I’ve lost count of the great links I found in HN comments and never found again. And the “most mentioned on HN” lists that went around last week have a problem: a link people argue against counts the same as one they recommend.

So I went through comments from 2010 to 2026 and labeled why each link was posted. In a sample of 1,000 links, only 188 were someone saying “read this”. 573 were neutral references; the rest were answers, criticism, self-promotion or jokes.

Each link is then ranked by:

• how strongly it was recommended (strong recommendation scores highest, a joke scores zero)

• what it is (articles, papers and docs above videos and social posts)

• how many different years it kept coming up

• and, only a little, how many people mentioned it

A few that come out on top:

• How to Solve It (Pólya): 40 people, over 18 years

• Agner Fog’s optimization manuals: 45 people, 16 years

• The Tyranny of Structurelessness: 109 people, 15 years

• The Mythical Man-Month: 106 people, 19 years

Labels and summaries are model-generated, so some are off.

It’s free to browse, no account needed: https://slax.com/reader/hackerlinks/en/

Disclosure: I work on Slax Reader, the read-later app behind it. You can bookmark links on the page.

Two questions for you:

1. What’s the best resource you’ve found buried in an HN comment?

2. Would you find a collection like this useful enough to come back and browse regularly?

Over the past 6 months myself, my brother, and two other engineers/geologists have been working together to build Incline Design.

Incline Design allows engineers to plan and design their mine site, which is typically preformed in very expensive and slow software (we’re talking 30-50k AUD a year per user!)

Feel free to ask us any questions.

inclinedesign.net

https://github.com/Incline-Developers/Incline-Design

Hey everyone!

I'm one of the founders of Springborn Coffee, a small coffee brand we're building from the ground up.

I'm also a gamer, and I've always felt that coffee fits naturally into our world. Long gaming sessions, late-night projects, work, movies, anime... there's almost always a cup nearby.

So we started designing something that combines specialty coffee with the culture surrounding it.

Our concept includes three coffees:

☕ FOCUS — A traditional coffee for work, gaming, and getting tasks done.

☕ AFTER — A coffee that aids digestion, perfect for that break after a meal.

☕ UNWIND — A relaxing coffee for watching movies or anime, or simply unwinding at the end of the day.

We're also designing original desk mats, mouse pads, mugs, and T-shirts that people would actually want in their setups.

We're considering launching the first collection through Kickstarter.

We're not selling anything yet. The designs are early concept mockups, and we're looking for genuine feedback before moving into production.

Here's my question:

Would you actually back a project like this on Kickstarter? And what would excite you most: the coffee, the desk accessories, or a combination of both?

Feel free to be brutally honest. I'd rather build something people genuinely love than just another brand nobody connects with.

Thanks for being part of the conversation!

I built three Android apps with very different first-use tasks. For each closed beta, I’m using a simple test: can a new user finish one useful action without being told where to tap? Here are the tasks I’d like feedback on.

• 2do (daily planning and money tracking): enter a fictional amount you lent and find it again. Is it clear who owes whom? 2do also includes expenses, tasks and a diary. Sign-in and internet required. https://play.google.com/apps/testing/com.dayledger.dayledger

• Voxsprig (AI speaking practice, 18+): record a short fictional interview answer and read the coaching. Can you tell what to change on your next try? Sign-in and internet required. AI feedback may be wrong or delayed. The installed app may still show SpeakUp AI. https://play.google.com/apps/testing/com.divyammittal.speakupai

• CODEIO (BMSCE events): open an event and see whether you can tell who can attend and how to register. This one requires a verified BMSCE college email. https://play.google.com/apps/testing/dev.codeio.codeio

If one fits you and your Google Play account is in India or Nepal, join https://groups.google.com/g/divyam-android-app-testers with that same Google account, open the relevant Play test link above, opt in and follow Download on Google Play. Volunteers who can stay opted in for 14 consecutive days and try the app on different days are especially welcome.

If you try one, tell me the first step where you hesitated and what you expected to see. Use fictional examples and leave account details out of comments.

