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Ask HN: Review my WebApp CourseRail: Find UCLA Courses

3 points by thethimble ↗ HN
I'm a CS student at UCLA that built my first webapp using Python/Django. I'd love to get some feedback on it!

www.CourseRail.com

The app was made to replace UCLA's online course directory which really sucks. There are so many small improvements I can make but I forced myself to release as students are now planning their Winter Quarter schedules.

I would appreciate any feedback you guys have to offer and perhaps even some tips/creative ideas on how I might spread the word across campus!

Thanks! -Advait

8 comments

[ 5.6 ms ] story [ 28.2 ms ] thread
iworkforthem
I like it! The filtering of search results is great! In terms of design, I think you can not have a bottom section, it can be integrated to the main page, just maybe small fonts.

The domain name will be tough to relate to UCLA. You want to consider something closer, like uclacourses or ucladir, it would be easier to SEO too.

thethimble
Unfortunately, UCLA is very stubborn about their copyrights (UCLA, Bruins, etc.) so incorporating those names into the site will definitely bring in legal trouble (a student had to deal with this problem for calling his site "321Bruin").

In any case, there are plans to expand beyond just UCLA so I wanted to keep the name as generic as possible.

iworkforthem
Time to think national... A name which can allow you to cover other universities eventually. Just wondering... why course(rail) ... course I can understand.. rail I dun quite get, not to mention it's misleading.
clojurerocks
Its not just ucla that has a crappy course directory. I was looking at grad schools in the beginning of the year and was suprised at how many schools have really awful websites. Some of which are almost impossible to navigate. I actually started brainstorming an idea similiar to this but got caught up with other things. So good luck with it!
mbowcock
I agree with this comment and think this would be a great idea if applied to other schools. Along the lines of what iworkforthem said below - you could use a subdomain per school.

ie - ucla.courserails.com

thethimble
This is definitely the plan. If CourseRail works out at UCLA, look out for expansion to other schools in the coming quarters/semesters.
clojurerocks
And maybe expand it beyond just courses. Every school seems to have a site thats layed out differently. Making it difficulty to find information. So maybe you can also have other school related pages such as departments.