25 ms·

Why I prefer making useless stuff

772 points by azhenley 5y ago

emptyparadise 5y ago
I love making tiny projects for fun and not for profit, using tools I enjoy working with and not tools I would need to scale to a trillion users, trying ideas I like and not ideas I can monetize. I almost forgot why I enjoyed coding.
dheera 5y ago
I build a lot of "useless" stuff too. Where by useless I mean useful to me, but isn't ever going to have customers. A. Educational value is a thing. Not everything needs to be a business with customers. Not every project needs to make money. Many of my projects teach me something about science, tech, or arts. B. Fun is a thing. Building stuff is a way to enjoy life for me, similar to spending time on the beach. A couple of my more "useless" projects: https://dheera.net/projects/4x5/ https://dheera.net/projects/4x5/ https://dheera.net/projects/mnist-clock/ https://dheera.net/projects/mnist-clock/ https://dheera.net/projects/einkframe/ https://dheera.net/projects/einkframe/ https://dheera.net/projects/shoji-lamps/ https://dheera.net/projects/shoji-lamps/
- radiator 5y ago
  Someone who wouldn't want to undersell those projects could use the term art instead of useless.
  - dheera 5y ago
    Oh I just called them "useless" in mockery of the HN sense of the word, i.e. in the same sense of the word that TFA speaks of: not being able to scale it into a unicorn startup with customers. But yes, they are useful to me as art, as educational projects, as fun, etc.
justin_oaks 5y ago
The biggest reason to make useless stuff instead of useful stuff is to avoid harassment. If you have something useful on GitHub then entitled users will come out of the woodwork to request features, report "bugs" (read: the user is doing something wrong), or otherwise expect free work out of you.
- dheera 5y ago
  Let them know they are free to make a pull request? I don't see this as a reason to specifically avoid useful stuff.
  - swiftcoder 5y ago
    That's precisely the point. They aren't free to make a pull request. A pull request puts a time demand on the project owner to review and merge the patch. What they are free to do is fork the project, and do whatever the hell they want to in the fork.
    - ratww 5y ago
      Yep. It's a cathedral rather than a bazaar [1]. A very small cathedral, but still one. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cathedral_and_the_Bazaar https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cathedral_and_the_Bazaar
- toast0 5y ago
  I haven't gotten any feedback on my github stuff (which isn't quite useless, just not useful to many), but it's pretty easy to ignore feedback in general, and it's not too hard to turn off issues; not sure if you can turn off pull requests though.
- watwut 5y ago
  Wasn't really my experience. Besides, github have tons of useful smaller projects that either don't have any issues filed by strangers or have them while author happily ignores those.You have make something pretty big to have big enough community for it to cause issues. And if that really bothers you, you can turn off issues in github.
grouphugs 5y ago
must be nice to be so fortunate, but this is just regular nazi greed
rdiddly 5y ago
Building useful stuff with a "user base" of one falls under that too. I'm my own customer.
ssivark 5y ago
Love the OP's attitude. It's perfect for anyone looking to explore computing as a medium. The HN comments they quote (shipping for customers, and avoiding pointless homework) come from a very different perspective -- where the medium being explored is not computing, but rather the process of satisfying specific human needs in the context of a "market". Both have their own value; it's just that they're completely orthogonal in intent and worth not conflating.
- jfoster 5y ago
  The quote attributed to me was on the topic of "challenging projects every programmer should try": https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21790779 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21790779 It's not that I would recommend every project must have customers, but I do think that most programmers will learn & grow tremendously if they take on a project where they are trying to directly satisfy a set of customers. It came to mind because whilst there's a tendency to focus on projects that are technically challenging or interesting, I think such a project would perhaps prove even more challenging, albeit in very different ways.
revskill 5y ago
I once tried to setup isomorphic Haskell webapp (haskell on both server and client) and i learnt a bunch of things. The result is useless, not practical but their knowledge is practical, and it's what matters to me, not the result.
dorkwood 5y ago
> And if those aren't enough, I have several more useless projects planned! I can't wait to get started on them: I feel like this is such a key technique for maintaining momentum with your personal projects -- always keep a list of things you want to work on next. I'll often find myself day-dreaming about the next thing on my list while I'm still tinkering away on my current project. After I realized how important this was for myself, I started noticing other people doing it too; apparently whenever Bob Dylan had an idea, he'd write it down and put it in a box. When it came time to create, he'd open the box.
legerdemain 5y ago
A lot of people who insist on building only stuff they can sell have very little business sense. They rarely seem to know if what they're building has any real chance of making money. As a result, they end up building a lot of stuff that's both useless and boring.
spottybanana 5y ago
Doesn't sound like useless to me, these projects sound very educational.
boothby 5y ago
I didn't know anything about compilers, but I figured out how to compile Piet programs, so I wrote a compiler[1]. The project has stalled out for (a) lack of free time and (b) some silly ambitions, but I don't care what the public thinks about my lack of updates, and that's great. In the meantime, I've been going down weird rabbit holes and learning aspects of computing that I missed in school. [1] https://github.com/boothby/repiet https://github.com/boothby/repiet
leifg 5y ago
I came to the same conclusion over the time. Mainly because I figured out: When you want to build stuff for profit, coding is an afterthought. There are so many tasks necessary that involve zero coding. You essentially become your own product manager that needs to talk to (potential) customers, completely reevaluate your value proposition, do marketing sales. The more time you spend on coding, the higher the chance your assumptions about what people want are wrong. If you want to spend 100% coding I would argue that's impossible to make profitably.
- nly 5y ago
  "Coding" is a small part of most software engineering roles though. I mean I think I've written more code in 2 weeks working on useless hobby projects than I have in 2 years professionally. I'm not even exaggerating
  - trangon 5y ago
    Sounds like you aren’t working on a greenfield project, granted most people aren’t. But it’s not like that for everyone.
mrweasel 5y ago
Most of the projects I do for fun is either project I know customers are working on, or stuff we already have at work. This gives me a goal, and gives me a sense of how hard the problem actually is. If it does work out, no one care, the thing already exists. I also have a project I normally use when attempting to learn a new language. It involves naked women and copyright violations, but it get’s me around most aspects of a language and gives me a sense of how complete a language and its eco-system it.
- cosmojg 5y ago
  > It involves naked women and copyright violations, but it get’s me around most aspects of a language and gives me a sense of how complete a language and its eco-system it. You can't just leave us hanging like that. What's the project?
  - atatatat 5y ago
    Custom "The Fappening" viewer?
  - mrweasel 5y ago
    One of the Danish newspaper have a page 9 girl (like the UK page 3 girl). One of the magazines have a "girl of the week" (they also have a male version if that's more your thing). For my learning project, for the last four language I looked at, my code grabs the latest "page 9" girl every day, and builds up an archive. Because Denmark is a small country, the girls in the newspaper will frequently have appeared in the magazine at some point, to it checks their archive and try to build up a merged archive. It's a neat little project for learning, because you need to do at least: http requests, regex, database integration, an web application (to browse the archive), scheduling and how to use modules/package/third-party libraries. Later iterations also adds a REST api, so I can use the project to learn how to write JavaScript application.
neolog 5y ago
I'm curious how much money you make from the affiliate links on your site?
adamius 5y ago
Is it useless? Compare coding these projects to Dorodango https://www.laurenceking.com/blog/2019/09/26/dorodango-blog/ https://www.laurenceking.com/blog/2019/09/26/dorodango-blog/ Perhaps the act is the end in itself. The journey in this case is probably more important than the destination.
- mosselman 5y ago
  This is amazing. I totally see the parallel to coding little things that are 'useless'. It is a form of meditation maybe. Working on 'useless' code is a sort of massage for the mind sometimes.
- Delk 5y ago
  I think the important thing is that considering a project useless frees one of any obligation to think about its usefulness. It might not be useless but its value might come from not trying to be useful. Which is probably what you meant anyway, but I think "useless" means two different things here.
DoreenMichele 5y ago
Sounds like this is how he keeps his interest in coding alive and his ability to enjoy it in spite of getting paid to do it. If you only do what you get paid to do as a coder, you may grow to hate it and this can be career-ending. You could suffer burnout or just decide to quit or get fired and no one wants you anymore. The first rule of sustainable productivity is taking care of the thing doing the producing. If that's a human, that isn't limited to physical wellbeing, especially if they are producing knowledge work.
asimjalis 5y ago
I love this. I feel the same way as OP. Question in my mind is why is this? Can we understand what makes our own useless projects so engaging?
- nicbou 5y ago
  You accept from the start that you will be the only critic, user and contributor of the project, so you do whatever you want.
- MaxBarraclough 5y ago
  My own guesswork answer: a 'useless project' necessarily combines a personal interest with the total absence of external obligations. Productive work sometimes has the former property, but rarely has the latter. A successful useful unpaid project might feel like an obligation, if there are users and a community around it. Note: does not apply to Fabrice Bellard, with his remarkable talent for building incredibly useful software on a whim, on his own, in secret (at least initially).
- scaramanga 5y ago
  The intrinsic urge to create. That and the fact that the creation is taking place outside of any coercive or exploitative relationship.
mam3 5y ago
