Contributing to open source can be intimidating, but likely project maintainers will be glad to help or guide you - your contribution doesn't have to be huge, and since you're going to spend more time reading and understanding code than writing it as well as conforming to pre-existing code styles, it will be very useful experience. I would reccommend contributing to a game or utility that you already use, as it benefits you and you will have experience in the UX.
Another thing could be building a utility for your self. I remember the first program I ever wrote was a budgeting app in C, as I was always writing down and doing the math on my bank balance while in school. It opened the door to automating daily tasks and was useful in helping guide me to learn more about the software.
And as mentioned above, build a game. It's fun and makes testing much more interesting. Maybe something with a simple AI, like battleship or a card game.
I wanted to pitch “implement stl” of a language of your choice, but since OP wants to add it to portfolio, I think contributing to open source is the best advice. If one-man backed app is not a breakthrough on the market, without proper pressure from business your yet-another-blog-clone of a current generation product would look most likely quite poor.
For sure - leverage the open-source community. I remember working on this utility, and a good way through I stumbled across a very similar one built by a company I had heard of, and I got a bit discouraged as it was much better. That being said, it's still good experience either way, but open-source has the added benefit of building teamworking skills.
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Contributing to open source can be intimidating, but likely project maintainers will be glad to help or guide you - your contribution doesn't have to be huge, and since you're going to spend more time reading and understanding code than writing it as well as conforming to pre-existing code styles, it will be very useful experience. I would reccommend contributing to a game or utility that you already use, as it benefits you and you will have experience in the UX.
Another thing could be building a utility for your self. I remember the first program I ever wrote was a budgeting app in C, as I was always writing down and doing the math on my bank balance while in school. It opened the door to automating daily tasks and was useful in helping guide me to learn more about the software.
And as mentioned above, build a game. It's fun and makes testing much more interesting. Maybe something with a simple AI, like battleship or a card game.
I wanted to pitch “implement stl” of a language of your choice, but since OP wants to add it to portfolio, I think contributing to open source is the best advice. If one-man backed app is not a breakthrough on the market, without proper pressure from business your yet-another-blog-clone of a current generation product would look most likely quite poor.
For sure - leverage the open-source community. I remember working on this utility, and a good way through I stumbled across a very similar one built by a company I had heard of, and I got a bit discouraged as it was much better. That being said, it's still good experience either way, but open-source has the added benefit of building teamworking skills.