Artificial Ivy in the Browser
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This is just a goofy thing I cooked up over the weekend. It's kind of like a screensaver, but with more reading and sliders. (It's not terribly efficient, so expect phone batteries to take a hit!)
HN · launched Jan 20, 2026 · 96 upvotes (top 11%) · 0 views
Niche: novelty and humor web apps · 188 launches, 11 in the last 7 days ▼ -39% · Explore this niche →
Category and tags
- Media & entertainment
- Content generation
- B2C
- Not AI
- Hobby / open-source project
Visit website ↗ Source listing ↗
More like this: all 188 launches in novelty and humor web apps →
Could you build this?
Yes It is a self-contained browser toy running cellular automata/agent-based growth simulations on an HTML5 canvas with a few sliders. This is a classic, weekend vibe-coding project.
Discussion
18 comments analyzed.
Competitors mentioned: Canvas 2D
Concerns raised: CPU-heavy, causes severe performance degradation and system crashes, Browser and OS become unresponsive as simulation fills screen, Long press power button fails to work during freeze
Feature requests: Rewrite with WebGL and shaders for better performance, Add pruning/cutting mechanic with different outcomes, Simulate nutrients and reward roots that find them, Add geotropism and phototropism (gravity and light-seeking), Customizable line colors
Competitors
Other products that read as similar to this one : 75 launches clear the similarity bar, closest 8 shown.
Attention rank: #5 of 76 (itself plus its competitors, highest first, normalized so YC and Product Hunt are compared fairly).
Launched 83 days after the earliest competitor.
- The web needs more creativity and whimsy · hn · 2026-11-05 · 5 upvotes · similarity 0.45
- Cabinet of Distilled Pixels · hn · 2026-11-06 · 5 upvotes · similarity 0.44
- A solar system simulation in the browser · hn · 2025-12-29 · 13 upvotes · similarity 0.40
- Alien Abducto-rama: a FUN browser game I made with my kids · hn · 2026-01-24 · 6 upvotes · similarity 0.38
- Odd Orbit, live 3D globe of quakes, weather, satellites and UFO reports · hn · 2026-10-21 · 7 upvotes · similarity 0.38
- Sunwet · hn · 2026-03-20 · 5 upvotes · similarity 0.37
- Having fun making mini static site apps · hn · 2026-06-01 · 10 upvotes · similarity 0.37
- XHTML · hn · 2026-09-24 · 5 upvotes · similarity 0.37
The niche, labels, vibe code rating and competitor comparison on this page are analysis by Nicheloom. If you use them, please credit nicheloom.com. How you may use our data.