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296 points reverseCh | 1 comments | | HN request time: 0.225s | 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!
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Netcob ◴[] No.41923280[source]
I didn't expect it to be that useless.

I like to experiment with home automation things, and recently I added a feature to my system where I could push notifications with images to my phone (pretty much everything I do is entirely self-hosted btw). Then a Valetudo update came out - Valetudo is a FOSS replacement for the cloud services usually required for supported robot vacuums. You root your robot, block it from phoning home, install Valetudo, and now you have a robot that won't spy on you unless you specifically tell it to.

So the update introduced a feature where photos with obstacles recognized by the robot are available via the UI/API. So I put something together where I'll get the pic sent as a notification immediately.

In effect, it's like I've subscribed to the most boring instagram feed of the world. Just random low-quality pictures of items in my apartment. The low quality and weird perspective actually makes it look intentional or filtered, as if a mouse is being forced to make a collage for photography class but doesn't feel inspired at all.

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yurishimo ◴[] No.41923438[source]
Could you use this to build your own “poop detector” where an object is routed around until you confirm with the robot if it’s “safe” to proceed in that area?

I love my robot vacuum but I dare never run it when I’m not at home for fear or smearing poop all over my floor on accident. Sadly I didn’t shell out enough money for a bot with superior object detection.

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wmanley ◴[] No.41923495[source]
Maybe just stop shitting on the carpet.
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1. ornornor ◴[] No.41992203[source]
Old habits die hard