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Ideas for Computing
I've been writing my ideas down for years. This is a 100 ideas forming an idea of how computers could be.
- txutxu 13y agoI've like many of the ideas. Inspiring. +1 I don't understand very well how would you like to implement the "93 Shell Output Pinning". Usually I do that with an array variable.
- sparkie 13y agoPerhaps it would be linked with variables, similar to how graphical debuggers can give you a "variables" window which shows variables in scope, and the ability to filter such variables. I suppose the idea is to extend the terminal to be more debugger/IDE like.
- oliver_FF 13y ago"8. Command Auto-complete" This would be awesome.
- tsahyt 13y agoDoesn't bash already do something vaguely similar though? I noticed it can complete flags and options now. zsh has been capable of this for a long time too. It doesn't convert between long and short options or sort arguments but it does help you by offering the completion which means less typing and slightly less memorization.
- oliver_FF 13y agoSure, but it would be great if it went a little further: "... and/or provides a documentation panel for that argument". Having a one-liner to explain what ls's `--dired` does without having to drop down to a new line and look it up would be great, displaying the first sentence of the relevant section of the man page could be enough?
- rjwebb 13y agoDoesn't zsh do something like this? At the very least, it seems to be extensible enough that you could provide completion+manpage documentation if you wanted to.
- Wilya 13y agoZsh certainly does something like this. Here's what my autocompletion looks like: http://leukensis.org/files/zsh-autocomplete.png http://leukensis.org/files/zsh-autocomplete.png The program has to provide its autocomplete files, but it's very powerful. My 'kill' autocompletes with a ps-like output, for example.
- samsquire 13y agoDoes zsh support matching long and arguments? That's what I want. A bit like fish (http://fishshell.com/assets/img/screenshots/man_completions.png http://fishshell.com/assets/img/screenshots/man_completions....) and finalterm which others have mentioned.
- dsego 13y agosomething like http://finalterm.org http://finalterm.org ?
- samsquire 13y agoThat's very cool. There's a bit of 'see it use it' (21) too where you can click the filename. Thanks!
- jodrellblank 13y agoI'm still wondering about another window, which displays the man page of the command you are typing, as you type it. And, say, a live browsing view of folders as you autocomplete a path.
- jitnut 13y agoLoved the idea of EmailMetaData. I was thinking on similar lines on creating a smarter email system for businesses.
- tiziano88 13y agowould it be something like this: https://developers.google.com/gmail/schemas/ https://developers.google.com/gmail/schemas/ ?
- igravious 13y agoThis a well of useful and thought-provoking ideas. I would like to point out a general theme though. A lot of these ideas seem most relevant to technical savvy people and I think why a lot of them (especially UI stuff) have not been implemented is because interfaces must cater to everybody. Perhaps what we need more of is a dev mode switch (s/w or h/w) like the Chromebook has which enables a lot of these ideas so that the ordinary user is not overwhelmed. Some of the ideas in the list are aimed at a general audience though. So perhaps each entry in the list needs to make a note of who the target audience is.
- DonaldDerek 13y agoI'm with you, but users must be educated and they will adapt, take as an example the touch revolution. Even old people adapted to this change.
- dsego 13y agoWell, number 9 already exists in some form on OS X. You can't drag because it drags the window, but if you click on the file name in the title you get a dialog with some file options (rename, move, duplicate, ...).
- danabramov 13y agoYou can't drag the title, but you can drag the icon.
- mortdeus 13y agowatches as 100 developers jolt out of their basements to register a startup
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- jlgarhdez 13y agoNumber 8 already exists with fish shell. It indexes the man pages as you have suggested.