Sure its nice to be "loving what you do" and its always better than having somensort of external pressure. Now saying you really prefer to do specifically useless stuff seems like glorifying a weakness for no reason. Why not leaving an open door to both have fun and make money ? Seems like the author tries to make some moral/practical higher ground because he cant deal with the ambivalence of whether what he does is for some "inherent" pleasure or for money. At the end of the day the way your deal with you psychology is not my problem. Having fun if is cool. Making money is cool in another way. If mixing both is too hard for you the maybe you really dont have any real problem in your life. That post wont get too much of my sympathy.
- jhatemyjob 5y ago
  Yea it seems like OP is writing a bunch of throwaway projects that don't go anywhere. What's the point of writing software if nobody is gonna use it? I'd rather go do something else. Like go hiking or swimming or something.... Don't get me wrong, I like coding videogames as much as the next guy but it's like, if nobody is gonna play it then what's the point?
  - cupofcoffee 5y ago
    The point is you get better at it.
    - hamburglar 5y ago
      And some people find it fun.
    - mrwoggle 5y ago
      Yeah, you become a better programmer. And if it is fun while you at it, it another win.
  - gammalost 5y ago
    The point is that he enjoys them. Throwaway project can be like a puzzle (at least for me). Pick a subject, find some problem and figure it out. I could ask the same about going hiking, what's the point of that? You're still back home at the end of the day.
nicbou 5y ago
Since a little less than two years, I live from a website I built, and I have a lot more control over my schedule. Since then, I built a lot more useless stuff. I'm the only user. I can hardcode things, introduce breaking changes, manually migrate data and so on. I can cut corners, or over-engineer everything. Other people can use it, but I don't care about what they think of my variable names, or which features they want. The turning point for me was the concept of apps as home-cooked meals [0]. If a gardener can grow flowers only he will see, I can write code only I will run. [0] https://www.robinsloan.com/notes/home-cooked-app/ https://www.robinsloan.com/notes/home-cooked-app/
- headmelted 5y ago
  Genuinely curious - Are you saying here that you have a blog that runs on your own code or your income comes from the project? I only ask as if you’ve discovered a way to produce an income from coding something your own way while still having no-one else to answer to then I too would like to reach Valhalla and you must show me the way.
  - NetOpWibby 5y ago
    Show us the way!
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
  - ackbar03 5y ago
    https://images.app.goo.gl/G4k1Tu3mYCaFJ1dw8 https://images.app.goo.gl/G4k1Tu3mYCaFJ1dw8
  - nicbou 5y ago
    It's a content website with affiliate income, nothing outstanding. It worked really well, but that was just luck. I didn't expect that, and I couldn't do it twice. Before that, I worked programming contracts, and 3-4 months of those per year would also suffice. Given our profession, many of us could also work less and live on half their income.
seg_lol 5y ago
It isn't useless by any stretch, it is non-Commericial, it is playful, experimental. I understand the sentiment and the terminology, not challenging it, but being silly and playful should be just as valid as making a your next open source side hustle. Once things start getting _serious_ for some definition, a whole other cloud rolls in. There is now a right way to do things, but how do we know this is the right way. How do the boundaries get pushed? Much of the time, best practices is a signaling phrase to have an in group and an out group. Things like esolangs give one cover to be playful. For example if you try metaprogramming in Python, you will be called out as unpythonic. If you create classes in Python with public member variables, you will be ridiculed.
_wldu 5y ago
I agree 100%. All my programs are "Toy Programs" and they are very fun to build and use.
pjmlp 5y ago
Same approach over here. I try new approaches and languages, occasionally something gets dumped into Github for the usual headhunters requests for HR filter. Turning them into useful stuff for others? Well that is what work is for.
brundolf 5y ago
It’s funny, my favorite useless projects have also mostly been compilers and game engines! +1 to this mindset. I would go even further and suggest that useless projects tend to be morally superior to useful ones. A lot (not all) of the useful software out there ends up being used to make the world worse, but useless software can only ever inspire joy (in yourself and, hopefully, in others).
- ratww 5y ago
  Agree. Something else: Useless software is also very educational. I'm also into compilers and engines. I learned 3d programming by looking at small projects online. The "worse" the code, the easier to learn. If I had tried to follow the Unreal/Unity/Godot codebase I'd still be at the intro screen.
- tachyonbeam 5y ago
  Personally, I got to the point where I realized that trying hard to make software that's useful can turn a side-project into something stressful, essentially a second job on top of my regular full-time job, which I just can't do, too much risk of burnout. Trying to turn something into a side-business adds a lot of constraints. You're not just playing anymore, you have to optimize everything towards the goal of making profit. However, I still think you can enjoy working on things that are useful, to yourself and other people, and not for profit. The projects I'm the most proud of are projects I've shared that have been used and appreciated by many users online. You just have to keep the project small and simple, and keep your expectations low.
- chii 5y ago
  > useless projects tend to be morally superior to useful ones people have claimed that crypto mining is useless too - but a lot of people also claim that crypto mining is morally wrong since it consumes vast amounts of electricity for "no reason". I think there's no such thing as morally superior, and a project is never useless to any and everyone. A "useless" project is taken to mean useless to everyone else but the author (since it inspires joy - which makes it not useless). So in other words, a project that's only useful for yourself is morally superior. However, that's just another way to describe selfishness. So by the transitive property, being selfish must be morally superior!
tooltower 5y ago
This is exactly why I hate the expansive IP contracts I've had to sign with my employer. It effectively requires me to ask permission for publishing these useless weekend stuff, robbing me of the joy.
- chadcmulligan 5y ago
  I just cross those bits out - I'm just writing a crud app for you - and you want to own everything I think - yah, na, happy to sign over copyright for the code I write for you (literally the conversation I had for my last contract). If they say no, oh well.
kevinventullo 5y ago
I think I’m somewhere in between. I like thinking about (and sometimes building) things that are possibly useful, but difficult or painful to monetize. Kind of an academic approach where I don’t need to grovel for funding.
rpastuszak 5y ago
yes, we need more toys! https://sonnet.io/posts/reactive-hole/ https://sonnet.io/posts/reactive-hole/
abhinav22 5y ago
This is something I try to be careful of. Programming takes time, which is an opportunity cost as we get older. If I was well off, I would love to relax my mind on projects not going anywhere. However until that point, I try to do something that I feel has some value (or hope will one day). That said, I do agree with the general premise that work is where we spend to make money and we should relax in our spare time. The criteria for me is that I should enjoy what I’m doing and it should have some small chance of success. But as long as I enjoy it, then I’ll be okay. Better to do a project with 2% chance of success that I enjoy than one of 50% chance of success that I feel like a chore. Life’s too short. However I would not be able to actively do a project with zero chance of any value (learning can be achieved through many ways, so I don’t count that as value on the outset, only as justification for the time spent afterwards). I rather go for a walk then. There are only a few hours a day where I have the energy to code, it’s too precious to waste. (ps sorry for the over use of first person - just wanted to share my perspective)
- ExtraE 5y ago
  > (ps sorry for the over use of first person - just wanted to share my perspective) Why do you feel bad about/dislike first person (in this context)?
  - abhinav22 5y ago
    It becomes (or at least implies) too much anecdotal, which is not ideal for a unopinonated discussion. Excessive use of first person imo is a good flag that the writer is too self concerned (egotistical), which can interfere with their judgement (as it’s affected by ego and not a cold, rational look at both sides). Which I’m guilty of from time to time. I realized that as I was halfway through, but it was too late in the night so I just pressed reply :)
ransom1538 5y ago
Did someone say useless stuff! I love useless projects. Do you need a doctor that is published on the procedure you are about to have? https://www.opendoctor.io/research/?research_papers=mohs+surgery&zip=32765&search=search https://www.opendoctor.io/research/?research_papers=mohs+sur... What about ranking doctors based on their Opioid subscription count? I got you covered. https://www.opendoctor.io/opioid/highest/ https://www.opendoctor.io/opioid/highest/
PicassoCTs 5y ago
The usefulness question is the a poison to discovery. How many things we use in our daily life would have survived the first peer review for usefulness? The printing press? Makes no sense, use scribes. The public cant even read. The internet? Why would people use a computer to communicate and share data? Its super slow, just send a magnetic drive or even better, copy the images on paper. Solar power? We have coal, oil, nuclear, that stuff has no future. If something is not useful, in dubio assume, that it is, but you just are not capable of seeing the use or the market it will create.
- ExtraE 5y ago
  I mean, your point is a good one but those are bad examples. The printing press was made to print bibles in bulk. The internet was made by the DOD and universities, not to transfer large files/images but for small text documents. Solar came from LEDs which were discovered by accident by scientists working on other semiconductors (trying to find something useful), but to your credit probably explored because it was interesting. 99% of the work done on solar now is to do something useful.
stadium 5y ago
I've been building a useless app in my free time, an hour here or there, for the last 2 months. Then last week at work, I got a chance to contribute to a project that happened to use the same stack. It was random luck. And the useless project prepared me for the useful one that pays me a salary.
- nly 5y ago