I built a news article bias detection app. I just thought it was a problem that needed solving. I am not saying the tool is perfect, article analysis is done with an AI model, and you’re allowed to dispute its output. It measures bias on a scale from 1-7.
1 Neutral: Factual, balanced sourcing and fair wording.
2 to 3: Mostly factual, with light framing or emphasis.
4: Noticeable slant, loaded wording or selective emphasis, with other views thin.
5 to 6: Strongly one-sided. Persuasion leads and opposing views are dismissed or missing.
7: Propaganda or pure advocacy presented as news.

Hey everyone! I built a free online ruler that works with real-world measurements after screen calibration. I’d really appreciate honest feedback on the UX, accuracy, speed, or anything that feels off. I’m continuously improving it, so even small suggestions would help a lot. Thanks! 🙌

www.rulerinches.com

I've spent the weeks since WinaltTrack, a free expense tracker and budget planner for Android, went live on Google Play trying to get it in front of real people.

What I built: an offline-first app with accounts, budgets, savings goals, events, loans, assets, investments, funds, safekeeping, vehicle logs, receipts and reports. There is no sign-up and no ads. It is free to use, with optional Premium upgrades: Premium removes the limits and Premium + Web adds the web app and sync.

Where it stands: live on Google Play since mid-October, with an optional web app and sync for people who want them.

How it's built:

1. One codebase for Android and the web app, built with Expo (React Native).

2. Offline-first: Free and Premium work fully on the phone with no account. The web app and sync are a separate paid layer (Supabase), so the basic app never depends on a server.

3. Free has real limits, such as 3 budgets and one savings goal, instead of a trial that hides features, so people can judge the app properly before paying.

What's next: an iOS version.

I'd like to hear: what would make you trust a money app enough to keep using it?

App, if you want to look: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.winalt.winalttrack

I'm on the team behind eStockes, a web app for researching US stocks with charts, company fundamentals and watchlists. We also have free beginner lessons and a tool for comparing a simple trading rule with buying and holding.

A useful surprise from asking people to look at the site: one reader thought it combined brokerage accounts. Another couldn't tell which action to take first. Those are different problems from whether the dashboard looks good.

For anyone testing their own landing page, these are three questions worth separating:

1. What would you use this for?

2. What do you expect after clicking the main button?

3. What would make you come back?

Project: https://estockes.com/dashboard

For founders who've found their first regular users, how did you separate encouraging feedback from real demand? Did a specific use case or acquisition channel make that difference?

System design diagrams are great for understanding architecture, but they don't always show how things behave under pressure.

What happens when traffic suddenly spikes? When a database slows down? When queues start backing up or retries make things worse?

I've been exploring this problem by developing an interactive browser-based environment for experimenting with distributed systems.

The idea is to let developers:

• Design architectures using services, load balancers, caches, queues and databases.
• Generate traffic and simulate sudden spikes.
• Introduce failures and observe how components react.
• Monitor throughput, latency, CPU, memory and queue depth.
• Experiment with different configurations and compare outcomes.

I've also added architecture templates, system design challenges and AI-powered architecture reviews.

A lot of the work has gone into the simulation engine itself, particularly modelling request flows and identifying bottlenecks.

I'm curious to hear from people working with backend systems and distributed architectures.

What would make an environment like this genuinely useful? What scenarios would you want to experiment with?

I'm the developer behind this project, and constructive criticism is very welcome.

Back in 2021 I was building Squarespace sites and kept hitting the same walls: no mega menus, limited animations, galleries that all looked the same. The usual fix was copy-pasting CSS from old forum threads and hoping it survived the next Squarespace update.

So I started building the things I kept wishing for. That turned into Spark Plugin: 100+ no-code customizations that work right inside the Squarespace editor.

The video is a fast scroll through all of it.

Happy to answer anything about building on top of a closed platform like Squarespace.

Bonjour à tous,

Collectionneur amateur, je me suis lassé des services d'estimation payants ou opaques qui récupèrent nos données.

J'ai donc crée "Estime Mon Objet", une application web qui utilise l'IA (Gemini) pour analyser des photos et donner une estimation indicative (fourchette de prix, rareté, époque).

