Snorklr: Discography Browser
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Snorklr is an elegant discography browser.why is this special?
- it neatly organizes full-album listings by artist
- the interface is sleek and unobtrusive (à la spotify)
- music can be streamed 100% legally (via youtube)
what did I learn to do?
- run Chron jobs & Task Queues in Google Appengine
- search Youtube and embed video using Google API in javascript
- query and retrieve data from MusicBrainz (and Last.fm)
- responsibly cache server-side API calls for speed and politeness
- use Bootstrap.less mixins & LESS css pre-processing
Zeitnot: Chess Tactics Trainer
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Zeitnot is a new kind of chess tactics trainer.why is this special?
- it uses positions from real games played recently on the internet
- the interface is minimal compare to alternatives
what did I learn to do?
- add Drag & Drop functionality via jQuery
- implement Fade-In/Out effect via jQuery
- read/write cookies via jQuery
- mod a C++ Chess engine (Crafty) to mine tactical positions
- read/write/sort XML markup through C++ & JS
- query FICS for large quantitites of games
- calculate ELO and Glicko chess ratings
Sleeves: Weather Forecast
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Sleeves is a simple local weather forecast.
why is this special?
what did I learn to do?
- position/size better for different screen resolutions
- write basic Python code and host on Google AppEngine
- query weather stats (XML) from Yahoo Dev API in Python
- apply horizontal-scroll effect using MooTools
- draw primitive-style suns, clouds, and hands in Illustrator
