Ask HN: What are you working on? (March 2025)

Hacker News Discussion ↗

Overall Patterns

  • Wide mix of side projects, solo startups, and long-term hobbies; many people explicitly use weekends/evenings or sabbaticals to build things.
  • Strong skew toward developer-focused tools, AI/LLM infrastructure, and small SaaS apps; lots of “scratching my own itch” stories.
  • Several people are not coding at all but rebuilding life after burnout, changing careers, or taking intentional breaks.

AI, LLMs, and Agents

  • Many tools wrap or extend LLMs: MCP servers/DSLs, agent frameworks, RAG layers, AI email and coding assistants, sandboxed code execution, and long‑context memory systems.
  • Use-cases include: large‑scale text classification, social media monitoring, observability, customer support, personal notes, and voice agents that make or receive phone calls.
  • Some discussion of tradeoffs: LLMs are praised as “way easier” and good‑enough in many domains, but others question their efficiency and reliability vs classical methods, and worry about legality (AI robocalls) and user tolerance (would people hang up on AI callers?).
  • Several projects emphasize sandboxing and security (e.g. browser-based sandboxes, MCP-based tooling, LLM linters, sleep/health devices with strong privacy claims).

Developer Tools, Infrastructure, and Languages

  • New ORMs, web frameworks, build/deploy systems, Postgres extensions on top of distributed KV stores, and server-sent events servers.
  • Many experiments with custom interpreters, VMs, OS kernels, DSLs, new PLs (Eiffel‑inspired, JSX‑like, esolangs), and structured query engines for Kubernetes or logs.
  • Strong interest in self-hosting: tunnels, DNS tooling, bookmark servers, monitoring stacks, and “local-first” SDKs and apps.
  • Some deep technical rabbit holes: lock‑free deques, LSM‑tree databases, Postgres-on-FoundationDB, COM-based VST hosting, and GNSS receivers.

Consumer Apps, Games, and Creative Tools

  • Fitness (calisthenics, gymnastics rings, breathing, sleep improvement), budgeting, habit tracking, journaling, and personal knowledge tools.
  • Numerous language-learning and education projects (Arabic, Japanese, German, ML, CS education programs).
  • Many games: roguelikes, card games, co‑op arcade titles, VR integrations, geography guessing, drone wargames, and tabletop RPG tooling (including LLM‑driven DMs).
  • Creative tools for 3D art, animation, music production, and drawing; several emulator and retro‑tech projects.

Indie SaaS, Monetization, and Adoption

  • Common pattern: small utilities (social listening, observability, uptime, invoicing, recruiting, HR, real-estate tools, travel planning, job tracking, etc.) with unclear or deliberately light monetization.
  • Pricing debates: some deliberately keep generous free tiers to maximize use and feedback; others struggle with converting highly price‑sensitive users.
  • Accounting, invoicing, and compliance sparks deep commentary: real‑world requirements (tax, standards, e‑invoicing) often clash with “simple” tools and indie expectations.

Personal and Career Themes

  • Several people are quitting or considering quitting draining corporate jobs; others are mid‑sabbatical, focusing on health, sleep, or “rebuilding life.”
  • Burnout, constant illness, and overwork recur; some projects are explicitly non‑technical (blogs on burnout, personal growth RPG‑style blogs, house renovations).
  • There’s a noticeable undercurrent of using side projects—technical or not—as a way to regain autonomy, meaning, and joy.