IdeaWell

Project ideas from Hacker News discussions.

Choreographic Programming in Rust

Original Article

Hacker News Discussion

📝 Discussion Summary (Click to expand)

1. Documentation is hard to read – many call it “Claudish” or AI‑generated
- “I would really like the README to be revised in human English. Claudish makes my brain averse to absorbing the information.” – zanderwohl
- “It's some form of Claudish, I can't read it.” – taylorius
- “I have no idea what this project does, and parsed none of the readme!” – the__alchemist
- “Pangram rates it (up to ‘This README is arranged by responsibility:’) as 100% AI generated. I'm struggling to disagree.” – snitty
- “Can't they train these LLMs to produce human‑readable English? And human‑readable code, for that matter.” – amelius

2. The core idea: compile‑time choreography that prevents deadlocks and fits actor‑style concurrency
- “It essentially lets you define a communication protocol where things have to happen in a certain order. At compile‑time, your ordering is checked against certain rules, and certain classes of deadlocks and hangs can be avoided. The order of actions is then enforced at runtime.” – zanderwohl
- “After reading this paper I ended up building this into my actor based language. It makes a lot of sense in actor based concurrency…” – ch4s3
- “multiparty session types are relevant to this…” – Smoofer (link to session‑types paper)
- Questions about endpoint projection, KoC strategy, and inspiration from Choral/MultiChor/Chorex show deep technical interest. – ashton314

3. Frequent comparisons to related systems (Orleans, Koka, ChorRus, etc.) and desire for practical adoption
- “Have you looked at Microsoft Orleans by chance? … I had Claude implement a similar one for me in Rust…” – giancarlostoro
- “I'm not an expert in Orleans but I have looked at it alongside koka… Their automatic lifecycle management is nice, but…” – ch4s3
- “What existing research systems (Choral, MultiChor, Chorex, etc.) did you take as inspiration? What benefits does your system have over ChorRus?” – ashton314
- “IMO the README is not Claudish, this project is in an area that is more 'computer science' than 'coding'…” – rhodey (highlighting the CS‑heavy nature that invites such comparisons).

🚀 Project Ideas

Generating project ideas…

DocuMend: AI-to-Human Documentation Converter

Summary

  • Converts AI-generated or overly technical documentation into clear, human-readable English with examples and diagrams.
  • Core value proposition: saves developers time understanding complex projects like Hibana QUIC/HTTP3.

Details

Key Value
Target Audience Open-source maintainers and developers struggling with dense docs
Core Feature AI-powered rewriting engine that preserves technical accuracy while improving readability, optionally adds diagrams and code snippets
Tech Stack Python, LangChain, LLM API (OpenAI or local LLMs), Markdown processor, Mermaid for diagrams
Difficulty Medium
Monetization Hobby

Notes

  • HN commenters complained about Claudish README and desire for human-readable English (zanderwohl, taylorius).
  • Could spark discussion on documentation quality and be practically useful for many projects.

Hibana Playground: Interactive Choreography Visualizer

Summary

  • Provides an interactive web sandbox for designing and visualizing Hibana choreography protocols, with compile-time checks and runtime simulation.
  • Core value proposition: lowers barrier to entry by letting developers experiment with protocol definitions and see deadlock detection in action.

Details

Key Value
Target Audience Systems programmers, researchers, and learners interested in session types and choreography
Core Feature Drag-and-drop or code editor to define actions and order, real-time visualization of message sequence charts, compile-time rule validation, deadlock detection
Tech Stack Frontend: React + TypeScript + Mermaid.js; Backend: Rust (compiled to WebAssembly) for Hibana core; Serverless (e.g., Vercel)
Difficulty High
Monetization Hobby

Notes

  • Commenters like zanderwohl explained the concept but found README opaque; a playground would let them "see what it does".
  • Could generate discussion on multiparty session types and attract contributors.

ExplainLikeI'mFive for Open Source (ELI5 OSS)

Summary

  • Generates plain-language explanations, short videos, and FAQs for complex open-source projects using LLMs tuned for clarity.
  • Core value proposition: helps newcomers grasp project purpose quickly, reducing friction to contribute.

Details

Key Value
Target Audience Newcomers, students, and casual contributors to technical projects
Core Feature Automated ELI5 generation from README/source, optional video narration with subtitles, embeddable widgets for project sites
Tech Stack Python, LLM (e.g., Llama 2), ffmpeg for video, SvelteKit for widget
Difficulty Medium
Monetization Hobby

Notes

  • HN users asked for ELI5 explanations (rhodey, ted).
  • Would be welcomed by community and could increase engagement.

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