Page 1 of 2

Can't think of a project idea

Posted: Tue Sep 04, 2007 7:04 am
by arukomp
Hello everyone,

First of all, sorry if I went into wrong section, because most of my time I've been in PHP Code section and I don't know where to post my request.

I've stopped programming PHP for a month, i think, tried to learn C++. Then I decided that PHP is better for me. It's easier and also powerful language.

I want to start a PHP project. Something that would be useful and reasonable for many or some people. It shouldn't be too hard, as I don't have many experience with PHP (6-9 months, i think), but it should be challenging. I believe that many programmers learn while they create. I also want to learn, but I want to learn in fun way. Reading books all the time is quite boring for me and sometimes not so efficient... So now I'm looking for project ideas to create. There are many CMS, Shopping Carts and similar things, so I don't want to create what has been created professionally several times. I thought of a Web Game, but they take very long time to create and I don't want to spend full year on one project. I saw one idea about creating a website which would keep my region's or country's people's contact addresses, info about apartments, but there's already a phone book with all that info, which was sent to everyone for free.

Also, maybe I should mention or not, I'm 16 years old and I have school, so this programming project would be for my free time. I should get plenty of that :)

I hope someone can come up with some idea. I'll also be looking for them myself of course :)

Thanks for ANY ideas.

Posted: Tue Sep 04, 2007 7:21 am
by s.dot
I, too, am all out of ideas. And the motivation to find a good idea isn't there. Good luck on your search!

Posted: Tue Sep 04, 2007 7:26 am
by Delph
Take a look at StartUpping! A nice community to share ideas about having ideas!

Posted: Tue Sep 04, 2007 7:48 am
by arukomp
Thanks, but I didn't find any ideas on StartUpping... All I noticed that it's some information about making business or some sort of that category...

Well, I'll keep looking elsewhere, because I really want to start something now :)

Posted: Tue Sep 04, 2007 8:32 am
by TheMoose
I'm completely the opposite. I have many ideas, just lack the motivation, drive, time and focus to actually finish one.

What I find myself doing to get ideas is inadvertently think of things I could do to further expand my hobbies (or just interests). Like take for example World of Warcrack. I don't play heavily (lie), and with the recent advent of their Armory page (web-based profile), I figured I could expand it. It's all based in XML so that makes it even easier for outside developers like me to work with the data and create other apps based off of it. One example is a Guild Rankings page that continuously scans the armory for updates to gear, and ranks that person's guild based on gear.

Another thing I do is sit in class and things just start popping into my head (unfortunately none of it involves the Calculus I should be focusing on :().

Posted: Tue Sep 04, 2007 9:07 am
by arukomp
I understand what you're talking about, Moose. I've also been playing WoW for a while and I liked the database of all items, players in the game. Now I'm thinking about a script to control huge amounts of data, maybe a script to integrate other databases into fansites, or to control databases for private servers, which will be different from retail WoW.

Well, at least now I have something in mind :) Thanks Moose. I'll be looking further for more ideas for today and tomorrow I'll start working on project which seems to be best of all.

Posted: Tue Sep 04, 2007 11:27 am
by arukomp
I'm also thinking... Maybe try to make a Web Role-Playing Game... I think most of game development time is consumed when creating media for the game. Maybe I could use media from other games? Is it legal? If no, is there any way I could use them legally? Maybe put something like "Images on this website are copyrighted by Blizzard Co...." or something like that? I really want to have my own game running, but I'm not good at imagining things, writing stories etc. There are Web game templates, but they lack of features and are not what I want.

Posted: Tue Sep 04, 2007 11:54 am
by TheMoose
arukomp wrote:I'm also thinking... Maybe try to make a Web Role-Playing Game... I think most of game development time is consumed when creating media for the game. Maybe I could use media from other games? Is it legal? If no, is there any way I could use them legally? Maybe put something like "Images on this website are copyrighted by Blizzard Co...." or something like that? I really want to have my own game running, but I'm not good at imagining things, writing stories etc. There are Web game templates, but they lack of features and are not what I want.
Disclaimers such as "images are copyright their owners" doesn't always free you from litigation. You need explicit written consent from someone able to give that permission from the owner company, and then you'll need that disclaimer (usually, but not always) or some form of to let people know that you obtained permission, and that they are copyrighted materials.

Posted: Tue Sep 04, 2007 1:56 pm
by arukomp
Hm... I don't think I'm going to get some media from any company :? Their creations are so good that they become selfish :) This is the thing that stops me from creating web rpg. Maybe I should first start with programming and only then worry about media? But then if I won't find any, the game will be half-finished and not released, unless there's very kind person who would agree to make graphics for free... What do you think?

Posted: Tue Sep 04, 2007 2:53 pm
by RobertGonzalez
Try doing something that would ultimately benefit you and potentially the development community.

Posted: Tue Sep 04, 2007 7:02 pm
by califdon
My take (from someone old enough to be your grandpa, maybe your greatgrandpa!):

It's natural to be interested in games, but you're never going to create anything as sophisticated as those, which are developed by teams of highly experienced programmers and artists. If your goal is to flex your PHP muscles, I would suggest something more like a data driven Calendar of Events, maybe for an organization in your community. You would need to write a script to display appropriate items, checking the dates and not show events that already happened, etc. You would also need to write scripts to maintain the database, allowing an authorized admin to add new events, edit events, etc. An example of what I mean can be found at http://hiddenvilla.org/calendar.php, which I wrote for a nonprofit organization last year.

That's only one idea. Another one that I wrote just for fun is a sort of game, but is written with Javascript, using PHP only to store and analyze users' scores: http://ravey.net/reactiontime/

Posted: Tue Sep 04, 2007 8:22 pm
by s.dot
That's a pretty nifty little game, califdon.

Posted: Wed Sep 05, 2007 4:54 am
by arukomp
Califdon, thanks, I really like the idea about calendar, I think that's what I've been loking for. Thanks again :D

Posted: Wed Sep 05, 2007 12:00 pm
by cod4em
when I need a source of inspiration I hit up script directories and look for existing stuff thats neat, and try to recode my own version with my own improvements. It usually gives me a fun project to work on for a while until I get bored half way through.


Codango.com has been my recent favorite for checking out and looking for stuff....theyve got some sweet screenshots to go with most of the stuff and you can really get a look at stuff in a hurry...

I dont know - it helps me think of new ideas at least...hopefully it does the same for you? :)

Posted: Wed Sep 05, 2007 2:31 pm
by califdon
arukomp wrote:Califdon, thanks, I really like the idea about calendar, I think that's what I've been loking for. Thanks again :D
Glad it struck a bell for you. :) If you need any help along the way, just ask.
scottayy wrote:That's a pretty nifty little game, califdon.
Thanks, scottayy. Would you believe, I took the "65 Alive" refresher driver training class for seniors a couple of years ago (got me a 10% reduction in car insurance premium!), and that graphic is in the book they give out. In class, the instructor measured out 10 seconds and asked everyone how many numbers we found, in succession. I thought that was pretty dumb, so I decided to try to program it in Javascript. I scanned the scene, sliced it into a bunch of images so I could make an image map, etc. The fun part has been recording the users who have just stumbled across it--I guess the search engines found it, I didn't go to a whole lot of trouble trying to get it indexed. Over 500 users in a couple of years. And I'm getting a kick out of the average times by age group. Once in awhile I exercise my god-like authority and delete some records that I know were hacked. Like 3 seconds!! :)