  This happens all the time to me as well. I think the flip side of this is that, for most of us, it's very hard to learn new and interesting stuff in our paid software engineering roles. Day to day tends to be dominated by maintaining code you didn't write, dealing with business concerns, or greasing the tiny wheels in the big machine that your team covers.
dredmorbius 5y ago
There seems to be a critical role of consequence-free exploration (or at least consequence-reduced) in creativity. Richard Feynman's commentary on being burned out and playing with ideas of spinning plates, which culminated in his Nobel Prize award, comes to mind. Recently featured on HN (and something of a perennial favourite): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26931359 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26931359 https://www.asc.ohio-state.edu/kilcup.1/262/feynman.html?repostindays=413 https://www.asc.ohio-state.edu/kilcup.1/262/feynman.html?rep... You'll find similar observations regarding corporate research and development. See David Hounshell's work on R&D at DuPont: Science and Corporate Strategy: Du Pont R&D 1902-1980, originally published in the 1980s. https://www.worldcat.org/title/science-and-corporate-strategy-du-pont-rd-1902-1980/oclc/1086231462 https://www.worldcat.org/title/science-and-corporate-strateg... Similar stories exist for AT&T's Bell Labs, Xerox PARC, IBM Research, and even Ford Motor Company's research division. In the case of the latter, Henry Ford (in)famously gave his engineers significant discretion, but somewhat-less-than-optimal equipment, the latter apparently a spur to creativity in order to overcome limitations. Geoffrey West has discussed this regarding the Santa Fe Institute, I believe in the Q&A of this presentation: https://youtube.com/watch?v=w-8sbSPf4ko https://youtube.com/watch?v=w-8sbSPf4ko (At 1:09:00) West quotes the late Max Perutz's guidelines for organizing research, in full: Impishly, whenever he was asked whether there are simple guidelines along which to organise research so that it will be highly creative, he would say: no politics, no committees, no reports, no referees, no interviews; just gifted, highly motivated people picked by a few men of good judgment. Certainly not the way research is usually run in our fuzzy democracy but, from a man of great gifts and of extremely good judgment, such a reply is not elitist. It is simply to be expected, for Max had practised it and shown that this recipe is right for those who, in science, want to beat the world by getting the best in the world to beat a path to their door. http://www.theguardian.com/news/2002/feb/07/guardianobituaries.obituaries http://www.theguardian.com/news/2002/feb/07/guardianobituari... As an anti-creative environment, the most effective obstruction is to ensure that everything is not only consequential, but a path to failure. This tends to emerge in oppressive and excessively bureaucratic environments. John Cleese outlines the general parameters toward the end of this presentation: https://youtube.com/watch?v=Pb5oIIPO62g https://youtube.com/watch?v=Pb5oIIPO62g The start-up world seems to me to increasingly exemplify the high-consequence, no-win environment.
jack_riminton 5y ago
The thing I love most about useless projects is the freedom to not explain anything to anyone. That’s the part about painting that I love the most too. You don’t understand it? I don’t care
stemlord 5y ago
Obviously it's not useless. I'd say it's super important even, because it fosters a culture beyond the dominant capitalist culture of consumption for the sake of consumption which seems to eat away at every facet of living leaving complete emptiness of meaning in its wake. This is fundamentally what 20th century capitalist critique is all about and IMO a big reason why contemporary art practice is all about critical theory
cryptica 5y ago
Making useless stuff is nice if you and everyone else knows that it's useless and you can optimize the activity for maximum learning. I hate making useless stuff when everyone else believes that it's useful. Then the work is usually tedious, repetitive, stressful and frustrating. There is 0 satisfaction. You just want to waste as much time as possible to maximize your hours/income.
Areading314 5y ago
> A typed Lisp compiler with a focus on performance Not useless and much needed!
WalterGR 5y ago
What’s the game? shown in the second image from the left?
- azhenley 5y ago
  Unnamed and unreleased :) I occasionally work on it when I can’t sleep. I hope to release it one day...
tester756 5y ago
Over years I had shitton of random `abnsadc234` named projects that I used to learn, test, grasp, actually implement some concept. The thing about $customer_ready software is that huge % of it is just "boring" stuff, the exciting $core is just small part.
xyzelement 5y ago
This is subjective, but my personal threshold for when "useless" is OK or not depends on what's going on in the rest of your life. If you are making a good living, your family is taken care of, etc. etc. then go ahead and make as much useless stuff, because empirically you are making good life decisions and your useless stuff is just fun - doesn't detract from value, or perhaps even helps you learn useful skills that translate into your money-making life. On the other hand, if you're having employment or financial problems of any sort, the last thing you should be thinking about is "useless" stuff, because there're indicators in your life that you should be focusing on how to make more value for yourself (by making things of value to others.) I guess that's the same for everything, not just useless projects. I'd have the same criteria for watching a lot of TV - fine if your life is on track, probably should stop if there are other problems!
- egypturnash 5y ago
  I have spent the past five minutes trying to come up with the politest way to say “I wanna smack your miserable Greyface ass with a copy of In Praise Of Idleness” and I have given up.
- schwartzworld 5y ago
  There's nothing wrong with having a hobby for the sake of it just being fun. But if you insist on thinking about everything in terms of money, realize how many well-paid programmers started out as hobbyists. Learning to create now can translate to big bucks later. For me, I build software for a living, but a lot of my hobby projects are completely useless to anybody but me. I build them in languages and tools that require me to think differently, and the new way of thinking influences the code I write at work. This has paid off in terms of career trajectory, for sure. There is a bonus, in that me being a better programmer means I can spend less of my time figuring out how to write it, which means more time with my family.
nn3 5y ago
I talked to someone who just finished their CS degree. He said "The school had all the rights for the graduation work, so I made sure it was a useless as possible"
calltrak 5y ago
I built this useless project https://picc.io https://picc.io its for sharing images. The idea has been done to death I admit and there is a snowballs chance it would take off. I can't seem to get any one to use it.My visitors stats are a joke. Imgur owns peoples minds in this space! And I suck monkey balls at marketing (not literally, i'm glad to add)
anta40 5y ago
This is very cool. If I were interviewing for candidates, I'd definitely ask for their "useless stuffs". Sure, being able to develop and maintain whatever you need for your company is important, but sometimes you don't have much degree to employ your creativity.
ajxs 5y ago
I definitely identify with the author. A big mistake I made in the past was to assume that other software engineers are equally enthusiastic about these kind of projects, or the least bit impressed by them. I was asked for a job interview to prepare presentations on two projects I was particularly proud of. I chose a hobby Operating System kernel I'd developed from the ground up, and a fully-functional MIPS assembler I had written. The interviewers (senior developers within the company) really just did not get it. Responding with questions such as: "Is this going to make you any money?", and "When do you expect this to be complete?". They really couldn't understand my motivations. I did these projects for no other reason than that I love programming, and I have never stopped loving learning about it. I have never needed to consider, or justify to myself why I did these things. I do them because I enjoy what I do. I ended up pivoting to discuss some comparatively banal professional project migrating a mid-sized financial product to a new tech-stack, which managed to captivate their attention. I found this experience extremely disheartening, however important a lesson it was to learn. I don't think it's changed my outlook in any way though, admittedly. I still work on the same kinds of projects, and I still think the best developers are the ones who do work on toy projects for their own enjoyment.
- jefftk 5y ago
  That's a really disappointing reaction you got. If I was interviewing someone who described having implemented a kernel or an assembler for fun I would be thrilled!
  - scaramanga 5y ago
    Right! If GP is looking for a job then for the love of god, please email gianni at my-hn-user-name dot co dot uk :)
  - monsieurbanana 5y ago
    You would be thrilled, but would that get the candidate the job? A very common topic about programming is how useless are most whiteboard job interviews, as they challenge the interviewees on something they will never use in the job. Few things are farther away from day-to-day programming that a white-board problem, but kernel development might just be one of them. In regards to the GP story, I'm also saddened that the interviewers didn't show interest for those projects. Kernel development indicates a high aptitude for many kinds of unrelated programming jobs, but not for most of them. Especially "enterprise" jobs. For the purposes of the interview the "banal professional project" is likely the relevant one. If anything, having the senior developers show no interest is a good thing, and indicates that even if the candidate gets the job he probably won't enjoy his time at the company.
dw-im-here 5y ago
The world isn't ready for one, let alone _two_ new todo apps for iOS
Sparkyte 5y ago
I think toy projects are a great exercise to innovate your conventional way to write code. For example you can't necessarily improve if you can't simply how you write. Readability is essential in code. So practice makes perfect and writing for profit often requires redundancy which does neither the programmer or the customer any good.
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phonebucket 5y ago
> I’ve always pursued my interests without much regard for final value or value to the world ... I’ve spent lots of time on totally useless things. - Claude Shannon [1] He is known for a large number of playful side projects. [1] https://spectrum.ieee.org/tech-history/cyberspace/claude-shannon-tinkerer-prankster-and-father-of-information-theory https://spectrum.ieee.org/tech-history/cyberspace/claude-sha...
raevilman 5y ago
I agree. I tweeted my thoughts on same lines an hour back. But in my case, project is going to be a bit long term. https://twitter.com/raevilman/status/1396683828907941888?s=19 https://twitter.com/raevilman/status/1396683828907941888?s=1...
supernihil 5y ago