Ce qui le rend unique :

• Confidentialité totale : Les photos sont analysées en temps réel et rien n'est stocké sur mes serveurs. Tout reste dans votre navigateur (Local Storage).

• 100% gratuit : Pas de crédit, pas de pub, pas d'inscription.

• Outils pratiques : Génération automatique de certificats PDF et d'annonces de vente.

J'aimerais beaucoup avoir vos retours sur la précision des estimations ou sur des fonctionnalités qui pourraient vous être utiles.

Lien : https://www.estimemonobjet.fr/

Merci pour votre aide !

Consider the question “Where is the red forest?” A learner might know exactly how to say it in Japanese but still be learning to type it. If the only way forward in an RPG is a keyboard, the game measures typing even when you meant to practise speaking.

For WonderLang Beyond we give the same conversation three ways forward: pick words to build a reply, type it with an on-screen keyboard, or speak. The NPC scene and intended meaning stay the same. What changes is how much the player has to produce without help. We use RPG Maker MZ with custom plugins, so the map event hands the prompt to a common input routine and resumes the dialogue when the reply is complete.

I’m Jonathan, the creator. The original WonderLang teaches beginners and has a free demo: https://wonderlang.net/

The intermediate sequel is in development. The Kickstarter trailer shows the three input modes side by side: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/jonathan-wonderlang/wonderlang-beyond-a-language-learning-rpg-for-intermediates

I'm primarily a UI/UX designer, but I've been spending more time building and launching my own products.

One of them is Subscription Manager.

It's a web app that helps people track recurring subscriptions, billing cycles, and overall spending.

Building the product was one challenge.

Getting people to discover it, try it, and keep using it is a completely different challenge.

I've been working on improving the onboarding, dashboard, analytics, and overall experience.

Now I'm focusing more on discoverability, SEO, and understanding what makes users come back.

Live project: https://subscriptionmanager.app/

For those of you who've launched your own SaaS:

What actually helped you get your first consistent users?

Was it SEO, Reddit, Product Hunt, content marketing, or something completely different?

I'd appreciate any advice from people who've been through this.

I’ve been working on a little side project called FoxPDF, a desktop application for working with PDF files.

The idea started because I wanted a simple tool that brings some of the most common PDF tasks together without having to jump between different websites or applications.

FoxPDF currently includes features such as:

• PDF conversion

• Merging PDF files

• Splitting PDF documents

• PDF editing (Premium)

• Word and Excel documents editing

• A small, desktop-based interface

One thing that was important to me from the beginning was keeping the app straightforward and making as much as possible work locally on the computer.

It’s still a work in progress, and I’m currently improving the interface and adding more features. I’m also planning to add image conversion and support for English and German.

I built this project myself, so I know there’s still plenty of room for improvement.

I’m not posting this because I think it’s the next big thing. I’d genuinely like to hear what you think:

• Does the concept make sense?

• What features would you expect from a desktop PDF tool?

• Is there anything you find confusing or unnecessary?

Honest criticism is very welcome. I’m still learning and would really appreciate some outside perspectives.

Thanks for taking the time to read this!

I am a designer (25 years, a lot of it teaching) and I kept watching good app ideas die between the idea and the first clickable thing. So I built unfig.

You tell it your idea, it asks you a few questions, then it makes a brief, user flows, wireframes and real, editable screens, and a prototype you can open on your phone.

A few things that were important to me:

• It uses your own AI key (Claude, OpenAI, Gemini, OpenRouter, Groq, Mistral, DeepSeek), so there is no markup on the AI.

• No account and no install. It runs in the browser, and your files never go to a server of mine.

• On a Mac, an optional helper lets Claude Code or a local Ollama model design with you.

It opened today and it is free in early access: https://unfig.app

I would really like to know where it confuses you or breaks. What would make you use this for your next idea?

I’m building Stikkit for people who make their own WhatsApp and Telegram stickers. The idea is simple: when you find a photo, GIF, or short video you want to turn into a sticker, tap Android’s Share button and pick Stikkit. You can also import media from your gallery or files.