- unimpressive 13y agoI've thought of some of these independently. (It's good to see somebody else did too.) We could probably make more progress if we all kept a list like this publicly. Or even privately, with snippets shared where appropriate. I know if I went through some old journals I could scrounge up a decent list myself. One I had: Bash scripting in the style of hypercard. Hypercard was described to me as a system that had a set of functions and let the user make programs out of them. Bash syntax is simple enough that making an interface that gives you the power of shell without degenerating from the original should be possible. The output should be a regular text based bash script, allowing others to edit without the program and the user to see what's going on underneath. EDIT: A second idea to go with the first: A utility that allows you to create a GUI window from the command line. This could be used in conjunction with the Bash script editor to make graphical programs that the user can easily incorporate into their (presumably window based) workflow.
- klibertp 13y ago> A utility that allows you to create a GUI window from the command line. Defunct now, but it lets you easily create windows without all that event-basedness that is annoying and unfit for scripts: http://easygui.sourceforge.net/ http://easygui.sourceforge.net/
- ville 13y ago> A utility that allows you to create a GUI window from the command line. In Gnome there is Zenity (https://help.gnome.org/users/zenity/stable/ https://help.gnome.org/users/zenity/stable/) that allows creating simple dialogs from command line.
- mtrimpe 13y ago> Bash scripting in the style of hypercard. It sounds like the Clojure library Stevedore [1] does what you're looking for there. [1] https://github.com/pallet/stevedore https://github.com/pallet/stevedore
- unimpressive 13y agoIs it a graphical interface? There aren't any screenshots. Or do you mean the library would be useful in building the tool?
- 14113 13y agoI find 54 particularly interesting, a site with detailed overviews of different stacks, along with instructions, or links to instructions on how to get started would be very valuable.
- Erwin 13y agoThis reminds of this: http://www.squidi.net/three/ http://www.squidi.net/three/ which attempts to define a large number of computer game gameplay mechanics. Maybe we need more forwarding-reaching fiction in our world. More essays on computing futurology, grand envisioning of what we can achieve with software. Even ambitious prototypes of a new way to do something (like Lighttable) A lot of what I see are tooling details, lot of boring effort duplication on mostly-identical languages and lot of nitpicking/bikeshedding comments like: well, you may have a good idea for solving world cancer, but your article does not work in my weird mobile browser, so your credibility is shot. Where's our version of "The Mother of all Demos" ?
- _random_ 13y agoThanks for that link!
- sparkie 13y agoThe problem is most modern computing is driven by the single question: "How can I monetize this idea?" It's only hobbyists and academics that really try to improve the state of computing, rather than having a primary focus on revenue. It's unfortunate that groundbreaking ideas are usually not the moneymakers, else we'd see innovation at a quicker rate. Software patents are another hindrance to innovation too. Often the results of some publicly funded research are patented, and never actually made into end products, and the public has no rights to use the invention funded with their tax money. I'd bet a dozen or more of those hundred ideas are already covered in part by some patents that aren't used in any real products, but serve only to prevent anyone else from developing them. I can't really see most people being so open about ideas as the author of this article precisely because innovative ideas people have will also come with the idea of monetizing it, with the belief that they need a patent to do so. What's more of a shame, is a list like this 100 ideas, doesn't serve to prevent anyone from patenting an implementation of such idea, despite it already being published. Articles like these do not serve as 'prior art' when considering patent applications. Perhaps it wouldn't be so bad if anyone who developed an idea could patent it, but little guys, hobbyists and academics can't afford to without outside funding, whilst the wealthy corporations whose primary motive is profit can patent ideas by the dozen.
- alexjeffrey 13y agosome of these are really interesting ideas. I have one to add to the mix: go implement them! As technologists we all have unprecedented power to create change at our fingertips and I'd love it if you could come back with a list of great ideas, _with some of them implemented already_. [note] the biggest one for me is the "life engine" - I would happily pay you £50/month for this!
- jamii 13y agoThe Locker Project (http://lockerproject.org/ http://lockerproject.org/) was a good stab at this. Seems to be abandoned now though (https://github.com/LockerProject/ https://github.com/LockerProject/ - last update 9 months ago).
- pknerd 13y ago#54 sounds cool. How about doing something similar for comparing Enterprise Systems/Applications? Anyone to join hands with me?