Over the years ive found myself with my "hobby art-ware" between two seats: programmers/engineers that, contrary to my expectation, dont see the value and ask questions like "is it on product hunt?" And the other camp being my artist friends who ask: "what do you wanna say with this, what is the concept" I finally have found piece in my "stuff" being a product of my intuitive curiosity and therefore not bound by the same laws of explanation :-)
blocked_again 5y ago
My philosophy is, as long as you are financially independent, you earned your right to work on useless projects. If not focus your energy on making a recurring source of income which generates money even if you end up in hospital for 1 year.
- jlokier 5y ago
  My philosophy is that it is harsh to treat it as a luxury that should be limited to those who achieve financial independence, because most people won't achieve that independence no matter how hard they try (or if they do they will be rather old, i.e. retired), but the need for creative leisure and self-expression throughout life is strong in a lot of people.
  - blocked_again 5y ago
    I agree. My comment was mostly from the perspective of a software engineer. I have not achieved financial independence. Is no where close at the moment. But still the philosophy remains. I don't think it's that hard to achieve financial independence especially if you are a software engineer. So giving up even before trying is not the most optimimum decision I think.
mattlondon 5y ago
Couldn't agree more with this. There is a lot of sentiment on HN about how you should be making a side business or selling your own stuff or being your own boss or getting your first 100 paying customers or your $xxxxx MRR or whatever. That is all fine, but I think that line of thought can be a little bit toxic at times: you don't have to be continually hustling for the next dollar all the time - it is ok to do stuff simply for the joy of it.
- ronyfadel 5y ago
  I disagree with this. Sure, hackers get excited at people posting business/financial success stories, but a big chunk of HN gets super excited about hacks that are smart but have no economic viability. This comes in stark contrast to the IndieHackers/ProductHunt/Twitter builder communities, who are all about making revenue and not about tinkering and doing cool hacks.
ogou 5y ago
Some the comments here are disheartening. So much crass dismissal of anything not monetized. A lot of what we use on regular basis got started with simple ideas for things with limited usefulness at the time. I remember when there was much more creative energy in this industry. Obviously, tech is a major economic force now. But, that pretense of creativity and exploration is still being exploited. That's why we are funneling entire generations into coding classes, maker spaces, and youth empowering tech initiatives. They are being told, "learn to love coding. explore your dreams". Very quickly they get redirected into conformist production paths so they become tools. What a shame. Long live creativity and self-determination.
- TeMPOraL 5y ago
  It's ironic. Where do software companies get their highly technically competent developers? Most of them don't train people, nor do they give enough time for developing deep technical skills. They rely on people who picked up most of the necessary experience prior to joining, and then maybe transferring some of their knowledge to others. But where do those original knowledgeable people gain their skills, if not at their jobs? By doing useless side projects.
  - rualca 5y ago
    > But where do those original knowledgeable people gain their skills, if not at their jobs? By doing useless side projects. So much this. The time you have is a finite resource, and technical expertise is a function of how you invest your time in activities that enable you to learn and grow. More often than not, your job is not aligned with your career plan or growth path. So how is it possible to bridge that gap? Well, through your own persona projects, projects whose goals are set by you and are not encumbered by third party requirements and don't even have to have a business model. Just coding. Corporations want the reward of investing time in learning and exploring, but they don't want to foot the bill.
  - mehphp 5y ago
    They don’t sound so useless to me then :) They clearly led to the development of skills that produce great economic value.
abinaya_rl 5y ago
Nothing is useless. Either you are learning something or teach yourself not to make that in the future as a business :)
pythonist 5y ago
I must say that I also relate with the author and would add that making things just for fun or your own curiosity or even need, can be beneficial to others too, directly or indirectly. With every toy project, new skills are acquired. Useful or not, you cannot now at the time, but I can say that if I did not make toy projects, I would not have jobs that I had and some of the projects that others also find useful, like https://newreleases.io https://newreleases.io, would not exist.
Popegaf 5y ago
Why does anybody care what you do during your free time as long as it: - is fun - doesn't hurt anybody (except possibly yourself)? Go write books, programs, plays, scripts, go do sports, go do drugs (responsibly), go drink, go play board games or online games, just do it. It's your life, your body and your decisions.
laymonage 5y ago
Before I decided to pursue my CS degree and write software for a living, I was afraid that getting stressed from university/work would make me hate programming. One of the reasons that kept me going was because I still try to find the time to make stuff like this. It reminds me how programming can be fun.
Tade0 5y ago
I remember when I was in college and told my friend that I just spent a sizeable (for a student) amount of money on an electric guitar and couldn't be happier. His reply was: so, how are you planning on making that money back with it? I had no reply to that. There are people who, as zombie fiction for teenage audiences author Jonathan Maberry put it "think like insects" - they have but one overriding goal in life: maximize their total wealth. This is an approach to life so foreign to me yet so often rewarded that it makes me wonder who's really happier. One thing I know is that I hate working with such people - reading their code feels like listening to muzak - it works, but there doesn't seem to be any actual thought or design behind it. Long term it becomes unmaintainable, but that usually doesn't matter much, because projects get rewritten all the time.
magpi3 5y ago
The main takeaway from the article is an old one: play and learning are very closely related and perhaps our instincts for play have been honed by the evolutionary benefits of that relationship.
zoren 5y ago
I’ll tell you one thing about useless stuff. Sometimes it turns out to be useful, only in a way you hadn’t imagined.
ra423 5y ago
I have crushed so many of my cool ideas by "who would use this". Now I know why should I create stuff even if no one is going to use it.
ulzeraj 5y ago
I'm far from starting any personal project at all during my Saturdays but I do have a useless stuff fascination. I'm often wondering myself why I watch so many videos about people fixing or modding old Amiga and 68k computers. Those computers are bare and raw compared with what we have today. However I find those fascinating. I wonder what is like to write programs in these machines.
DonHopkins 5y ago
That's why Factorio is such fun and addictive crack for programmers: it's 100% useless stuff! There are no stake holders screaming for features. No QA nit picking and submitting bugs against your unique artistic self-expressions. No customers canceling their subscriptions because they don't like the coal smoke belching megafactory bitcoin mine you just built in their back yard. You can do whatever you fucking well please, for as long as you want, and don't have to answer to anyone. The only existing life in the universe is you and the bugs. And you can disable the bugs if you like! What other programming environment has a "disable bugs" feature that works?
DonHopkins 5y ago
>A "better" CHIP-8 that supports networking and sound CHIP-∞ that supports unicode and symbolic algebraic computation
beardyw 5y ago
Now I am retired and have chronic fatigue where interaction with others exhausts me, programming without any pressure is a great way to settle my brain. Probably not for everyone, but having been coding for nearly 50 years it's what I am made of!
refactor_master 5y ago
On the one hand I fully understand the hobbyist aspect, as well as how it could make a candidate better. On the other, it’s a slightly sickening work ideal.
daviddaviddavid 5y ago
The number one reason at this point in my life (44 years old, fulltime programmer) that I tend to not have any side projects at all is my absolute disdain for physically being tethered to a computer. After a full week of staring at a screen and sitting too much (I alternate between standing/sitting desks all day) and typing, the last thing in the world that I want to do is more of that. Which is unfortunate, because there are numerous fun programming projects that I'm itching to do. So I play music and make elaborate chalk art with my kid and garden and ride my bike like a madman. And I suspect that I'm better for it. (Though I'd probably be better at my day job if I were doing those side projects.)
- kharak 5y ago
  I realized at some point, that I would actually love coding, if it could be physicalized. Like the games Factorio or Satisfactorio. Give me VR/AR and a 3D programming language and I'd get willfully lost for days. But sitting or standing for hours and hours in front of a screen, I'm starting to resent it. This goes so far that I started thinking about building a backpack with an extendable arm to hold my laptop in front of me. Still 2D and physically moving doesn't add to the programming task, but at least I could move while working.
  - elliottkember 5y ago
    Try a treadmill desk! I used one once. Very slow speed. Just shifting your weight from foot to foot really. Ambling. Surprisingly nice!
  - ehnto 5y ago
    > I realized at some point, that I would actually love coding, if it could be physicalized. Like the games Factorio or Satisfactorio. Give me VR/AR and a 3D programming language and I'd get willfully lost for days. I have thought about that a lot, so much of software is ephemeral, and I find I can never talk to anyone in the real world about it making it feel even more ephemeral. I don't intend to retrain exactly as I do love software, but I have been trying to work with software that interacts with the real world more often, and I have been adding lots of hands on skills to my skill collection. Working in robotics or automation could potentially be a decent blend of software and the real-world that still has career prospects, and if anyone has any suggestions on more hands-on software industries I would love to hear them.
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slmjkdbtl 5y ago
The worst thing is there's always people commenting: Why are you reinventing wheels? Why don't you just use Unity? These trigger me every time.
lamby 5y ago
Reminds me of the Daoist parable about the "useless" tree that never gets cut down.

