10 ms·

Show HN: YTT Tech – My curated database of instructional YouTube Videos

206 points by jrowen 6y ago

jrowen 6y ago
Hey HN, I love learning how to do things on YouTube. It's amazing - empowering, really - that we can instantly look up how to do so many things. When I looked around for a site dedicated to organizing and curating this content, I didn't find much, so I took a stab at it. The goal of the site is to make it easy to browse through and discover videos on different topics. After implementing the basic experience and authoring tools, I spent weeks combing through videos to get the collection started, and I've only scratched the surface. Many areas of interest remain to be added, and to that end, users can submit videos to the database and make other contributions. If the idea resonates it could become a useful resource. You don't need to register for the main experience of viewing the videos, only to contribute new ones, and email is optional. A demo video can be found here: https://youtu.be/EpWfvu0p5lA https://youtu.be/EpWfvu0p5lA Thanks!
- ivanhoe 6y ago
  Great idea, thanks. One potential problem I see is that categories seem too broad, you cover a lot of area here. There's so much good content out there that very quickly just 2 levels won't be enough to categorize it into a browsable lists. The same problem most of us have with bookmarks, at some point there's so many of them that you can't find anything anymore.
  - jrowen 6y ago
    Yes, definitely. As the database grows I would have to add a third level, at least. Probably sections within the large pane that would fold out. Creating a useful hierarchy and keeping it balanced is one of the bigger challenges of the project.
- jarbus 6y ago
  This is fantastic, you have a great curation so far. Would it be possible to create an RSS feed of new videos/categories that are added?
  - jrowen 6y ago
    Thanks, I'm open to it, but I have no experience with that. Any pointers on where to get started with that?
    - shezi 6y ago
      RSS and atom are simple xml formats that encapsulate information about posts or items on a site. They are linked on the site with meta tags or in direct a links. Here's a link to some documentation: https://www.xul.fr/en-xml-rss.html#structure https://www.xul.fr/en-xml-rss.html#structure Your framework will also likely have helpers to generate those. And you can contact me directly for help, email is in my profile.
- ryzvonusef 6y ago
  I wonder if this shouldn't be in some wiki-format instead...
- beprogrammed 6y ago
  I love the look of this page. Great job.
staticelf 6y ago
You should make the main content full screen or at least larger and perhaps add more fields. It took a long time before it loaded in the boxes, so is the server overloaded atm?
- jrowen 6y ago
  By more fields do you mean more departments/subjects? Those would be added over time, it takes time to find and vet videos and I didn't want to have a bunch of mostly empty ones, though I understand that it can give the appearance that many things are just left out (users can also suggest new ones when adding videos). The backend is on Lambda and DynamoDB so it should be able to handle it, but it does seem to be slow right now, I'm increasing the ReadCapacityUnits to see if that helps.
hasbot 6y ago
How/why did you choose those videos? I'm hoping to build a cabin this year and not a single video I've watched is listed here. The framing videos you have listed seem pretty old-school. Fine Homebuilding and Matt Risinger have updated videos.
- jrowen 6y ago
  I chose them based on what I've come across and searched for, and comparing several videos of the same type. The carpentry videos were some of the earliest ones I added so my process may not have been as good then. Of course, I'm not an expert on all of these subjects. I've done my best to get things off to a good start, but ultimately the idea would be that people with more knowledge than me add videos on things they know about.
- mauvehaus 6y ago
  If you want to build a log cabin, MySelfReliance is worth a watch, especially the early ones and the summary one of the first cabin build.
samblr 6y ago
That's a neat idea, no distractions from suggested videos.
dharmab 6y ago
You should add an automotive section. 90% would be ChrisFix. Also, motorcycle repair with MC Garage, Revzilla/The Shop Manual and Fortnine.
- jrowen 6y ago
  Yeah I had considered it, as I know it’s a popular topic, but I know virtually nothing about cars. Would you break out the different sections by manufacturer - is most stuff specific to certain makes/models? Or is it general enough that a “brakes” section would make sense?
  - dharmab 6y ago
    There's a body of general knowledge that is applicable to most makes and models, and specific knowledge for each make and model. The specific knowledge is mostly in service manuals and dedicated forums, but the general knowledge is widely available in video form. The general learning path is to get the general background online, then read the service manual for the exact procedure for your car or bike.
- mauvehaus 6y ago
  Would like to add that 1Aauto does great videos, at least for my 7th generation Honda Civic.
wcd-fyi 6y ago
First of all, congratulations on getting this project out the door! This could be a nice discovery tool for people seeking a new hobby. I notice that each REST request you're making returns a lot of extra data in the payload that the site doesn't seem to use (submittedBy, ytTags, ytDuration, etc). You could probably improve performance by only returning the minimal set of the data the UI needs. You commented below that this backed by Lambda & DynamoDB. I'm guessing the site is running a little slow right now because it's making a db query for each REST request. Since your list of videos is relatively small and will only be updated periodically, you might consider simply including the whole json structure in the page and making the site entirely static. It will scale much better and save you some money on hosting costs. If you prefer to keep the data loading dynamically, consider putting a caching layer in front of the lambdas.