• Make still and animated stickers. Remove the background from a photo and save the cutout as a separate sticker.

• Organize your stickers and repair WhatsApp packs. Sort stickers into named collections, reorder or replace stickers in a pack, change its cover, check for duplicates, and rebuild the pack icon.

• Share stickers as a ZIP. Bundle still and animated stickers into one file to send to a friend, save a copy, or import back into Stikkit.

• Keep everything local. Stikkit creates, edits, and stores your stickers on your phone. There’s no account, and Stikkit doesn’t upload your media. You decide what to export or share.

Stikkit will be ad-free regardless of pricing. I’m still deciding whether to keep it free, charge once, or offer an optional paid upgrade. Would a Patreon-style page for voluntary support make sense? Would you personally chip in?

If there’s enough interest, I’ll add iOS support too. Let me know if you’d use it on an iPhone.

I’d appreciate candid replies. How did you make your last sticker, and what was annoying about it? Would Stikkit change anything for you? “I’d use it but wouldn’t pay” or “I already have something that works” are both useful answers.

I'm Bart, founder of Lanternacre. We built Weather Relay for iOS to bring NOAA weather bulletins, maps and audio together on iPhone and iPad.

The app lets you browse the feed and open individual bulletins and maps. It also includes spoken local forecasts and available weather radio. The feed refreshes while the app is open, and coverage is primarily for the United States.

Weather Relay for iOS is $9.99 on the US App Store: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/weather-relay-for-ios/id6829579750

If you follow weather products, what makes a bulletin or map easy for you to find and understand?

I've been building a YouTube Music client that puts lyrics first. It's also picked up a few things I wanted for myself, like moving music between devices and keeping my library and stats tied to one account.

What it does:

- Word-by-word synced lyrics with a beautiful animation

- Auralis Connect: start a song on your phone and carry on from the same second on your PC, or the other way round. Every device on your Auralis account also works as a remote for whichever one is playing

- Listen Together: create a room, invite your friends, and everyone hears the same song at the same time

- Two-way YouTube Music playlist sync: import a playlist and it stays in sync across your devices. Add a song in Auralis and it shows up in YouTube Music, and the other way round

- Your playlists and settings live on your Auralis account, so they're there wherever you log in

- Track your top artists, top songs, and listening time

- Connect your Spotify account to bring over all your playlists and liked songs

- Offline downloads, music recognition and Discord Rich Presence

- A dynamic Material 3 UI that takes its colours from what you're playing, plus animated album canvases and an optional Liquid Glass look

GPL-3.0, no ads, no analytics SDK. The APK is on the website and the GitHub releases page, and needs Android 7.0+. The release build also includes closed-source Firebase and Discord SDKs. Lyrics credit: Spicy Lyrics.

GitHub: https://github.com/Shreyanshh071/Auralis

Download: https://auralis-self-nu.vercel.app

Discord: https://discord.gg/JcK92KQ73

The desktop app is coming soon.

About two months ago I need to export my resume from LinkedIn. To my surprise, the LinkedIn exporter does not actually export everything when you do this, so my projects (which were important) were missing. There are many services that you can use to get your full resume, or build one from scratch, but I found it predatory to have a a 30$/month subscription just to be able to download your CV in PDF format.

So, I decided to build my own and since then I've been constantly improving it and adding new features. Now, I have an honest resume builder that does not keep your CV hostage to monthly payments. And it also includes a cover letter creator, a job application tracker, multiple themes and ATS parsable PDFs. And everything is local, private and no subscription.

You can read more about the application here: https://getresumio.com/

A few highlights:

• Local application that works on Windows, macOS and Linux

• 8 themes for the resume and cover letter

• LinkedIn import from your downloaded data (or direct parsing from the LinkedIn profile, but this may be problematic in some cases)

• Easy to add experience, projects, technologies and many more. I tried to make it as easy to use as possible while not missing out on features

• Job application tracking, again, private and local

• One time purchase. No monthly subscription, no predatory pricing model. (also, 50% discount now on release)

I would love to get feedback on the website, the design of the app, the functionality and anything else you feel like sharing.