

Ask HN: Would a game to teach Bash & *nix be worth-while? - timruffles

I got struck by the idea to build a game to teach Bash &#38; *nix.<p>It'd be modelled on classic kung-fu movies where you'd learn with a master (Master Foo, clearly), to battle the evil Master Blub. Badges, leader-boards and all other buzzwords would be present. Have a look - http://banzaibash.com<p>Does it sound like something you or anyone else would find useful? If I could get around 250 preorders that'd be enough to take the time off to build it.
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rudin
Loving the concept but maybe you should be charitable and make it free as it
is really just a tutorial + triggers.

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timruffles
I'd love to but I'm not really at a point in my life where I can do a whole
project full time for fun :) Since it'd be cloud based (as you'd be doing
things which would be dangerous to do on your home system, under time
pressure) it'd have running costs, and I expect the security aspect to be
tricky.

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souperhearo
What about using something like kickstarter to raise money?

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timruffles
I wish I could, but Kickstarter is US only. The alternative, invested.in
doesn't look that strong.

I think you're right that it's a model that would work well - if I could raise
the money to code it I'd happily make it open source after that (running costs
means it'd have to cost something to use on someone's server).

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noctrine
What about IndieGoGo?

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schelle
I'm not sure exactly what you are looking for, but IndieGoGo has had a lot of
successful non-US projects. Community is building every day, and the payment
options (e.g. PayPal & direct credit card) are not US only. Check it out.

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thirdstation
Have you considered selling this as an assessment tool? You'd probably have to
drop the Kung-fu theme but that doesn't mean it would have to be boring
either.

I think a scored and timed test would be really useful to HR departments at
large corporations who need to screen technical applicants.

One hitch is that with most thing *nix, TMTOWTDI. Do you check for the result
or do you check the command typed? Just as an example, your screenshots show
the pushd/popd lesson. If prompted to change to my home directory in under two
seconds I'd just type 'cd'. To get back to where I used to be I'd type 'cd -'.
I never use pushd/popd. If the lesson is presented as 'use pushd and popd to
navigate the filesystem' then there's no issue.

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timruffles
It's a good point - I am planning to be result oriented, for anything complex
it'd be impossible to think of all the ways you could sensibly achieve it.

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aw3c2
I might be inclined to buy it if it was a "pay as you go" model where much
smaller amounts of money can unlock the next set of levels.

Maybe a model like Project Euler (with paid-stages) would work better? I'd
much prefer it to be free of course.

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timruffles
That's a cool idea, especially as lots of people wouldn't need the basics,
just the advanced stuff.

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scrrr
Nice, but I think game-features make sense where the actual learning perhaps
is non-existant or not rewarding enough. When learning how to use a shell you
have successes along the way anyway and you don't need any score or badge to
feel happy.

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timruffles
I agree, but command-line skills were something I didn't consider learning
explicitly - not really knowing how useful it'd be. I know a lot of developers
with just a sketchy understanding of a tiny part of them!

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sga
I'm very intrigued. This is definitely one of the skills I'd like to improve
upon. But I'd like to play with a demo episode first before forking over the
preorder cash.

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gwilliams
How about a game to teach regex? That would be awesome. "Write a regex that
will match xxx and yyy but not zzz", for example.

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timruffles
Interesting - regex could be an expansion pack :)

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vgurgov
interesting idea itself, depends on execution.

i'd suggest to highlight that its productivity game for Mac OS console as
well.

i believe Mac users will more likely pay for that.

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timruffles
Thanks, that's good advice, Mac users (I use Mac) are definitely happier to
pay for productivity stuff - OmniFocus etc. I'll add that :)

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orta
your paypal redirects to yoursite.co.uk instead of a thank you page! I hope
you get around to doing this, cause it looks like an interesting project.

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timruffles
Done, thanks.

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meastham
You've got a typo in the last screenshot, "direcotry"

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timruffles
Good spot, you're in the git log now :)

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wyclif
Yes.

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timruffles
Thanks very much for your support wyclif, any suggestions?

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ody
Have you checked out Hacker Evolution? Might be a good source of ideas. It
also strikes me that £20 may be a tad much to ask for an interactive fiction
text game.

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NickPollard
But £20 might be well worth it for the skills and productivity gained.

Products are worth what value they provide, not what they cost to make.

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ody
Good idea however your site has no news, contact info etc .. nothing apart
from an overview of the product and links to paypal .. add some info about
yourself at least and I'll cough up £11.99.

Good luck!

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timruffles
About me page now up (isn't it awkward writing about yourself :D). I'll pop
more stuff in as it happens!