- jrowen 6y ago
  Thank you for the detailed feedback! I've removed the unused data on videos, and included the department/section list in the page, so that's one less request. I would like to add caching but haven't tackled that yet.
sixQuarks 6y ago
I love curation projects. Here's a tip if you want to get people to submit more videos. Include a "Submit Video" button in each area. When someone knows of a great video for a category, having to sign up for an account is a huge hassle and de-motivator. So just turn the onboarding upside down. Make it easy to submit a link first. Once the link is submitted, THEN ask them to fill out the Username/password/email. At that point, they're already invested in the process, already submitted the link, and it's a lot easier to finish.
- dasyatidprime 6y ago
  Note that the optional version of this works fine, but the more sites hide a requirement this way, the more users are justified in assuming that anything they do on a new site may shove random things in their way and get fatigued on doing so entirely except in places they already know. Save the trust environment!
- jrowen 6y ago
  Thank you, my thought here was to make the registration as quick and easy as possible - no email or confirmation is required. I figured that someone would have to be somewhat invested in order to want to make submissions anyway - it takes longer to get the video URL and go through the submission form than to register.
  - techbio 6y ago
    An OAuth2/"login with your YouTube account" might streamline this for you, and facilitate sharing of collections already created on YouTube through their Data API.
    - OhHiMarkos 6y ago
      That's a lot of hassle just to submit a youtube url, isn't it?
      - techbio 6y ago
mauvehaus 6y ago
Suggested addition for woodworking: finishing. It's most people's second least favorite thing after sanding.
ivan888 6y ago
Just submitted one of my favorite videos on basic electrical. Feedback: - What happens after submission? I'm assuming it goes into a review queue, or caching is involved so I'm not seeing it right away. Maybe make it clear if there is a review queue after submitting - More detail around what the skill levels mean. I wasn't really sure how to choose. I consider it beginner, but I also saw other videos I consider beginner marked as intermediate
- jrowen 6y ago
  Thank you! Yes it goes into a queue (if you're interested you can see the queue in the demo video [0]). One thing I would like to add to the user's profile is a list of videos they've submitted and their status - I agree that it's totally unclear right now, I will try to add a note about that somewhere. The skill level is of course going to be subjective and vary from topic to topic, part of my labeling has to do with what tools are required (if it requires expensive/specialized tools I tend to rank it higher). If you think a video is mislabeled you can make a suggestion by clicking on the comment bubble in the header (orange part) of the selected video. [0]https://youtu.be/EpWfvu0p5lA?t=238 https://youtu.be/EpWfvu0p5lA?t=238
abidlabs 6y ago
I really love the beautiful UX experience
DiggyJohnson 6y ago
I cannot overemphasize how much I like this project, as well as the design of the site. Like sixQuarks said: "I love curation projects."
- jrowen 6y ago
  Much appreciated, I wasn't sure if the design would resonate with people :)
fernly 6y ago
How about submitting whole channels? I'm thinking of the likes of BlondieHacks, Vintage Machinery, Adam Savage's Tested, Essential Craftsman, Primitive Tech: each one a whole library of instructional material in a general category area.
- jrowen 6y ago
  I've considered that, but most of them have at least some videos that are not quite as instructional, or that would go into multiple different categories. I think cherry-picking keeps it more focused. Perhaps maybe a separate section that highlights some of those great channels would be good.
ryanwhitney 6y ago
I love this so much. It’s like youtube but without the youtubers. Thank you!
jakeadler 6y ago
I love this idea. I agree, there are platforms like SkillShare but none really curate YT videos that are actually good. If possible try to include captions bc many people use them on yt and will be a small feature people expect. I would try to build up a group of people who are avid YT viewers to help you find videos for all categories. Also including a section for beginner, intermediate, and advanced would be awesome - bc learning python from the start isn't optimal for an advanced programmer.
ripvanwinkle 6y ago
Thanks for taking this on. Are you also looking for curators or how are you planning to scale that
- jrowen 6y ago
  That's a good question, to be honest I hadn't gotten that far yet. It would be great to get some contributors on board but I haven't started. Maybe dig for some specialty forums/subreddits and reach out to people there. Open to any ideas or suggestions, email is in my profile!
mindhash 6y ago
I was expecting Ranveer brar videos in Indian cooking. Is there a way to contribute?
- jrowen 6y ago
  Yes! That would be awesome! You can register an account (very quick, no email required) and then submit a video. Scroll down from the main section to find the instructions.
reacharavindh 6y ago
Just want to say that the UI and UX is clean and effective. I really enjoyed that.
radomir_cernoch 6y ago
Thanks! This is a great tool to “bypass” YouTube's recommendations. Often I feel like having seen 100% of woodworking videos on YouTube. Yet, I recognize 10% channels from your tool. It gives me a good inspiration!
koziserek 6y ago
and where's https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=snz7JJlSZvw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=snz7JJlSZvw ? ;)