772 points by azhenley 5y ago

I love making tiny projects for fun and not for profit, using tools I enjoy working with and not tools I would need to scale to a trillion users, trying ideas I like and not ideas I can monetize. I almost forgot why I enjoyed coding.

dheera 5y ago

I build a lot of "useless" stuff too. Where by useless I mean useful to me, but isn't ever going to have customers. A. Educational value is a thing. Not everything needs to be a business with customers. Not every project needs to make money. Many of my projects teach me something about science, tech, or arts. B. Fun is a thing. Building stuff is a way to enjoy life for me, similar to spending time on the beach. A couple of my more "useless" projects: https://dheera.net/projects/4x5/ https://dheera.net/projects/4x5/ https://dheera.net/projects/mnist-clock/ https://dheera.net/projects/mnist-clock/ https://dheera.net/projects/einkframe/ https://dheera.net/projects/einkframe/ https://dheera.net/projects/shoji-lamps/ https://dheera.net/projects/shoji-lamps/

radiator 5y ago
Someone who wouldn't want to undersell those projects could use the term art instead of useless.
- dheera 5y ago
  Oh I just called them "useless" in mockery of the HN sense of the word, i.e. in the same sense of the word that TFA speaks of: not being able to scale it into a unicorn startup with customers. But yes, they are useful to me as art, as educational projects, as fun, etc.

justin_oaks 5y ago

The biggest reason to make useless stuff instead of useful stuff is to avoid harassment. If you have something useful on GitHub then entitled users will come out of the woodwork to request features, report "bugs" (read: the user is doing something wrong), or otherwise expect free work out of you.

dheera 5y ago
Let them know they are free to make a pull request? I don't see this as a reason to specifically avoid useful stuff.
- swiftcoder 5y ago
  That's precisely the point. They aren't free to make a pull request. A pull request puts a time demand on the project owner to review and merge the patch. What they are free to do is fork the project, and do whatever the hell they want to in the fork.
  - ratww 5y ago
    Yep. It's a cathedral rather than a bazaar [1]. A very small cathedral, but still one. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cathedral_and_the_Bazaar https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cathedral_and_the_Bazaar
toast0 5y ago
I haven't gotten any feedback on my github stuff (which isn't quite useless, just not useful to many), but it's pretty easy to ignore feedback in general, and it's not too hard to turn off issues; not sure if you can turn off pull requests though.
watwut 5y ago
Wasn't really my experience. Besides, github have tons of useful smaller projects that either don't have any issues filed by strangers or have them while author happily ignores those.You have make something pretty big to have big enough community for it to cause issues. And if that really bothers you, you can turn off issues in github.

grouphugs 5y ago

must be nice to be so fortunate, but this is just regular nazi greed

rdiddly 5y ago

Building useful stuff with a "user base" of one falls under that too. I'm my own customer.

ssivark 5y ago

Love the OP's attitude. It's perfect for anyone looking to explore computing as a medium. The HN comments they quote (shipping for customers, and avoiding pointless homework) come from a very different perspective -- where the medium being explored is not computing, but rather the process of satisfying specific human needs in the context of a "market". Both have their own value; it's just that they're completely orthogonal in intent and worth not conflating.

jfoster 5y ago
The quote attributed to me was on the topic of "challenging projects every programmer should try": https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21790779 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21790779 It's not that I would recommend every project must have customers, but I do think that most programmers will learn & grow tremendously if they take on a project where they are trying to directly satisfy a set of customers. It came to mind because whilst there's a tendency to focus on projects that are technically challenging or interesting, I think such a project would perhaps prove even more challenging, albeit in very different ways.

revskill 5y ago

I once tried to setup isomorphic Haskell webapp (haskell on both server and client) and i learnt a bunch of things. The result is useless, not practical but their knowledge is practical, and it's what matters to me, not the result.

dorkwood 5y ago

> And if those aren't enough, I have several more useless projects planned! I can't wait to get started on them: I feel like this is such a key technique for maintaining momentum with your personal projects -- always keep a list of things you want to work on next. I'll often find myself day-dreaming about the next thing on my list while I'm still tinkering away on my current project. After I realized how important this was for myself, I started noticing other people doing it too; apparently whenever Bob Dylan had an idea, he'd write it down and put it in a box. When it came time to create, he'd open the box.

legerdemain 5y ago

A lot of people who insist on building only stuff they can sell have very little business sense. They rarely seem to know if what they're building has any real chance of making money. As a result, they end up building a lot of stuff that's both useless and boring.

spottybanana 5y ago

Doesn't sound like useless to me, these projects sound very educational.

boothby 5y ago

I didn't know anything about compilers, but I figured out how to compile Piet programs, so I wrote a compiler[1]. The project has stalled out for (a) lack of free time and (b) some silly ambitions, but I don't care what the public thinks about my lack of updates, and that's great. In the meantime, I've been going down weird rabbit holes and learning aspects of computing that I missed in school. [1] https://github.com/boothby/repiet https://github.com/boothby/repiet

leifg 5y ago

I came to the same conclusion over the time. Mainly because I figured out: When you want to build stuff for profit, coding is an afterthought. There are so many tasks necessary that involve zero coding. You essentially become your own product manager that needs to talk to (potential) customers, completely reevaluate your value proposition, do marketing sales. The more time you spend on coding, the higher the chance your assumptions about what people want are wrong. If you want to spend 100% coding I would argue that's impossible to make profitably.

nly 5y ago
"Coding" is a small part of most software engineering roles though. I mean I think I've written more code in 2 weeks working on useless hobby projects than I have in 2 years professionally. I'm not even exaggerating
- trangon 5y ago
  Sounds like you aren’t working on a greenfield project, granted most people aren’t. But it’s not like that for everyone.

mrweasel 5y ago

Most of the projects I do for fun is either project I know customers are working on, or stuff we already have at work. This gives me a goal, and gives me a sense of how hard the problem actually is. If it does work out, no one care, the thing already exists. I also have a project I normally use when attempting to learn a new language. It involves naked women and copyright violations, but it get’s me around most aspects of a language and gives me a sense of how complete a language and its eco-system it.

cosmojg 5y ago
> It involves naked women and copyright violations, but it get’s me around most aspects of a language and gives me a sense of how complete a language and its eco-system it. You can't just leave us hanging like that. What's the project?
- atatatat 5y ago
  Custom "The Fappening" viewer?
- mrweasel 5y ago
  One of the Danish newspaper have a page 9 girl (like the UK page 3 girl). One of the magazines have a "girl of the week" (they also have a male version if that's more your thing). For my learning project, for the last four language I looked at, my code grabs the latest "page 9" girl every day, and builds up an archive. Because Denmark is a small country, the girls in the newspaper will frequently have appeared in the magazine at some point, to it checks their archive and try to build up a merged archive. It's a neat little project for learning, because you need to do at least: http requests, regex, database integration, an web application (to browse the archive), scheduling and how to use modules/package/third-party libraries. Later iterations also adds a REST api, so I can use the project to learn how to write JavaScript application.

neolog 5y ago

I'm curious how much money you make from the affiliate links on your site?

adamius 5y ago

Is it useless? Compare coding these projects to Dorodango https://www.laurenceking.com/blog/2019/09/26/dorodango-blog/ https://www.laurenceking.com/blog/2019/09/26/dorodango-blog/ Perhaps the act is the end in itself. The journey in this case is probably more important than the destination.

mosselman 5y ago
This is amazing. I totally see the parallel to coding little things that are 'useless'. It is a form of meditation maybe. Working on 'useless' code is a sort of massage for the mind sometimes.
Delk 5y ago
I think the important thing is that considering a project useless frees one of any obligation to think about its usefulness. It might not be useless but its value might come from not trying to be useful. Which is probably what you meant anyway, but I think "useless" means two different things here.

