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HNWatcher: track keywords and follow users on Hacker News

29 points by julien421 13y ago

cedricgeffroy 13y ago
Nice tool ! Luv it !
rogaha 13y ago
Very cool stuff! I was waiting for something like that! :)
Sujan 13y ago
What are you using as the backend/API?
- julien421 13y ago
  It is partially based on HN Search API [1] and partially based on homemade Ruby scripts. [1] HNSearch: https://www.hnsearch.com/api https://www.hnsearch.com/api
  - Sujan 13y ago
    Nice, I'm asking because there was a similar service [1] that stopped working without explanation before and that kinda sucked after getting used to it. [1] http://hackerfollow.com/ http://hackerfollow.com/
    - julien421 13y ago
      Never heard of it. I will try to get in touch with them to see what happenned.
devil1591 13y ago
love it! cool stuff!
EkaterinaK 13y ago
Very cool product!
Fuzzwah 13y ago
"Like any service, we will eventually charge our users." I use plenty of services which don't charge me......
- julien421 13y ago
  Hey Fuzzwash, You are right but unfortunatly, hosting + emails ( via mailgun ) are not free, so at one point we will probably have to charge for the service if we have lots of users. We are not a company and we are not funded, this is a week-end(s) side-project :)
  - fecak 13y ago
    You've created an interesting product, but you may want to give more thought to a monetization strategy. I don't see many paying to use something like this, but it could get some users.
Sujan 13y ago
Feedback: - Autofocus on input field in modal windows after clicking "Follow a new HackerNews user". - Remember my checkbox selection in the same modal window - Favicon! - Autofollowing e.g. "pg" could improve onboarding - Design is not very content focused right now, I would probably switch the middle and right column - Highlight found keywords in comment text - Notify/show me if someone replied to one of my comments - Modify title depending on what is shown (Right now following.php always shows "HackerNews users I follow" even when I have selected a specific one)
- rogaha 13y ago
  Nice feedbacks!
- julien421 13y ago
  Thank you for the feedback Sujan! Be sure we will work on this this week-end :) PS: we highlight the keywords only when you click on the specific keyword for now.But not on the "All" sub-tab.
  - Sujan 13y ago
    Ah I see. Why not? It would be especially useful there. And I just noticed you remove all linebreaks in the output of comments right now. Intentional or bug? Makes for some quite unstructured reads with e.g. patio11's texts.
    - sylvainkalache 13y ago
      No reason, just we did not have the time to do it :) It's on our TODO!
    - sylvainkalache 13y ago
      @Sujan done! =)
      - Sujan 13y ago
        Perfect, much better. The keywords.php is now actually useful.
mickeyben 13y ago
I've been using it for the past week and it's great. If you wish to get alerts for your brand and receive the HN link while it's hot it's the perfect tool.
hkmurakami 13y ago
I've been using this to follow some users whose comments I respect, and it's been a great improvement from loading the hn user comments page all the time. I imagine this is more valuable for startups and marketing managers, but it's been useful me the average hn addict as well :)
scanaki 13y ago
Quiet nice!

29 points by julien421 13y ago

cedricgeffroy 13y ago

Nice tool ! Luv it !

rogaha 13y ago

Very cool stuff! I was waiting for something like that! :)

Sujan 13y ago

What are you using as the backend/API?

julien421 13y ago
It is partially based on HN Search API [1] and partially based on homemade Ruby scripts. [1] HNSearch: https://www.hnsearch.com/api https://www.hnsearch.com/api
- Sujan 13y ago
  Nice, I'm asking because there was a similar service [1] that stopped working without explanation before and that kinda sucked after getting used to it. [1] http://hackerfollow.com/ http://hackerfollow.com/
  - julien421 13y ago
    Never heard of it. I will try to get in touch with them to see what happenned.

devil1591 13y ago

love it! cool stuff!

EkaterinaK 13y ago

Very cool product!

Fuzzwah 13y ago

"Like any service, we will eventually charge our users." I use plenty of services which don't charge me......

julien421 13y ago
Hey Fuzzwash, You are right but unfortunatly, hosting + emails ( via mailgun ) are not free, so at one point we will probably have to charge for the service if we have lots of users. We are not a company and we are not funded, this is a week-end(s) side-project :)
- fecak 13y ago
  You've created an interesting product, but you may want to give more thought to a monetization strategy. I don't see many paying to use something like this, but it could get some users.

Sujan 13y ago

Feedback: - Autofocus on input field in modal windows after clicking "Follow a new HackerNews user". - Remember my checkbox selection in the same modal window - Favicon! - Autofollowing e.g. "pg" could improve onboarding - Design is not very content focused right now, I would probably switch the middle and right column - Highlight found keywords in comment text - Notify/show me if someone replied to one of my comments - Modify title depending on what is shown (Right now following.php always shows "HackerNews users I follow" even when I have selected a specific one)

rogaha 13y ago
Nice feedbacks!
julien421 13y ago
Thank you for the feedback Sujan! Be sure we will work on this this week-end :) PS: we highlight the keywords only when you click on the specific keyword for now.But not on the "All" sub-tab.
- Sujan 13y ago
  Ah I see. Why not? It would be especially useful there. And I just noticed you remove all linebreaks in the output of comments right now. Intentional or bug? Makes for some quite unstructured reads with e.g. patio11's texts.
  - sylvainkalache 13y ago
    No reason, just we did not have the time to do it :) It's on our TODO!
  - sylvainkalache 13y ago
    @Sujan done! =)
    - Sujan 13y ago
      Perfect, much better. The keywords.php is now actually useful.

mickeyben 13y ago

I've been using it for the past week and it's great. If you wish to get alerts for your brand and receive the HN link while it's hot it's the perfect tool.

hkmurakami 13y ago

I've been using this to follow some users whose comments I respect, and it's been a great improvement from loading the hn user comments page all the time. I imagine this is more valuable for startups and marketing managers, but it's been useful me the average hn addict as well :)

scanaki 13y ago

Quiet nice!