206 points by jrowen 6y ago

Hey HN, I love learning how to do things on YouTube. It's amazing - empowering, really - that we can instantly look up how to do so many things. When I looked around for a site dedicated to organizing and curating this content, I didn't find much, so I took a stab at it. The goal of the site is to make it easy to browse through and discover videos on different topics. After implementing the basic experience and authoring tools, I spent weeks combing through videos to get the collection started, and I've only scratched the surface. Many areas of interest remain to be added, and to that end, users can submit videos to the database and make other contributions. If the idea resonates it could become a useful resource. You don't need to register for the main experience of viewing the videos, only to contribute new ones, and email is optional. A demo video can be found here: https://youtu.be/EpWfvu0p5lA https://youtu.be/EpWfvu0p5lA Thanks!

ivanhoe 6y ago
Great idea, thanks. One potential problem I see is that categories seem too broad, you cover a lot of area here. There's so much good content out there that very quickly just 2 levels won't be enough to categorize it into a browsable lists. The same problem most of us have with bookmarks, at some point there's so many of them that you can't find anything anymore.
- jrowen 6y ago
  Yes, definitely. As the database grows I would have to add a third level, at least. Probably sections within the large pane that would fold out. Creating a useful hierarchy and keeping it balanced is one of the bigger challenges of the project.
jarbus 6y ago
This is fantastic, you have a great curation so far. Would it be possible to create an RSS feed of new videos/categories that are added?
- jrowen 6y ago
  Thanks, I'm open to it, but I have no experience with that. Any pointers on where to get started with that?
  - shezi 6y ago
    RSS and atom are simple xml formats that encapsulate information about posts or items on a site. They are linked on the site with meta tags or in direct a links. Here's a link to some documentation: https://www.xul.fr/en-xml-rss.html#structure https://www.xul.fr/en-xml-rss.html#structure Your framework will also likely have helpers to generate those. And you can contact me directly for help, email is in my profile.
ryzvonusef 6y ago
I wonder if this shouldn't be in some wiki-format instead...
beprogrammed 6y ago
I love the look of this page. Great job.

