Ask HN: Everything I try to build already exists | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Everything I try to build already exists

As a beginner in programming and someone looking for something exciting to do, every idea I have already exists in some form.

Every project idea I have, I go to GitHub and there are at least a few dozen of them. Why should I bother?

Any advice to see this situation in a different perspective?

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As a beginner in programming, learning programming itself is supposed to be what's exciting to do. You're coming to know a whole new way of thinking and doing.

There have been an enormous amount of beginners before you; of course all the things beginners can accomplish already exist. Many have turned into experts before you, also; of course many of the things only experts can accomplish already exist.

But, it's all new to you. As a beginner, your job isn't to create, it's to learn and improve, to understand. Meaningful creation might come later. You can't do that if you never do anything at all. You have to start by learning what's possible, and that means doing things that have already been done, for yourself.

This is normal, because you don't have enough experience to think of more advanced things. Also, programming is a means to an end. If you just sit around looking for something to program, then you'll be limited to your current shallow understanding of other people's problems.

Work on other people's projects for a while, and develop a hobby or work interest besides programming. When you find something that would be better if it were automated/digitized then you'll have both the technical skills and the domain insight necessary to create something new.

It might seem from reading interviews and blogs that other people are just overflowing with ideas for new things, unlike you. Don't worry about this. >>90% of interviews and so on aren't real studies of their subject, but really promotional - some light news/entertainment about someone of momentary interest that's engaging enough to be worth subsidizing with advertising. You can of course learn some interesting technical or personal details but they won't help you with the more fundamental questions. 'How I got my big break' stories usually get refined down to the level of an elevator pitch, and are neither intended nor likely to be informative.

tl;dr programming teaches you how to make things, you need to explore other spheres of activity to get ideas about what to make.

If you find it exciting, who cares if someone else already did it? Do people avoid skydiving because someone else already did it?

If you're looking to make an impact, then help with an existing project. Most big open source projects have some kind of contributors guide.

That's the joy of technology. There's always room for improvement, as you can imagine there are a thousand of things existing before these on Github.

If you enjoy a project, you can always submit a PR and became a contributor.

It may exist but bring it to the average user and make it easy to use. The average user can not use github.

Competition is good.

https://cdn-images-1.medium.com/1*SCO-6zyGCoAcxPC_WAZXMA.jpe...

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