Project Description

I have this private project I've been working on during my spare time. During this hackweek I want to spend some extra time to boost its progress.

This project is basically a Ruby on Rails application that will allow users to self-assess their progress with regards to learning a new language. This is in no way an application similar to Duolingo or such, which focus more on learning the language itself. Rather, it is about having a personal tool in which you can track and test your progress. And all of this is meant to be entirely customizable so the experience is tightly tailored for each user. Thus, it's meant to be used as a companion together with whatever you are doing to learn a new language.

Moreover, this tool is entirely agnostic to whatever you are doing to learn a language. In this regard, it differs a lot to stuff like Duolingo, because there will be no expectations about how you learn a language, which vocabulary you are supposed to be aware of, etc. Take things at your own pace and with whatever schedule you may have. In fact, this tool should be so unaware of all these conundrums, that you should be able to work with it in an entirely immersive scenario. That is, this tool will not force you into translation exercises and stuff like that. Do it, if you want, but that's up to you: there are other ways to self assess your language learning experience.

The project right now is still in the very early stages, so there's still a lot of room of integrating new ideas and doing crazy things to it. That's why I keep it into a private repository, and it will continue to be this way until it's stable enough for me to open it. Thus, right now the development process and the planning for it only makes sense to me and my current itches, and it's not in a stage where it can be opened into the wild. That being said, I'm writing all this down here just in case someone has any ideas on how things could go in a tool such as this.

Goal for this Hackweek

The goal for this hackweek is to bring this project from a "this could eventually work with time and care" stage, into a "it's still flawed and not ready to be opened, but at least I can use it for the first time in a reliable manner" stage. Not very ambitious, I know, but it will be a big step for me.

Moreover, I'm taking the opportunity to test new stuff from the latest releases from Rails, Ruby, Vue, etc. So, this will also be a way for me to get up-to-date into these technologies.

Resources

I am not looking for someone to help me on the development of this. At this stage, I'd prefer to go alone and avoid having to plan, explain, etc.; and push code fast. That being said, as I mentioned before, I'm open for new ideas from people learning languages: what has been useful to you, what would you expect from a tool such as this, etc.