staticelf 6y ago

You should make the main content full screen or at least larger and perhaps add more fields. It took a long time before it loaded in the boxes, so is the server overloaded atm?

jrowen 6y ago
By more fields do you mean more departments/subjects? Those would be added over time, it takes time to find and vet videos and I didn't want to have a bunch of mostly empty ones, though I understand that it can give the appearance that many things are just left out (users can also suggest new ones when adding videos). The backend is on Lambda and DynamoDB so it should be able to handle it, but it does seem to be slow right now, I'm increasing the ReadCapacityUnits to see if that helps.

hasbot 6y ago

How/why did you choose those videos? I'm hoping to build a cabin this year and not a single video I've watched is listed here. The framing videos you have listed seem pretty old-school. Fine Homebuilding and Matt Risinger have updated videos.

jrowen 6y ago
I chose them based on what I've come across and searched for, and comparing several videos of the same type. The carpentry videos were some of the earliest ones I added so my process may not have been as good then. Of course, I'm not an expert on all of these subjects. I've done my best to get things off to a good start, but ultimately the idea would be that people with more knowledge than me add videos on things they know about.
mauvehaus 6y ago
If you want to build a log cabin, MySelfReliance is worth a watch, especially the early ones and the summary one of the first cabin build.

samblr 6y ago

That's a neat idea, no distractions from suggested videos.

dharmab 6y ago

You should add an automotive section. 90% would be ChrisFix. Also, motorcycle repair with MC Garage, Revzilla/The Shop Manual and Fortnine.

jrowen 6y ago
Yeah I had considered it, as I know it’s a popular topic, but I know virtually nothing about cars. Would you break out the different sections by manufacturer - is most stuff specific to certain makes/models? Or is it general enough that a “brakes” section would make sense?
- dharmab 6y ago
  There's a body of general knowledge that is applicable to most makes and models, and specific knowledge for each make and model. The specific knowledge is mostly in service manuals and dedicated forums, but the general knowledge is widely available in video form. The general learning path is to get the general background online, then read the service manual for the exact procedure for your car or bike.
mauvehaus 6y ago
Would like to add that 1Aauto does great videos, at least for my 7th generation Honda Civic.

wcd-fyi 6y ago

First of all, congratulations on getting this project out the door! This could be a nice discovery tool for people seeking a new hobby. I notice that each REST request you're making returns a lot of extra data in the payload that the site doesn't seem to use (submittedBy, ytTags, ytDuration, etc). You could probably improve performance by only returning the minimal set of the data the UI needs. You commented below that this backed by Lambda & DynamoDB. I'm guessing the site is running a little slow right now because it's making a db query for each REST request. Since your list of videos is relatively small and will only be updated periodically, you might consider simply including the whole json structure in the page and making the site entirely static. It will scale much better and save you some money on hosting costs. If you prefer to keep the data loading dynamically, consider putting a caching layer in front of the lambdas.

jrowen 6y ago
Thank you for the detailed feedback! I've removed the unused data on videos, and included the department/section list in the page, so that's one less request. I would like to add caching but haven't tackled that yet.

sixQuarks 6y ago

I love curation projects. Here's a tip if you want to get people to submit more videos. Include a "Submit Video" button in each area. When someone knows of a great video for a category, having to sign up for an account is a huge hassle and de-motivator. So just turn the onboarding upside down. Make it easy to submit a link first. Once the link is submitted, THEN ask them to fill out the Username/password/email. At that point, they're already invested in the process, already submitted the link, and it's a lot easier to finish.

