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Show HN: a web app to track when your food will go bad

8 points by thecombjelly ↗ HN
http://wasteless.io

A web app to keep track of when your food expires. Grew out of a CLI program I made for myself.

It was also an experiment with writing a webapp purely in Common Lisp. It comes with the full source code [0] as well as source code from some CL libraries that I spun off on the way.

libs:

cl-config: library for managing configuration settings loosely based on the BSD model. [1]

cl-init: library for integrating your common lisp program into an OS's init system. Manages starting and stopping the services as well as setting up a swank/slime interface. [2]

pg-sessions: a library that sits on top of hunchentoot and the postgres library postmodern to store and manage sessions in a postgres database. [3]

[0] https://bitbucket.org/thomashintz/wasteless/src

[1] https://bitbucket.org/thomashintz/cl-config/src

[2] https://bitbucket.org/thomashintz/cl-init/src

[3] https://bitbucket.org/thomashintz/pg-sessions/src

3 comments

[ 4.7 ms ] story [ 18.2 ms ] thread
spngejen
Very cool! I also love the name... if we waste less using Wasteless, we become wasteless.
User8712
The examples for the app are milk, bagels and cheese. All of these have expiration dates on the package or carton. Why do I need to waste time inputting this information online, and then look it up or check emails? Wouldn't it make more sense to just check the package when I have the fridge open?

Things without expiration dates, like fruit and veggies don't follow a particular timeline. They might be bad in 2 days, or 2 weeks. That means they can't be used with this application either, since they go bad when they look bad.

But, what about frozen dinners or something that I prepare, and freeze for the future? Well, I'll just write the date on them, when I stick them in the freezer.

Congrats on the experiment, but I'm going to be a little harsh on the concept and say it should be renamed to wastetime.io. This looks like a huge time sink by inputting everything I buy, and then removing everything I use. Apps are suppose to achieve the opposite, they should save me time.

thecombjelly
The problem I have is I don't look through my fridge, freezer, and pantry every day to see what things are going to go bad soon. I often forget about something I have, especially if it ends up behind or under something else. I don't end up rediscovering it again until it has gone bad.

The app also makes it easy to quickly get a handle on the ingredients going bad soon so that you can think of something to make with them. I've also found myself using it in the grocery store when I'm trying to remember if something I have has gone bad or not yet.

Just searching the list to see if I even have something is very useful too. I used to end up buying something twice since I forgot I had already bought it a while ago.