make the message box close when pressing ESC?

~~~
kd5bjo
That should be fixed now.

~~~
pbhjpbhj
The site appears to work without js enabled, except for dismissal of that
popup. Perhaps you could default the popup as display:none and bring it up
with js? Certainly I was able to set a goal and check in without js (well
done!) except that I had to _inspect element_ and delete the popup to do so.

~~~
kd5bjo
The popup only appears the first time any given detail page is loaded, even if
javascript is disabled. Reloading the page should clear it. The close button
on the dialog now does this if there is no javascript.

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rick_2047
I would like to have you sync the time with users local time. I am in india,
and my day does not change when its supposed to.

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bluesmoon
It's nice, but using tables for layout is so 1990s. How about making it nicer
by moving to CSS for layout. If you need help, just ask here on HN.

Good luck.

~~~
jfarmer
When evaluating product/business decisions I use what I call the live-or-die
criteria. Will my company (or product, in this case) live or die by this
decision?

If not, move on to something more important.

HTML tables vs. CSS is one of those decisions that really doesn't matter. No
product has ever failed because they used HTML tables, so why worry about it?
Use whichever helps you get the job done faster.

~~~
jeromec
I agree. Ideally, pure CSS is certainly the way to go, but it's not yet
supported well enough to be used exclusively IMHO in every situation. I get a
kick out seeing "savvy" people demand "table-less" web development, but with
no mention of cross-compatibility or w3c validity.

