Some ideas are great for pet projects, some are great for making money, and some just have lessons to be discovered in their execution. This is a collection of ideas that may or may never get executed upon. Some may have already been executed upon, but just not widely known.
These ideas are being put out here because they have the potential to be useful/helpful projects, but execution of the idea could take some time. Like these quotes allude to, the idea alone doesn't bring value:
"To me, ideas are worth nothing unless executed. They are just a multiplier. Execution is worth millions." – Steve Jobs
"Genius is one percent inspiration and ninety-nine percent perspiration." - Thomas A. Edison
Ideas
Recipe Manager
Not only manage recipes, but allow for pantry inventory, menu planning, grocery list generation, nutrition information, and nutrition tracking. Accomodate individual and linked accounts (like households). Access from all common devices.
Known Projects/Implementations
- none
RPG Pomidoro Tracker
Something to bring some fun to Pomidoro technique. Support keyboard shortcuts.
Known Projects/Implementations
- none
Google Wave + Email
Google Wave was a great collaboration platform that was ahead of its time. It billed itself as an email-killer, but the problem is it was a closed garden. Allow participants to interact with the Wave via email as well as via Wave (or a federated Wave server).
Known Projects/Implementations
- none
Growl For Windows (in NodeJS)
Try to re-implement Growl (and GNTP) support via NodeJS. Using Electron could help bundle the packaging for deployment.
Known Projects/Implementations
- none
Magic: the Gathering® Card Scanner
Set up a USB camera that you can "scan" MtG cards, run them through an OCR engine and catalog your collection. Bonus would be tapping into card pricing sites to determine high/low worth of the collection.
Known Projects/Implementations
- none
Parenting Credit Card
Teach kids financial responsibility by giving them a "credit card" that isn't actually tied to a bank/financial account. If the kid wants to buy something they can't afford (while out with the parent), the site/app can help record how much the kid owes on the account. Let the parent decided if it accrues interest as well. Probably simplier algorithms for interest calculation that actual credit cards use. NO ACTUAL FINANCIAL ACCOUNTS SHOULD BE USED.
Known Projects/Implementations
- none
World Builder
Essentially reverse-engineer/re-implement the aspect of Dwarven Fortress that creates a complete world, terrain, history, historic individuals, etc.
Known Projects/Implementations
- none
Modular version of Masterplan
Masterplan is a great tool for D&D campaign management and sessions, but it's only free (not open source), so modifying it to customize needs is a problem.
Known Projects/Implementations
- none
TicGit In Powershell
TicGit is an idea of ticket management in a Git repo as a baseless branch. Similar to gh-pages. The only issue is that it relied on Ruby to be available. This would support the same things TicGit did, but in a Powershell environment instead.
Known Projects/Implementations
- none
Port SMAUG to...any other language
3D graphics, lengthy cut scenes, and rich audio of MMOs are nothing compared to a text-based MUD from back in the day. Playing a classic MUD based on SMAUG always brings back a sense of nostalgia. So with the power of new-ish programming languages, why not try porting the server to a different language.
Known Projects/Implementations
- none
RSS Reader with AI assistance
It's easy to get overwhelmed by RSS feeds, so there should be an easier way to find the signal among the noise. Things like fetching all the content of an article if the feed is a truncated/alternative version of it; Pulling articles from link aggregation feeds; De-duplication of content if it surfaces from multiple feeds (or pulled as part of the link aggregation feeds); Estimated read times based on the user's past time spent on articles; User's interests, both from manually entering them and from the articles that the user opens to read.
Known Projects/Implementations
- none
License
The content presented here is licensed under CC0-1.0 (Creative Commons Zero v1.0 Universal). This means it is essentially public domain. Take these ideas and run with them. No requirement to do so, but a link to any idea that's implemented would be outstanding.