DoreenMichele 5y ago

Sounds like this is how he keeps his interest in coding alive and his ability to enjoy it in spite of getting paid to do it. If you only do what you get paid to do as a coder, you may grow to hate it and this can be career-ending. You could suffer burnout or just decide to quit or get fired and no one wants you anymore. The first rule of sustainable productivity is taking care of the thing doing the producing. If that's a human, that isn't limited to physical wellbeing, especially if they are producing knowledge work.

asimjalis 5y ago

I love this. I feel the same way as OP. Question in my mind is why is this? Can we understand what makes our own useless projects so engaging?

nicbou 5y ago
You accept from the start that you will be the only critic, user and contributor of the project, so you do whatever you want.
MaxBarraclough 5y ago
My own guesswork answer: a 'useless project' necessarily combines a personal interest with the total absence of external obligations. Productive work sometimes has the former property, but rarely has the latter. A successful useful unpaid project might feel like an obligation, if there are users and a community around it. Note: does not apply to Fabrice Bellard, with his remarkable talent for building incredibly useful software on a whim, on his own, in secret (at least initially).
scaramanga 5y ago
The intrinsic urge to create. That and the fact that the creation is taking place outside of any coercive or exploitative relationship.

mam3 5y ago

Sure its nice to be "loving what you do" and its always better than having somensort of external pressure. Now saying you really prefer to do specifically useless stuff seems like glorifying a weakness for no reason. Why not leaving an open door to both have fun and make money ? Seems like the author tries to make some moral/practical higher ground because he cant deal with the ambivalence of whether what he does is for some "inherent" pleasure or for money. At the end of the day the way your deal with you psychology is not my problem. Having fun if is cool. Making money is cool in another way. If mixing both is too hard for you the maybe you really dont have any real problem in your life. That post wont get too much of my sympathy.

jhatemyjob 5y ago
Yea it seems like OP is writing a bunch of throwaway projects that don't go anywhere. What's the point of writing software if nobody is gonna use it? I'd rather go do something else. Like go hiking or swimming or something.... Don't get me wrong, I like coding videogames as much as the next guy but it's like, if nobody is gonna play it then what's the point?
- cupofcoffee 5y ago
  The point is you get better at it.
  - hamburglar 5y ago
    And some people find it fun.
  - mrwoggle 5y ago
    Yeah, you become a better programmer. And if it is fun while you at it, it another win.
- gammalost 5y ago
  The point is that he enjoys them. Throwaway project can be like a puzzle (at least for me). Pick a subject, find some problem and figure it out. I could ask the same about going hiking, what's the point of that? You're still back home at the end of the day.

nicbou 5y ago

Since a little less than two years, I live from a website I built, and I have a lot more control over my schedule. Since then, I built a lot more useless stuff. I'm the only user. I can hardcode things, introduce breaking changes, manually migrate data and so on. I can cut corners, or over-engineer everything. Other people can use it, but I don't care about what they think of my variable names, or which features they want. The turning point for me was the concept of apps as home-cooked meals [0]. If a gardener can grow flowers only he will see, I can write code only I will run. [0] https://www.robinsloan.com/notes/home-cooked-app/ https://www.robinsloan.com/notes/home-cooked-app/

headmelted 5y ago
Genuinely curious - Are you saying here that you have a blog that runs on your own code or your income comes from the project? I only ask as if you’ve discovered a way to produce an income from coding something your own way while still having no-one else to answer to then I too would like to reach Valhalla and you must show me the way.
- NetOpWibby 5y ago
  Show us the way!
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
- ackbar03 5y ago
  https://images.app.goo.gl/G4k1Tu3mYCaFJ1dw8 https://images.app.goo.gl/G4k1Tu3mYCaFJ1dw8
- nicbou 5y ago
  It's a content website with affiliate income, nothing outstanding. It worked really well, but that was just luck. I didn't expect that, and I couldn't do it twice. Before that, I worked programming contracts, and 3-4 months of those per year would also suffice. Given our profession, many of us could also work less and live on half their income.

seg_lol 5y ago

It isn't useless by any stretch, it is non-Commericial, it is playful, experimental. I understand the sentiment and the terminology, not challenging it, but being silly and playful should be just as valid as making a your next open source side hustle. Once things start getting _serious_ for some definition, a whole other cloud rolls in. There is now a right way to do things, but how do we know this is the right way. How do the boundaries get pushed? Much of the time, best practices is a signaling phrase to have an in group and an out group. Things like esolangs give one cover to be playful. For example if you try metaprogramming in Python, you will be called out as unpythonic. If you create classes in Python with public member variables, you will be ridiculed.

_wldu 5y ago

I agree 100%. All my programs are "Toy Programs" and they are very fun to build and use.

pjmlp 5y ago

Same approach over here. I try new approaches and languages, occasionally something gets dumped into Github for the usual headhunters requests for HR filter. Turning them into useful stuff for others? Well that is what work is for.

brundolf 5y ago

It’s funny, my favorite useless projects have also mostly been compilers and game engines! +1 to this mindset. I would go even further and suggest that useless projects tend to be morally superior to useful ones. A lot (not all) of the useful software out there ends up being used to make the world worse, but useless software can only ever inspire joy (in yourself and, hopefully, in others).

ratww 5y ago
Agree. Something else: Useless software is also very educational. I'm also into compilers and engines. I learned 3d programming by looking at small projects online. The "worse" the code, the easier to learn. If I had tried to follow the Unreal/Unity/Godot codebase I'd still be at the intro screen.
tachyonbeam 5y ago
Personally, I got to the point where I realized that trying hard to make software that's useful can turn a side-project into something stressful, essentially a second job on top of my regular full-time job, which I just can't do, too much risk of burnout. Trying to turn something into a side-business adds a lot of constraints. You're not just playing anymore, you have to optimize everything towards the goal of making profit. However, I still think you can enjoy working on things that are useful, to yourself and other people, and not for profit. The projects I'm the most proud of are projects I've shared that have been used and appreciated by many users online. You just have to keep the project small and simple, and keep your expectations low.
chii 5y ago
> useless projects tend to be morally superior to useful ones people have claimed that crypto mining is useless too - but a lot of people also claim that crypto mining is morally wrong since it consumes vast amounts of electricity for "no reason". I think there's no such thing as morally superior, and a project is never useless to any and everyone. A "useless" project is taken to mean useless to everyone else but the author (since it inspires joy - which makes it not useless). So in other words, a project that's only useful for yourself is morally superior. However, that's just another way to describe selfishness. So by the transitive property, being selfish must be morally superior!

tooltower 5y ago

This is exactly why I hate the expansive IP contracts I've had to sign with my employer. It effectively requires me to ask permission for publishing these useless weekend stuff, robbing me of the joy.

chadcmulligan 5y ago
I just cross those bits out - I'm just writing a crud app for you - and you want to own everything I think - yah, na, happy to sign over copyright for the code I write for you (literally the conversation I had for my last contract). If they say no, oh well.

kevinventullo 5y ago

I think I’m somewhere in between. I like thinking about (and sometimes building) things that are possibly useful, but difficult or painful to monetize. Kind of an academic approach where I don’t need to grovel for funding.

rpastuszak 5y ago

yes, we need more toys! https://sonnet.io/posts/reactive-hole/ https://sonnet.io/posts/reactive-hole/

abhinav22 5y ago

This is something I try to be careful of. Programming takes time, which is an opportunity cost as we get older. If I was well off, I would love to relax my mind on projects not going anywhere. However until that point, I try to do something that I feel has some value (or hope will one day). That said, I do agree with the general premise that work is where we spend to make money and we should relax in our spare time. The criteria for me is that I should enjoy what I’m doing and it should have some small chance of success. But as long as I enjoy it, then I’ll be okay. Better to do a project with 2% chance of success that I enjoy than one of 50% chance of success that I feel like a chore. Life’s too short. However I would not be able to actively do a project with zero chance of any value (learning can be achieved through many ways, so I don’t count that as value on the outset, only as justification for the time spent afterwards). I rather go for a walk then. There are only a few hours a day where I have the energy to code, it’s too precious to waste. (ps sorry for the over use of first person - just wanted to share my perspective)

ExtraE 5y ago
> (ps sorry for the over use of first person - just wanted to share my perspective) Why do you feel bad about/dislike first person (in this context)?
- abhinav22 5y ago
  It becomes (or at least implies) too much anecdotal, which is not ideal for a unopinonated discussion. Excessive use of first person imo is a good flag that the writer is too self concerned (egotistical), which can interfere with their judgement (as it’s affected by ego and not a cold, rational look at both sides). Which I’m guilty of from time to time. I realized that as I was halfway through, but it was too late in the night so I just pressed reply :)

ransom1538 5y ago

Did someone say useless stuff! I love useless projects. Do you need a doctor that is published on the procedure you are about to have? https://www.opendoctor.io/research/?research_papers=mohs+surgery&zip=32765&search=search https://www.opendoctor.io/research/?research_papers=mohs+sur... What about ranking doctors based on their Opioid subscription count? I got you covered. https://www.opendoctor.io/opioid/highest/ https://www.opendoctor.io/opioid/highest/

PicassoCTs 5y ago

The usefulness question is the a poison to discovery. How many things we use in our daily life would have survived the first peer review for usefulness? The printing press? Makes no sense, use scribes. The public cant even read. The internet? Why would people use a computer to communicate and share data? Its super slow, just send a magnetic drive or even better, copy the images on paper. Solar power? We have coal, oil, nuclear, that stuff has no future. If something is not useful, in dubio assume, that it is, but you just are not capable of seeing the use or the market it will create.

