5 ms·

Debated it. But truthfully, it's like saying you'll launch the product when it's perfect. It's never done. It's always improving.

by drupeek 14y ago

jonmb 14y ago
"It's always improving." But what is "it"? It does sound like a wiki, or an article with comments. Tell me a story. Get me to empathize. :)
- olliesaunders 14y ago
  I think what drupeek says applies to this as well. You can be working on something and not really know what it is. I wrote this app a quite ago, only took me about 5 days to write it because it was quite simple, but it’s been years since I finally understood what it was for. In designing another system recently, I wrote down my entire thought process as it developed in the form of questions and answers to myself. When I read it back now I can see how I had this mixed up set of ideas and was actually quite confused. Then, as you read down, things start to become clearer and ideas become more developed. I guess it still has quite a long way to go as well because things certainly aren’t as clear as I would like them to be. So the point I’m making is that definition and clarity can take as long, and sometimes--although I think this is infrequent--longer, than the software development. As for the question of whether you should blog about it. I think it’s a difficult call. In a way you could say this story has wasted everyone’s time because I still have no idea what the app drupeek’s developing is about. But on the other hand we wouldn’t be having this conversation now were it not for it.
  - jonmb 14y ago
    Interesting... how did you write an app without knowing what it is for? It seems very backwards to write an app (or create anything, really) and then later figure out what to use it for.
    - olliesaunders 14y ago
      Well I wrote it with one thing in mind and when I finished it, it didn’t really help with that thing much. I was pretty sure it would be useful for other things though. Since then I’ve discovered a couple of other uses for it. I think this happens more when you write something that is very abstract as this is.
lambda 14y ago
We have this long thread, in which you have lots of people asking "what does this product actually do?" No one can figure it out from your pitch, either the original or your rewrite. People have been guessing at what this is like, and yet you haven't really clarified, you've just made excuses. You have the opportunity to get exposure to thousands of hackers, entrepreneurs, and investors, right here on Hacker News. And yet, you haven't yet provided a compelling story that anyone can actually understand. What does your product do? What problems does it solve? How is it better or suited to a different niche than many other tools (wikis, bugtrackers, Google Docs, email) that people already use?

Debated it. But truthfully, it's like saying you'll launch the product when it's perfect. It's never done. It's always improving.

by drupeek 14y ago

Debated it. But truthfully, it's like saying you'll launch the product when it's perfect. It's never done. It's always improving.

jonmb 14y ago

"It's always improving." But what is "it"? It does sound like a wiki, or an article with comments. Tell me a story. Get me to empathize. :)

olliesaunders 14y ago
I think what drupeek says applies to this as well. You can be working on something and not really know what it is. I wrote this app a quite ago, only took me about 5 days to write it because it was quite simple, but it’s been years since I finally understood what it was for. In designing another system recently, I wrote down my entire thought process as it developed in the form of questions and answers to myself. When I read it back now I can see how I had this mixed up set of ideas and was actually quite confused. Then, as you read down, things start to become clearer and ideas become more developed. I guess it still has quite a long way to go as well because things certainly aren’t as clear as I would like them to be. So the point I’m making is that definition and clarity can take as long, and sometimes--although I think this is infrequent--longer, than the software development. As for the question of whether you should blog about it. I think it’s a difficult call. In a way you could say this story has wasted everyone’s time because I still have no idea what the app drupeek’s developing is about. But on the other hand we wouldn’t be having this conversation now were it not for it.
- jonmb 14y ago
  Interesting... how did you write an app without knowing what it is for? It seems very backwards to write an app (or create anything, really) and then later figure out what to use it for.
  - olliesaunders 14y ago
    Well I wrote it with one thing in mind and when I finished it, it didn’t really help with that thing much. I was pretty sure it would be useful for other things though. Since then I’ve discovered a couple of other uses for it. I think this happens more when you write something that is very abstract as this is.

lambda 14y ago

We have this long thread, in which you have lots of people asking "what does this product actually do?" No one can figure it out from your pitch, either the original or your rewrite. People have been guessing at what this is like, and yet you haven't really clarified, you've just made excuses. You have the opportunity to get exposure to thousands of hackers, entrepreneurs, and investors, right here on Hacker News. And yet, you haven't yet provided a compelling story that anyone can actually understand. What does your product do? What problems does it solve? How is it better or suited to a different niche than many other tools (wikis, bugtrackers, Google Docs, email) that people already use?