- ville 13y agoThere was a Show HN post a while ago for this kind of website: http://leanstack.io/cloud-stacks/ http://leanstack.io/cloud-stacks/ (discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5736155 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5736155)
- pietro 13y agoNumber 22 is more or less how Windows PowerShell works.
- microcolonel 13y agoThere are also lots of native UNIX Scheme-evaluating shells, shells done in dynamic language environments like Python, Ruby etc...
- beech 13y agoI'm working on something similar to #73. Web Of Trust Recommendations at http://reqqi.com/ http://reqqi.com/ I also keep a spreadsheet of ideas that I'm probably never going to work on, this might have inspired me to publish my own list. Also, if anyone is interested, Reqqi is hiring
- microcolonel 13y agoA lot of these are already done, like command autocomplete. Many show a lack of vision, why are we thinking about putting buttons and windows all over the place, adding complex nonstandard headers willy-nilly to our emails when we could be thinking about important things like indexing the vast power of existing UNIX tools in a voice-controlled environment?
- quasque 13y agoThe email metadata idea reminds me of EDIFACT, or at least what it was intended for - a standard electronic format for commercial transactions. It predates the WWW though, so looks quite 'ugly' by today's standard of using markup language to describe data. However I think it would be a good starting point for coming up with a broadly applicable data schema. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EDIFACT https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EDIFACT
- lifeisstillgood 13y agoI like #4 - life dashboard. I don't quite know how but these will have to go on the occasional tinkering list.
- markm208 13y agoI am working with some students of mine on something like 89, 'Code Journeys'. We call it Storyteller. http://www.storytellersoftware.com http://www.storytellersoftware.com It allows one to comment on the evolution of code rather than on individual sections of it. Currently, there is not a good place to write down why things have evolved the way they did. There is a search/filtering interface to find only the interesting bits of history.
- freework 13y agoThe email metadata idea looks a little like this: https://github.com/priestc/LibraryDSS https://github.com/priestc/LibraryDSS
- yannis 13y agoNo. 36 Reminds me of Knuth's literate programming, which I attribute as the major reason for the continuing success of TeX/LaTeX. It needs a major rethink/revamp to move it on to the full spectrum of computer languages (what is available in python or haskell) is not fully satisfactory and has not really caught on.
- jnazario 13y agoon the Package Manager-Package Manager front (idea 12), i bet you could bastardize chef to do this. it already has the translation layer for multiple package managers (yum, apt, pkg-add, etc).
- davidgerard 13y agoEvery application develops until it contains a sketchy rewrite of apt-get. Not just languages - WordPress and MediaWiki are going that way too. We really need a bunch of standard interfaces to package management.
- thisisrobv 13y agoI had high hopes for this and was immediately turned off by #3. I still can't believe that their are developers who believe that design is just the pretty layer on top of their functioning infrastructure. It's not. That said, I wish there was a site that connected people with complementary skill sets around similar product ideas.
- samsquire 13y agoThe idea is to connect someone who has created something technical and useful in concept with someone who can create a wonderful user experience out of it. These are not always the same people.
- aroman 13y agoI think what he's saying (and I tend to agree) is that you can't develop the technical side in isolation from the actual design. Design is much more than appearance -- it determines how your site works, how parts interact, and can very often give immense direction to the backend. I agree with your idea (#3) but only as the reverse -- imagine a website of "ideas" and mockups waiting for people to implement them. I believe great apps start with design, not with a backend. (Of course you can write them in either order -- the point is to have considered and drafted a design before starting on the backend).