ExtraE 5y ago
I mean, your point is a good one but those are bad examples. The printing press was made to print bibles in bulk. The internet was made by the DOD and universities, not to transfer large files/images but for small text documents. Solar came from LEDs which were discovered by accident by scientists working on other semiconductors (trying to find something useful), but to your credit probably explored because it was interesting. 99% of the work done on solar now is to do something useful.

stadium 5y ago

I've been building a useless app in my free time, an hour here or there, for the last 2 months. Then last week at work, I got a chance to contribute to a project that happened to use the same stack. It was random luck. And the useless project prepared me for the useful one that pays me a salary.

nly 5y ago
This happens all the time to me as well. I think the flip side of this is that, for most of us, it's very hard to learn new and interesting stuff in our paid software engineering roles. Day to day tends to be dominated by maintaining code you didn't write, dealing with business concerns, or greasing the tiny wheels in the big machine that your team covers.

dredmorbius 5y ago

There seems to be a critical role of consequence-free exploration (or at least consequence-reduced) in creativity. Richard Feynman's commentary on being burned out and playing with ideas of spinning plates, which culminated in his Nobel Prize award, comes to mind. Recently featured on HN (and something of a perennial favourite): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26931359 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26931359 https://www.asc.ohio-state.edu/kilcup.1/262/feynman.html?repostindays=413 https://www.asc.ohio-state.edu/kilcup.1/262/feynman.html?rep... You'll find similar observations regarding corporate research and development. See David Hounshell's work on R&D at DuPont: Science and Corporate Strategy: Du Pont R&D 1902-1980, originally published in the 1980s. https://www.worldcat.org/title/science-and-corporate-strategy-du-pont-rd-1902-1980/oclc/1086231462 https://www.worldcat.org/title/science-and-corporate-strateg... Similar stories exist for AT&T's Bell Labs, Xerox PARC, IBM Research, and even Ford Motor Company's research division. In the case of the latter, Henry Ford (in)famously gave his engineers significant discretion, but somewhat-less-than-optimal equipment, the latter apparently a spur to creativity in order to overcome limitations. Geoffrey West has discussed this regarding the Santa Fe Institute, I believe in the Q&A of this presentation: https://youtube.com/watch?v=w-8sbSPf4ko https://youtube.com/watch?v=w-8sbSPf4ko (At 1:09:00) West quotes the late Max Perutz's guidelines for organizing research, in full: Impishly, whenever he was asked whether there are simple guidelines along which to organise research so that it will be highly creative, he would say: no politics, no committees, no reports, no referees, no interviews; just gifted, highly motivated people picked by a few men of good judgment. Certainly not the way research is usually run in our fuzzy democracy but, from a man of great gifts and of extremely good judgment, such a reply is not elitist. It is simply to be expected, for Max had practised it and shown that this recipe is right for those who, in science, want to beat the world by getting the best in the world to beat a path to their door. http://www.theguardian.com/news/2002/feb/07/guardianobituaries.obituaries http://www.theguardian.com/news/2002/feb/07/guardianobituari... As an anti-creative environment, the most effective obstruction is to ensure that everything is not only consequential, but a path to failure. This tends to emerge in oppressive and excessively bureaucratic environments. John Cleese outlines the general parameters toward the end of this presentation: https://youtube.com/watch?v=Pb5oIIPO62g https://youtube.com/watch?v=Pb5oIIPO62g The start-up world seems to me to increasingly exemplify the high-consequence, no-win environment.

jack_riminton 5y ago

The thing I love most about useless projects is the freedom to not explain anything to anyone. That’s the part about painting that I love the most too. You don’t understand it? I don’t care

stemlord 5y ago

Obviously it's not useless. I'd say it's super important even, because it fosters a culture beyond the dominant capitalist culture of consumption for the sake of consumption which seems to eat away at every facet of living leaving complete emptiness of meaning in its wake. This is fundamentally what 20th century capitalist critique is all about and IMO a big reason why contemporary art practice is all about critical theory

cryptica 5y ago

Making useless stuff is nice if you and everyone else knows that it's useless and you can optimize the activity for maximum learning. I hate making useless stuff when everyone else believes that it's useful. Then the work is usually tedious, repetitive, stressful and frustrating. There is 0 satisfaction. You just want to waste as much time as possible to maximize your hours/income.

Areading314 5y ago

> A typed Lisp compiler with a focus on performance Not useless and much needed!

WalterGR 5y ago

What’s the game? shown in the second image from the left?

azhenley 5y ago
Unnamed and unreleased :) I occasionally work on it when I can’t sleep. I hope to release it one day...

tester756 5y ago

Over years I had shitton of random `abnsadc234` named projects that I used to learn, test, grasp, actually implement some concept. The thing about $customer_ready software is that huge % of it is just "boring" stuff, the exciting $core is just small part.

xyzelement 5y ago

This is subjective, but my personal threshold for when "useless" is OK or not depends on what's going on in the rest of your life. If you are making a good living, your family is taken care of, etc. etc. then go ahead and make as much useless stuff, because empirically you are making good life decisions and your useless stuff is just fun - doesn't detract from value, or perhaps even helps you learn useful skills that translate into your money-making life. On the other hand, if you're having employment or financial problems of any sort, the last thing you should be thinking about is "useless" stuff, because there're indicators in your life that you should be focusing on how to make more value for yourself (by making things of value to others.) I guess that's the same for everything, not just useless projects. I'd have the same criteria for watching a lot of TV - fine if your life is on track, probably should stop if there are other problems!

egypturnash 5y ago
I have spent the past five minutes trying to come up with the politest way to say “I wanna smack your miserable Greyface ass with a copy of In Praise Of Idleness” and I have given up.
schwartzworld 5y ago
There's nothing wrong with having a hobby for the sake of it just being fun. But if you insist on thinking about everything in terms of money, realize how many well-paid programmers started out as hobbyists. Learning to create now can translate to big bucks later. For me, I build software for a living, but a lot of my hobby projects are completely useless to anybody but me. I build them in languages and tools that require me to think differently, and the new way of thinking influences the code I write at work. This has paid off in terms of career trajectory, for sure. There is a bonus, in that me being a better programmer means I can spend less of my time figuring out how to write it, which means more time with my family.

nn3 5y ago

I talked to someone who just finished their CS degree. He said "The school had all the rights for the graduation work, so I made sure it was a useless as possible"

calltrak 5y ago

I built this useless project https://picc.io https://picc.io its for sharing images. The idea has been done to death I admit and there is a snowballs chance it would take off. I can't seem to get any one to use it.My visitors stats are a joke. Imgur owns peoples minds in this space! And I suck monkey balls at marketing (not literally, i'm glad to add)

anta40 5y ago

This is very cool. If I were interviewing for candidates, I'd definitely ask for their "useless stuffs". Sure, being able to develop and maintain whatever you need for your company is important, but sometimes you don't have much degree to employ your creativity.

ajxs 5y ago

I definitely identify with the author. A big mistake I made in the past was to assume that other software engineers are equally enthusiastic about these kind of projects, or the least bit impressed by them. I was asked for a job interview to prepare presentations on two projects I was particularly proud of. I chose a hobby Operating System kernel I'd developed from the ground up, and a fully-functional MIPS assembler I had written. The interviewers (senior developers within the company) really just did not get it. Responding with questions such as: "Is this going to make you any money?", and "When do you expect this to be complete?". They really couldn't understand my motivations. I did these projects for no other reason than that I love programming, and I have never stopped loving learning about it. I have never needed to consider, or justify to myself why I did these things. I do them because I enjoy what I do. I ended up pivoting to discuss some comparatively banal professional project migrating a mid-sized financial product to a new tech-stack, which managed to captivate their attention. I found this experience extremely disheartening, however important a lesson it was to learn. I don't think it's changed my outlook in any way though, admittedly. I still work on the same kinds of projects, and I still think the best developers are the ones who do work on toy projects for their own enjoyment.

jefftk 5y ago
That's a really disappointing reaction you got. If I was interviewing someone who described having implemented a kernel or an assembler for fun I would be thrilled!
- scaramanga 5y ago
  Right! If GP is looking for a job then for the love of god, please email gianni at my-hn-user-name dot co dot uk :)
- monsieurbanana 5y ago
  You would be thrilled, but would that get the candidate the job? A very common topic about programming is how useless are most whiteboard job interviews, as they challenge the interviewees on something they will never use in the job. Few things are farther away from day-to-day programming that a white-board problem, but kernel development might just be one of them. In regards to the GP story, I'm also saddened that the interviewers didn't show interest for those projects. Kernel development indicates a high aptitude for many kinds of unrelated programming jobs, but not for most of them. Especially "enterprise" jobs. For the purposes of the interview the "banal professional project" is likely the relevant one. If anything, having the senior developers show no interest is a good thing, and indicates that even if the candidate gets the job he probably won't enjoy his time at the company.

dw-im-here 5y ago

The world isn't ready for one, let alone _two_ new todo apps for iOS

Sparkyte 5y ago

I think toy projects are a great exercise to innovate your conventional way to write code. For example you can't necessarily improve if you can't simply how you write. Readability is essential in code. So practice makes perfect and writing for profit often requires redundancy which does neither the programmer or the customer any good.