dasyatidprime 6y ago
Note that the optional version of this works fine, but the more sites hide a requirement this way, the more users are justified in assuming that anything they do on a new site may shove random things in their way and get fatigued on doing so entirely except in places they already know. Save the trust environment!
jrowen 6y ago
Thank you, my thought here was to make the registration as quick and easy as possible - no email or confirmation is required. I figured that someone would have to be somewhat invested in order to want to make submissions anyway - it takes longer to get the video URL and go through the submission form than to register.
- techbio 6y ago
  An OAuth2/"login with your YouTube account" might streamline this for you, and facilitate sharing of collections already created on YouTube through their Data API.
  - OhHiMarkos 6y ago
    That's a lot of hassle just to submit a youtube url, isn't it?
    - techbio 6y ago

mauvehaus 6y ago

Suggested addition for woodworking: finishing. It's most people's second least favorite thing after sanding.

ivan888 6y ago

Just submitted one of my favorite videos on basic electrical. Feedback: - What happens after submission? I'm assuming it goes into a review queue, or caching is involved so I'm not seeing it right away. Maybe make it clear if there is a review queue after submitting - More detail around what the skill levels mean. I wasn't really sure how to choose. I consider it beginner, but I also saw other videos I consider beginner marked as intermediate

jrowen 6y ago
Thank you! Yes it goes into a queue (if you're interested you can see the queue in the demo video [0]). One thing I would like to add to the user's profile is a list of videos they've submitted and their status - I agree that it's totally unclear right now, I will try to add a note about that somewhere. The skill level is of course going to be subjective and vary from topic to topic, part of my labeling has to do with what tools are required (if it requires expensive/specialized tools I tend to rank it higher). If you think a video is mislabeled you can make a suggestion by clicking on the comment bubble in the header (orange part) of the selected video. [0]https://youtu.be/EpWfvu0p5lA?t=238 https://youtu.be/EpWfvu0p5lA?t=238

abidlabs 6y ago

I really love the beautiful UX experience

DiggyJohnson 6y ago

I cannot overemphasize how much I like this project, as well as the design of the site. Like sixQuarks said: "I love curation projects."

jrowen 6y ago
Much appreciated, I wasn't sure if the design would resonate with people :)

fernly 6y ago

How about submitting whole channels? I'm thinking of the likes of BlondieHacks, Vintage Machinery, Adam Savage's Tested, Essential Craftsman, Primitive Tech: each one a whole library of instructional material in a general category area.

jrowen 6y ago
I've considered that, but most of them have at least some videos that are not quite as instructional, or that would go into multiple different categories. I think cherry-picking keeps it more focused. Perhaps maybe a separate section that highlights some of those great channels would be good.

ryanwhitney 6y ago

I love this so much. It’s like youtube but without the youtubers. Thank you!

jakeadler 6y ago

I love this idea. I agree, there are platforms like SkillShare but none really curate YT videos that are actually good. If possible try to include captions bc many people use them on yt and will be a small feature people expect. I would try to build up a group of people who are avid YT viewers to help you find videos for all categories. Also including a section for beginner, intermediate, and advanced would be awesome - bc learning python from the start isn't optimal for an advanced programmer.

ripvanwinkle 6y ago

Thanks for taking this on. Are you also looking for curators or how are you planning to scale that

jrowen 6y ago
That's a good question, to be honest I hadn't gotten that far yet. It would be great to get some contributors on board but I haven't started. Maybe dig for some specialty forums/subreddits and reach out to people there. Open to any ideas or suggestions, email is in my profile!

mindhash 6y ago

I was expecting Ranveer brar videos in Indian cooking. Is there a way to contribute?

jrowen 6y ago
Yes! That would be awesome! You can register an account (very quick, no email required) and then submit a video. Scroll down from the main section to find the instructions.

reacharavindh 6y ago

Just want to say that the UI and UX is clean and effective. I really enjoyed that.

radomir_cernoch 6y ago

Thanks! This is a great tool to “bypass” YouTube's recommendations. Often I feel like having seen 100% of woodworking videos on YouTube. Yet, I recognize 10% channels from your tool. It gives me a good inspiration!

koziserek 6y ago

and where's https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=snz7JJlSZvw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=snz7JJlSZvw ? ;)