6 ms·
Ask HN: Review my site - readit.me
- kungfooey 17y agoI started out with Java, but I've worked in PHP for a few years now. I dabbled with Django, but this is my first attempt to build anything useful in Rails. It uses the Amazon API to gather book data, and obviously authlogic + facebooker for Facebook Connect.
- azeemazhar2 17y agoHey that is really nice. Will it show me recommendations in some way?
- kungfooey 17y agoThanks! Nope, no recommendations yet. I'd either have to build in recommendations or (preferably) somehow yank that data from Amazon. Might be something I try to do next, since I've had a couple of users ask me about it.
- hajrice 17y agoFirst of all, when I arrive, I have no idea What the app is for, how it helps me, etc. I suggest you add a paragraph or two explaining what it does and how to get started. But overall it's a pretty cool site. Good luck!
- kungfooey 17y agoI guess that's what the "about" link in the top right-hand corner is there for. I suppose it needs to be more obvious? Edit: probably need some sort of boilerplate on the front page to explain it succinctly. Thanks for the pointer.
- idoh 17y agoFor reference, stackoverflow.com and reddit.com give a banner on the top of the screen that is sort of a faq for first time visitors. It seems like a reasonable thing to add to this site - tell people who've never been to your site about it, while not mucking things up for repeat visitors.
- diN0bot 17y agoyeah....a landing page of sorts. also, i'd lvoe there to be different lists. not just recently, more recommendations within a genre. i'm constantly looking for science fiction rec's (and even then, i only like certain kinds of scifi...the not fantasy kind; magic realism is ok, though, bc often well written and brief...)
- RyanMcGreal 17y agoWhen someone visits the site and isn't logged in, they should get a different front page - specifically, with a prominent, brief explanation of what they can do with the site.
- CWuestefeld 17y agoIs this just a way for me to log what books I've read? I'm not really getting the point, I'm sorry to say.
- kungfooey 17y agoYou got it. Just a minimalist reading diary - there are other sites that handle reading + networking (goodreads, readernaut, etc) but I find them all too cluttered. The 'about' page tells more about what I was aiming for.
- kingkilr 17y agoWhy would I use this over Readernaut: http://readernaut.com/ http://readernaut.com/
- kungfooey 17y agoI tried readernaut but felt it did too much. I just wanted a minimal way to keep up with what I've read, not add reviews (that's what Amazon is for), add friends (we all use Facebook, right?), or create lists. There's also http://goodreads.com/ http://goodreads.com/ and http://www.librarything.com/ http://www.librarything.com/
- ilconsigliere 17y agoPhonetically, readit could easily be mistaken for the immensely popular reddit. This seems rather important from a branding perspective. I assume its meant to be "read" sounding like "reed," not "read" sounding like "red".. but it's easy to see how this could cause confusion.
- Psyonic 17y agoActually, given that it's a log of what you have read, I'm going to assume it is pronounced red-it.
- kungfooey 17y agoOriginally it was going to be "Who Read It?" but then I realized that the domain name could be creatively interpreted. Hence, just Read It. When I say it myself, I pronounce it "reed", probably due to the similarity to reddit (which I don't find to be particularly bothersome).
- barmstrong 17y agoCool idea! Could be something there. Props for getting it out there. Could be a facebook app?
- jayliew 17y agoIs this just a side project .. or can you share your vision and plan for this? I like it, but I have to say that I've been using Shelfari for a while and it appears to pretty much do the same thing.