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phonebucket 5y ago

> I’ve always pursued my interests without much regard for final value or value to the world ... I’ve spent lots of time on totally useless things. - Claude Shannon [1] He is known for a large number of playful side projects. [1] https://spectrum.ieee.org/tech-history/cyberspace/claude-shannon-tinkerer-prankster-and-father-of-information-theory https://spectrum.ieee.org/tech-history/cyberspace/claude-sha...

raevilman 5y ago

I agree. I tweeted my thoughts on same lines an hour back. But in my case, project is going to be a bit long term. https://twitter.com/raevilman/status/1396683828907941888?s=19 https://twitter.com/raevilman/status/1396683828907941888?s=1...

supernihil 5y ago

Over the years ive found myself with my "hobby art-ware" between two seats: programmers/engineers that, contrary to my expectation, dont see the value and ask questions like "is it on product hunt?" And the other camp being my artist friends who ask: "what do you wanna say with this, what is the concept" I finally have found piece in my "stuff" being a product of my intuitive curiosity and therefore not bound by the same laws of explanation :-)

blocked_again 5y ago

My philosophy is, as long as you are financially independent, you earned your right to work on useless projects. If not focus your energy on making a recurring source of income which generates money even if you end up in hospital for 1 year.

jlokier 5y ago
My philosophy is that it is harsh to treat it as a luxury that should be limited to those who achieve financial independence, because most people won't achieve that independence no matter how hard they try (or if they do they will be rather old, i.e. retired), but the need for creative leisure and self-expression throughout life is strong in a lot of people.
- blocked_again 5y ago
  I agree. My comment was mostly from the perspective of a software engineer. I have not achieved financial independence. Is no where close at the moment. But still the philosophy remains. I don't think it's that hard to achieve financial independence especially if you are a software engineer. So giving up even before trying is not the most optimimum decision I think.

mattlondon 5y ago

Couldn't agree more with this. There is a lot of sentiment on HN about how you should be making a side business or selling your own stuff or being your own boss or getting your first 100 paying customers or your $xxxxx MRR or whatever. That is all fine, but I think that line of thought can be a little bit toxic at times: you don't have to be continually hustling for the next dollar all the time - it is ok to do stuff simply for the joy of it.

ronyfadel 5y ago
I disagree with this. Sure, hackers get excited at people posting business/financial success stories, but a big chunk of HN gets super excited about hacks that are smart but have no economic viability. This comes in stark contrast to the IndieHackers/ProductHunt/Twitter builder communities, who are all about making revenue and not about tinkering and doing cool hacks.

ogou 5y ago

Some the comments here are disheartening. So much crass dismissal of anything not monetized. A lot of what we use on regular basis got started with simple ideas for things with limited usefulness at the time. I remember when there was much more creative energy in this industry. Obviously, tech is a major economic force now. But, that pretense of creativity and exploration is still being exploited. That's why we are funneling entire generations into coding classes, maker spaces, and youth empowering tech initiatives. They are being told, "learn to love coding. explore your dreams". Very quickly they get redirected into conformist production paths so they become tools. What a shame. Long live creativity and self-determination.

TeMPOraL 5y ago
It's ironic. Where do software companies get their highly technically competent developers? Most of them don't train people, nor do they give enough time for developing deep technical skills. They rely on people who picked up most of the necessary experience prior to joining, and then maybe transferring some of their knowledge to others. But where do those original knowledgeable people gain their skills, if not at their jobs? By doing useless side projects.
- rualca 5y ago
  > But where do those original knowledgeable people gain their skills, if not at their jobs? By doing useless side projects. So much this. The time you have is a finite resource, and technical expertise is a function of how you invest your time in activities that enable you to learn and grow. More often than not, your job is not aligned with your career plan or growth path. So how is it possible to bridge that gap? Well, through your own persona projects, projects whose goals are set by you and are not encumbered by third party requirements and don't even have to have a business model. Just coding. Corporations want the reward of investing time in learning and exploring, but they don't want to foot the bill.
- mehphp 5y ago
  They don’t sound so useless to me then :) They clearly led to the development of skills that produce great economic value.

abinaya_rl 5y ago

Nothing is useless. Either you are learning something or teach yourself not to make that in the future as a business :)

pythonist 5y ago

I must say that I also relate with the author and would add that making things just for fun or your own curiosity or even need, can be beneficial to others too, directly or indirectly. With every toy project, new skills are acquired. Useful or not, you cannot now at the time, but I can say that if I did not make toy projects, I would not have jobs that I had and some of the projects that others also find useful, like https://newreleases.io https://newreleases.io, would not exist.

Popegaf 5y ago

Why does anybody care what you do during your free time as long as it: - is fun - doesn't hurt anybody (except possibly yourself)? Go write books, programs, plays, scripts, go do sports, go do drugs (responsibly), go drink, go play board games or online games, just do it. It's your life, your body and your decisions.

laymonage 5y ago

Before I decided to pursue my CS degree and write software for a living, I was afraid that getting stressed from university/work would make me hate programming. One of the reasons that kept me going was because I still try to find the time to make stuff like this. It reminds me how programming can be fun.

Tade0 5y ago

I remember when I was in college and told my friend that I just spent a sizeable (for a student) amount of money on an electric guitar and couldn't be happier. His reply was: so, how are you planning on making that money back with it? I had no reply to that. There are people who, as zombie fiction for teenage audiences author Jonathan Maberry put it "think like insects" - they have but one overriding goal in life: maximize their total wealth. This is an approach to life so foreign to me yet so often rewarded that it makes me wonder who's really happier. One thing I know is that I hate working with such people - reading their code feels like listening to muzak - it works, but there doesn't seem to be any actual thought or design behind it. Long term it becomes unmaintainable, but that usually doesn't matter much, because projects get rewritten all the time.

magpi3 5y ago

The main takeaway from the article is an old one: play and learning are very closely related and perhaps our instincts for play have been honed by the evolutionary benefits of that relationship.

zoren 5y ago

I’ll tell you one thing about useless stuff. Sometimes it turns out to be useful, only in a way you hadn’t imagined.

ra423 5y ago

I have crushed so many of my cool ideas by "who would use this". Now I know why should I create stuff even if no one is going to use it.

ulzeraj 5y ago

I'm far from starting any personal project at all during my Saturdays but I do have a useless stuff fascination. I'm often wondering myself why I watch so many videos about people fixing or modding old Amiga and 68k computers. Those computers are bare and raw compared with what we have today. However I find those fascinating. I wonder what is like to write programs in these machines.

DonHopkins 5y ago

That's why Factorio is such fun and addictive crack for programmers: it's 100% useless stuff! There are no stake holders screaming for features. No QA nit picking and submitting bugs against your unique artistic self-expressions. No customers canceling their subscriptions because they don't like the coal smoke belching megafactory bitcoin mine you just built in their back yard. You can do whatever you fucking well please, for as long as you want, and don't have to answer to anyone. The only existing life in the universe is you and the bugs. And you can disable the bugs if you like! What other programming environment has a "disable bugs" feature that works?

DonHopkins 5y ago

>A "better" CHIP-8 that supports networking and sound CHIP-∞ that supports unicode and symbolic algebraic computation

beardyw 5y ago

Now I am retired and have chronic fatigue where interaction with others exhausts me, programming without any pressure is a great way to settle my brain. Probably not for everyone, but having been coding for nearly 50 years it's what I am made of!

refactor_master 5y ago

On the one hand I fully understand the hobbyist aspect, as well as how it could make a candidate better. On the other, it’s a slightly sickening work ideal.

daviddaviddavid 5y ago

The number one reason at this point in my life (44 years old, fulltime programmer) that I tend to not have any side projects at all is my absolute disdain for physically being tethered to a computer. After a full week of staring at a screen and sitting too much (I alternate between standing/sitting desks all day) and typing, the last thing in the world that I want to do is more of that. Which is unfortunate, because there are numerous fun programming projects that I'm itching to do. So I play music and make elaborate chalk art with my kid and garden and ride my bike like a madman. And I suspect that I'm better for it. (Though I'd probably be better at my day job if I were doing those side projects.)

kharak 5y ago
I realized at some point, that I would actually love coding, if it could be physicalized. Like the games Factorio or Satisfactorio. Give me VR/AR and a 3D programming language and I'd get willfully lost for days. But sitting or standing for hours and hours in front of a screen, I'm starting to resent it. This goes so far that I started thinking about building a backpack with an extendable arm to hold my laptop in front of me. Still 2D and physically moving doesn't add to the programming task, but at least I could move while working.
- elliottkember 5y ago
  Try a treadmill desk! I used one once. Very slow speed. Just shifting your weight from foot to foot really. Ambling. Surprisingly nice!
- ehnto 5y ago
  > I realized at some point, that I would actually love coding, if it could be physicalized. Like the games Factorio or Satisfactorio. Give me VR/AR and a 3D programming language and I'd get willfully lost for days. I have thought about that a lot, so much of software is ephemeral, and I find I can never talk to anyone in the real world about it making it feel even more ephemeral. I don't intend to retrain exactly as I do love software, but I have been trying to work with software that interacts with the real world more often, and I have been adding lots of hands on skills to my skill collection. Working in robotics or automation could potentially be a decent blend of software and the real-world that still has career prospects, and if anyone has any suggestions on more hands-on software industries I would love to hear them.

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slmjkdbtl 5y ago

The worst thing is there's always people commenting: Why are you reinventing wheels? Why don't you just use Unity? These trigger me every time.

lamby 5y ago

Reminds me of the Daoist parable about the "useless" tree that never gets cut down.