12 Months / 12 Side Projects — Are you in?
2017 is just around the corner. How about this new year’s resolution: release one side project per month!
Ok, that sounds intimidating at first, but it’s actually not that hard if you pick the right projects. Plus, you will soon have a really cool portfolio to show off. You can read more about how I got started doing one project per month in “One Side Project per Month — First Steps”, find out how it can help to avoid over engineering ant get things done in “The 1PPM-Challenge” or check out the inspiring story of levels.io.
Ideas, Ideas, Ideas
Now where can you find the ideas for these projects?
First check if you have any unfinished or forgotten projects or scripts on your hard-drive. Can you build on these projects, maybe add some feature to make them even more valuable for others?
Second, if you already encountered an unsolved problem, maybe in the field of your work, or had that business idea that kept stuck in your mind, great! Start deconstructing the problem: what skills would you need to implement this? Which technical components are required? If there is something that you can already build, start with that. Else find out where you can learn that skill, framework, programming language etc and pick a realistic learning project for the first month. E.g. if your idea is an App, think of the most simple App one could build and set the goal to release that in the first month.
If you don’t have a project idea, pick any interesting technology and start learning. If you combine it with a skill or interest you already have, a new project idea is born. E.g. if you like cats and are interested in hardware, you could build a cat food dispenser. If you are interested in software, build a game App for cats. Again, think of the most simple App for the first month, maybe a cat themed Tic-Tac-Toe game? Your next one month project can build on the results.
If you haven’t any ideas yet, you can still “borrow” one from an existing project. Maybe your execution is better or you would do it somehow different? Implement something like X but with technology Y? You can find thousands of ideas on ideaswatch. Or collaborate with others. There is no rule that you have to do everything on your own. A contribution to an OSS project would be an awesome project.
Releases
Don’t forget to release your work to the public. This is what will make you go the extra mile. You will fix that last little bug, add comments and documentation to your code, think about code quality or write about your hardware project. In the end, your results will be much better than when you do it just for yourself.
If you like, you can add your projects to the 1PPM Hall of Fame on GitHub. Simply fork the repository and add your projects! It would be awesome to learn about your projects and experiences.
Conclusion
Pick small, doable projects and you will have motivation and accelerate your learning in 2017. Document and share your results and you will soon have a great portfolio.
I would love to hear about your project ideas and your progress! Simply contact projects@1ppm.club. Follow @1ppmclub on twitter for inspiration. If you like to tweet about the challenge, use the hashtag #1PPM to share your progress!