- achille 13y ago😡🍋
- lambda 13y agoMeh. A lot of these sound like those ideas that any programmer comes up with, about what would be great, without ever actually putting the sweat in to turn a vague idea into something that actually works. I have probably as many half-baked schemes in the back of my mind. We probably all do. Why is this list particularly interesting? Heck, lots of these ideas sound downright bad. Adding operations for "put in new folder" and "pull out of folder"? Don't we already have plenty of ways to do this? A basic set of primitives (create new folder, move files to folder, whether done through the UI or on the command line), allows you to compose those simple actions into the more complex ones, rather than having some giant menu of everything you could ever possibly want to do with files that you need to navigate through. I'm just not sure what the value of long lists of vague, half-baked features ideas for random software is. Why not actually build one or two of these? That would be far more interesting.
- gdubs 13y agoA lot of ideas start out half-baked, in brainstorming sessions, etc. Even if you don't like the ideas here, judging from other comments it's at least thought-provoking. And this person basically opened up their private journal of ideas for anyone to look at.
- aroman 13y ago#87 "Interface Coalescing" is precisely implemented across OS X, notably the Finder for file I/O. Also, you spelled "Coalescing" wrong :)
- samsquire 13y agoThanks, fixed. Do you know if it has an API? It would be nice if it was a standard piece of architecture available on the desktop environment without creating completely dedicated dialogs. There would be some way to define how interfaces are to be merged.
- ChuckMcM 13y agoOne I keep noodling on is the one 'Ethical Me' which, on its face works well for ethics but it works for other things as well. Like documenting things you bought because they were 'more secure' or 'higher quality' etc. Understanding the meta-data of what is security 'worth' or quality 'worth' would really help inform product managers about whether or not investing resources there makes sense from a product desirability standpoint.
- maged 13y agoThe added features of email metadata can be achieved without the added complexities of adding metadata to all email, with a simple NLP solution. Gmail already does this with date recognition and google calendar integration, as well as the new email 'categories.' It'll be cool to see it expand so any application can take advantage of it (i.e. key management software and joining a new website).
- andrewguenther 13y agoGmail will actually recognize Schema.org markup in your email as well
- grinich 13y agosimple NLP solution famous last words.
- maged 13y agoWhat would be great is a kind of gmail (or any email client) app store. You give permission to different applications to work on top of your email client to react to different email content. ie Mint/your bank automatically adding item receipts to the card purchase it has access too.
- Mindless2112 13y ago#64 Peer to Peer Backup is almost met by DataHaven.NET [1], the drawback being that it uses a central server to keep track of virtual credits. [1] http://datahaven.net/ http://datahaven.net/
- miguelrochefort 13y agoI came up with most of these ideas independently. If you look at them, you'll realize that most share the same patterns, and actually are similar ideas. I'm currently working on something that superficially looks like #4, but includes at least 20% (potentially more) of these ideas (or make them obsolete). Most of them are trivial, and I'm sure much of us didn't get anything new from this list. Heck, I could come up with 50 more just like that (but maybe not that related to programming).
- nathanathan 13y agoThere's an idea I've been thinking about in the vein of the "create this" and api competition ideas (and the repo itself I suppose). I've found that on Stack Overflow questions of the form "Is there software that does x, y and x?" will often get locked. However, I think a site like SO for finding software could be really useful. And when you don't find it you've just identified a niche that hasn't been filled that someone could come along and make software for. It would be possible for developers to gauge demand by the number of up-votes/bounties a post gets. It could use many of the same mechanisms from SO like voting/comments/reputation/merging related posts, but perhaps adding some structured ways to describe ideas would facilitate better searching.
- jfb 13y agoOne thing I've wanted for years is a small, pocket-sized and battery operated blob of storage with a well-defined API, where all of my data lives. Not the cloud, because no, thank you; and not an external drive. I want something that my phone, my laptop, my TV, my workstation can use as a canonical data storage location for everything in my life. Ideally this would have a fast radio, so I could just leave it in my bag while I'm walking around listening to music on my phone; and a high-speed physical connection so I can plug it in if necessary.
- salgernon 13y agoI'm waiting for the sparrowOS guy to comment on this thread. Despite his hell-banned status, I've been impressed with what he as an individual has come up with. He seems likely to have implemented many of these features for his edification.