4 ms·

Show HN: I gave up on the project I'd been working on, so I open-source'd it

32 points by Jarred 15y ago

MatthewB 15y ago
Dang..you've been working on this for a while. Why did you give up?
- Jarred 15y ago
  I gave up because it wasn't that useful and I can do something simpler that's faster to create while making money off of it. It would be much more useful if most textbooks had an API or if teachers required for everything to be typed. The latter is not something that can be asked because there isn't anything out there that's good enough for public high schools to use (some students also don't have computers with a reliable internet connection). There were some minor UX issues with it as well, but that's mostly it.
Encryptor 15y ago
wth does it do?
aymeric 15y ago
Sorry English is not my mother tongue: what is a turn-in box?
- Jarred 15y ago
  In most classrooms teachers have a place for students to put their homework that's due. This is called a turn-in box.
- davyjones 15y ago
  Turn-in as in "Please turn in your homework by Monday." The box being referred to here is the digital version of a physical one.
veyron 15y ago
Have you looked into solutions with deeper integration? I am thinking of WebAssign. iirc they work with the textbook publishers to give more integrated problems (i.e. they would take a textbook problem like "What is the derivative of cos(3x) with respect to x" and would make 3 a magic variable such that each student would see a different problem such as "What is the derivative of cos(4x) with respect to x" or "What is the derivative of cos(5*x) with respect to x")
- Jarred 15y ago
  I would create something better than a textbook before working with textbook publishers. A decent chunk of the reason school is boring is a because of their work.
jontonsoup 15y ago
No tests?
- Jarred 15y ago
  Nope. Students don't type up their answers to tests and I wanted to keep it as compatible as I could.
Rinum 15y ago
I hope the project is of use to someone out there. Best of luck on your next project!
shimi 15y ago
Check out what edmodo (http://www.edmodo.com http://www.edmodo.com) are doing. Same concept with almost 4.5 million users.
christiangenco 15y ago
To those that want to play with it: 1. Download zip: https://github.com/Jarred-Sumner/Jantire/zipball/master https://github.com/Jarred-Sumner/Jantire/zipball/master 2. cd into the directory and run "bundle" 3. Sign up for the scribd API: http://www.scribd.com/developers/signup_api http://www.scribd.com/developers/signup_api 4. Get your API key and API secret: http://www.scribd.com/account/edit#api http://www.scribd.com/account/edit#api 5. Add these to "config/initializers/rscribd.rb" along with your login information on line 5 ('email','password') 6. rake db:migrate 7. rails c: c = Course.new(name:"Biology").save; User.new(email: "example@email.com", password:"password", password_confirmation:"password", teacher:true, first_name:"John",last_name:"Smith", courses:[c]).save 8. rails s; open 'localhost:3000' 9. Login 10. ??? 11. PROFIT Screenshots: http://imgur.com/a/fIxNN#0 http://imgur.com/a/fIxNN#0
- deleted 15y ago
  [deleted]

32 points by Jarred 15y ago

MatthewB 15y ago

Dang..you've been working on this for a while. Why did you give up?

Jarred 15y ago
I gave up because it wasn't that useful and I can do something simpler that's faster to create while making money off of it. It would be much more useful if most textbooks had an API or if teachers required for everything to be typed. The latter is not something that can be asked because there isn't anything out there that's good enough for public high schools to use (some students also don't have computers with a reliable internet connection). There were some minor UX issues with it as well, but that's mostly it.

Encryptor 15y ago

wth does it do?

aymeric 15y ago

Sorry English is not my mother tongue: what is a turn-in box?

Jarred 15y ago
In most classrooms teachers have a place for students to put their homework that's due. This is called a turn-in box.
davyjones 15y ago
Turn-in as in "Please turn in your homework by Monday." The box being referred to here is the digital version of a physical one.

veyron 15y ago

Have you looked into solutions with deeper integration? I am thinking of WebAssign. iirc they work with the textbook publishers to give more integrated problems (i.e. they would take a textbook problem like "What is the derivative of cos(3x) with respect to x" and would make 3 a magic variable such that each student would see a different problem such as "What is the derivative of cos(4x) with respect to x" or "What is the derivative of cos(5*x) with respect to x")

Jarred 15y ago
I would create something better than a textbook before working with textbook publishers. A decent chunk of the reason school is boring is a because of their work.

jontonsoup 15y ago

No tests?

Jarred 15y ago
Nope. Students don't type up their answers to tests and I wanted to keep it as compatible as I could.

Rinum 15y ago

I hope the project is of use to someone out there. Best of luck on your next project!

shimi 15y ago

Check out what edmodo (http://www.edmodo.com http://www.edmodo.com) are doing. Same concept with almost 4.5 million users.

christiangenco 15y ago

To those that want to play with it: 1. Download zip: https://github.com/Jarred-Sumner/Jantire/zipball/master https://github.com/Jarred-Sumner/Jantire/zipball/master 2. cd into the directory and run "bundle" 3. Sign up for the scribd API: http://www.scribd.com/developers/signup_api http://www.scribd.com/developers/signup_api 4. Get your API key and API secret: http://www.scribd.com/account/edit#api http://www.scribd.com/account/edit#api 5. Add these to "config/initializers/rscribd.rb" along with your login information on line 5 ('email','password') 6. rake db:migrate 7. rails c: c = Course.new(name:"Biology").save; User.new(email: "example@email.com", password:"password", password_confirmation:"password", teacher:true, first_name:"John",last_name:"Smith", courses:[c]).save 8. rails s; open 'localhost:3000' 9. Login 10. ??? 11. PROFIT Screenshots: http://imgur.com/a/fIxNN#0 http://imgur.com/a/fIxNN#0

deleted 15y ago
[deleted]