4 ms·

What do I do if I can't make anything cool? I mean, I can write code, but it seems like I'm incapable of an original thought.

• chuckwnelson 13y ago
  A lot of designers have this issue. The hardest person to develop/design for is yourself since you're your worst critic. Ask yourself "What if?" Take something you're interested in and modify it slightly versus trying to think of a whole new original concept. What if I made a to do list specifically for teachers? What if I created a workout app only for developers? etc. This could help spark your imagination into something more grandiose.
  • sown 13y ago
    that is kind of hard. i don't know many people.
• gpcz 13y ago
  You might need novelty for a side project to hit the front page of Hacker News, but you don't need novelty to see benefits from the "Do things and write about them" paradigm. For example, you could write blog posts about problems you've run into and how you solved them if the solution isn't already on Stack Overflow.
  • sown 13y ago
    it seems like it is always answered on SO.
• vidarh 13y ago
  Then look at Github or here, find projects you find cool, and contribute to them and write about that. If you don't know what you can contribute to, ask - most open source projects can always need more contributors.
  • sown 13y ago
    it seem slike all of the interesting things i want to help out on don't want my help. or maybe I'm not fit to assist.
    • aryastark 13y ago
      The beauty of github is that you don't have to ask. It removes that particular (and possibly socially awkward/difficult) barrier of entry, for new people. You simply fork a project that you want to make a change to, make the change, and then send the pull request (it's literally just a button in github you click). If they don't accept the change, don't take it personally.
• bobajett 13y ago
  Just pursue what you think is cool or interesting to you, learn about it and write about it. Creativity doesn't have to be completely original. If you write about your own learning experiences with projects of interest to you, that scratch your own itch, Im sure it will be interesting, even valuable to a few people.
  • sown 13y ago
    i'm too dumb to pursue anything that I find interesting, it seems.
• garysieling 13y ago
  There are a lot of tactics you can take to come up with things that are novel (in minor ways). I found that if you write you'll discover new things along the way. * Write up samples of old ideas in new languages (e.g. X in Scala) * Write up samples using new libraries (e.g. from the Show HN posts) * Combine two random things together (e.g. PDF.js + Lunr.js = ...). This works well with new libraries, because people like having their work used. * Thought experiments can work well (what's a feature of language/tool X that you don't like, and how would you fix it) * Write up sample code that fills the gaps in some libary's documentation (if you work on a tool and have trouble googling the results, this works well, or if the documentation doesn't answer questions in the way you formulate them) * Find a CS textbook on a subject you find interesting, find interesting problems but apply them to something you're familiar with. I've had good success with this with an NLP textbook, but apply the exercises to data I have access to so they are novel. * If you look at language based subreddits, a lot of the smaller ones are starved for content. You can find popular examples from language X and rewrite them for language Y. * Find a book of puzzles (soduku type things) and write up puzzle solvers.