These are just a few examples fresh in my head to write about.
The Simple Powerline Remote Interactive Monitor and Enforcer (SPRIME) started as a simple open source class project. It turned out to be much more…
The GaTech Convergence Innovation Competition happened to be going on at the same time. Our SPRIME project technically could fit in the smart-grid category for the CIC competition, but the project would have to be modified slightly to be eligible for submission. Doing so meant much more work, more documentation, and a sooner due date, relative to the rest of the class.
My group and I decided to go the extra mile and enter SPRIME into the CIC competition. If nothing else, at least we could say we tried. Fortunately, putting in that extra effort on the project turned out to be well worth it!
Besides dominating all the other projects in the class, SPRIME won first place in the CIC competition in the smart-grid category! Our prize was each a free Droid X phone from Verizon! Additionally, SPRIME also received mention on Hack-A-Day, and is now entered in the Ecomagination Challenge. Please vote for SPRIME!
(Special thanks to Tim Upthegrove and Jeff Starker)
FeedSpeak was another class project that of mine that benefited from putting a little more work into it. Taking time and effort to completely re-write it from scratch (code-wise it was pretty bad, but worked for a class demo) allowed it to be in the Android Market for Free or for Pay. It was also featured in the XDA Developers forums and on their front page!
Go the extra mile; hard work pays off. I thank my father for teaching this to me.
You have far exceeded that extra mile. I am very proud of you!