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296 points reverseCh | 1 comments | | HN request time: 0.203s | source

I recently came across the concept of "useless" programs - pieces of code that serve no practical purpose but are fun, creative, or challenging to write. These could be anything from elaborate ASCII art generators to programs that solve imaginary problems. I'm curious to hear about the most interesting or creative "useless" programs the HN community has written. What was your motivation? What unexpected challenges did you face? Did you learn anything valuable from the experience? Some examples to get the ball rolling: 1. A program that prints the lyrics of "99 Bottles of Beer" in binary. A text-based game where you play as a semicolon trying to find its way to the end of a line of code. A script that translates English text into Shakespearean insults. Share your creations, no matter how quirky or impractical. Let's celebrate the joy of coding for coding's sake!
1. kernyan ◴[] No.41923757[source]
I had an exercise bike that came with a heart-rate band monitor, but it only pairs with the stationary bike. I wanted to use it for running to show heart rate zones. So I wrote an android app that pairs with the band, gets reading and make some nicer display. I had no idea how to write flutter, or talk to bluetooth devices, but github and chatGPT helped a lot.

https://github.com/kernyan/HeartRateBandHacking