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Ask HN: Would you pay for a poster of your code?
I'm building a side project that takes your Github/Bitbucket repo, lets you pick some source files and create a 24x36 poster that is mailed to you(perhaps to mark the first release of your code). Font would be monospaced to fit evenly on the poster and perhaps some columns of code? The cost with rough estimates should be $50. I think it would be damn cool to have the first release of a project I worked on or an open source project I work on. What do you think?
edit: Something like http://imgur.com/wgDRIyL
- chippy 12y agoWhat would it look like, do you have an example?
- ortuna 12y agoSomething like: http://imgur.com/wgDRIyL http://imgur.com/wgDRIyL Also a physical example: http://imgur.com/mI0ETBu http://imgur.com/mI0ETBu But still fiddling with fonts and line spacing and spacing between columns. I did this manually and tested physical print, which came out really nice. and you can read the code!
- JoshTriplett 12y agoWhile the ability to read snippets of code is fun, you want to aim for a more striking visual style. Consider adding syntax highlighting specifically to add splashes of color, and doing something to make the columns look less uniform and newspapery.
- ortuna 12y agoI was thinking of the ability to upload a logo, but the logo would only overlay the text and not the background.
- JoshTriplett 12y agoThat suggests an idea that would require significantly more image processing to do, but would provide a huge amount of value: can you analyze the logo and the source code, and construct a large image of the logo out of snippets of source code, using code/whitespace density for shading? A print-resolution poster of a project logo constructed out of that project's source code is definitely something I'd pay money for, and lower-resolution versions will work well on social media.
- stevekemp 12y agoThat would be nice. I remember I contributed to the "Mozilla" advert which ran in in a newspaper a few year ago. That had a logo made up of the names of the people who had similarly donated.
- techdragon 12y agoI once did this with some stuff during reverse engineering, I printed about 20 portrait orientation A3 pages in colour of source code at the largest font size I could without inducing any lines to wrap.... With that, some post it notes and a nice pencil I was able to spot the problem in the control flow I hadn't seen when moving around the source file on my computer screen. I'd be much more likely to buy this kind of thing in colour.
- rickymetz2 12y agoWhats the finish and weight of the poster?
- ortuna 12y agofinish: semi gloss weight: ~170g I'm sure other types can be created for different prices.
- Someone1234 12y agoLove the concept, don't like the current design of the posters. It is like reading the phone book(!). I wouldn't hang that on my wall, sorry. Would I be interested in something like this? Maybe. But $50 is a legitimate thought-through purchase (read: I need to justify it to my +1). Anything over $30 is not something I can buy on a whim, and this is a "on a whim" kind of purchase.
- ortuna 12y agoThe generic columns being ugly seems to be a repeated theme. The $30 price does seem like a good price point. Would you care if the size was smaller to meet the price? Smaller size being 24x18.
- Someone1234 12y agoTo be honest I struggle to visualise just how big 24x18 is. Something the size of a 19" monitor would be nice just to hang up in a cube farm.
- arnold_palmur 12y agoI like this idea a lot and I actually like the design. It's nice and minimal - a interesting conversation piece perhaps when having guests over.
- ortuna 12y agoAt least in certain types of programming, you create something that can never be touch.