Grandma-test difficulty: 0/5 — Open a link and interact
Try-it time: Under 60 seconds
Worth your time: 5/5 — Do Not Miss
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You’ve got five minutes before your next meeting. You’re not looking to learn a framework, configure a pipeline, or debug a dependency tree. You just want to do something — make a thing move, hear a sound, watch colors bloom, play a tiny game — and feel that spark of “wait, that worked?!”
ElectricSheep is exactly that. It’s a collection of 20+ daily creative coding surprises, each a completely self-contained HTML file that runs in any browser the moment you open it [S1]. No npm install. No Docker. No API keys. No account. No terminal. Just click and you’re inside a generative flow field, slinging a golf ball through planetary gravity, playing a browser synthesizer, or piloting a spacecraft through an asteroid field [S1][S2].
The project comes from Josh Ledgard, who describes it as: I let my agent dream a little surprise each night based on our chats. This is what he builds. The surprises are built by Scoob — one per day — and the repository shows 229 commits with the latest surprise added just three days ago [S1]. This isn’t abandonware; it’s a living, growing gallery.
What you need
- A web browser (Chrome, Firefox, Safari, Edge — any modern browser works)
- An internet connection (for the first load; you can save individual HTML files to run offline)
- Zero technical knowledge
That’s the entire list. No Python, no Node, no Git, no CLI. If you can click a link, you can run every single surprise.
Simple setup walkthrough
Step 1 — Browse the gallery
Open the ElectricSheep repository on GitHub:
“ https://github.com/JoshLedgard/ElectricSheep “
Scroll down to the Surprises table, which lists 20+ rows with dates, names, and one-line descriptions [S2].
Step 2 — Pick one that catches your eye
Want hypnotic particles? Click Flow Field (March 4). Space mini-golf? Gravity Golf (March 5). A browser synthesizer with waveform visualizer? Neon Keys (March 6). A procedural text adventure on a failing space station? Station Omega (March 7). A falling-sand physics simulator with nine materials? Sand Lab (March 8).
An arcade game where you tap signals and block noise? Signal / Noise (March 11). Real-time reaction-diffusion patterns? Morphogenesis (March 9). A choose-your-own-adventure in Amsterdam? Lost in Transit (March 12). Ripple interference patterns? Interference (March 13). A π digit memory challenge? Pi Day Challenge (March 14).
An animated word bubble cloud? Word Weight (March 15). An ice-sliding puzzle? Drift (March 16). Growing Celtic-inspired tendrils? The Green (March 17). A hotel lobby speed game? Check In (March 18). A marketing idea generator? Campaign Spark (March 19).
A balance-beam puzzle? Equinox (March 20). Luminous trails through a noise field? Pathways (March 21). A Bayesian coin-flip explorer? Is This Coin Fair? (March 22). A mysterious house text adventure? The Open House (March 23). Endless asteroid fields? Last Light (March 24).
A self-building canal city? Night Builder (March 25). Signal drift? Signal Drift (April 8). Sailing uncharted fog-covered waters? Far Shore (April 9). And the list keeps growing [S1][S2].
Step 3 — Open the surprise
Click the surprise name in the table. That takes you to a folder like 11/07/Shadow-Desk/. Click index.html, then Raw (or use the raw.githubusercontent.com URL directly). The surprise loads instantly in your browser [S3].
Pro tip: For the fastest access, use the raw URL pattern:
“ https://raw.githubusercontent.com/JoshLedgard/ElectricSheep/main/11/07/Shadow-Desk/index.html “
Replace the folder path for any surprise. Bookmark your favorites.
Step 4 — Save for offline (optional)
Right-click the page, choose Save As → Webpage, HTML Only, and save to your desktop. Double-click the file anytime to run it offline — no internet needed [S3].
First thing to try: Shadow Desk
Open the Shadow Desk surprise (added November 7, 2026):
“ https://raw.githubusercontent.com/JoshLedgard/ElectricSheep/main/11/07/Shadow-Desk/index.html “
You’ll see a golden lamp on a paper-textured desk. Drag the lamp — watch the shadows of the paper cutouts (a star, a leaf, a house) stretch and shift in real time. Drag a cutout — its shadow follows. Adjust the Softness slider to blur the shadows. Click Add cutout to add a new shape (moon, diamond, or more stars). Then hit Save PNG to download your composition as an image file [S3].
It takes three seconds to load. Zero instructions needed. You immediately understand the delight: light, shadow, paper, play.
Turn it into a game or challenge
- Shadow composition challenge: Create the most interesting shadow overlap using only 5 cutouts. Save the PNG. Share it.
- Surprise roulette: Pick a random surprise from the table each morning for a week. Screenshot your favorite moment from each.
- Material hunt: In Sand Lab, find all 9 materials (sand, water, fire, lava, ice, seeds, oil, plant, wall) and trigger every interaction (water extinguishes fire, oil explodes near fire, lava solidifies into rock).
- π digit duel: Challenge a friend to the Pi Day Challenge. Highest digit streak wins.
- Word cloud portrait: Paste a favorite poem, song lyrics, or your own journal entry into Word Weight. Save the bubble cloud as a visual fingerprint of that text.
- Offline collection: Save 5 favorite surprises as HTML files. Put them on a USB drive. Hand it to someone with “Open these when you’re bored.”
Optional expert rabbit hole
Each surprise is a single HTML file — HTML, CSS, and vanilla JavaScript all in one place. Open any file in a text editor (Notepad, VS Code, even GitHub’s browser editor) and you can:
- Tweak colors, speeds, particle counts, physics parameters
- Add new shapes, levels, or behaviors
- Fork the repository and add your own daily surprise
- Study the code to learn canvas animation, game loops, procedural generation, or Web Audio API techniques
The Shadow Desk source, for example, shows a clean 200-line implementation: canvas setup, shadow mathematics (distance-based scaling and offset), pointer event handling for drag-and-drop, radial gradients for glow effects, and PNG export via canvas.toDataURL() [S3]. It’s a masterclass in self-contained creative coding.
One thing to know
These are surprises — polished mini-experiences, not full applications. They don’t save progress across sessions (except Word Weight and Pi Day Challenge which use localStorage). Some are purely visual; some are games with win/lose states. They run entirely client-side with no backend, so there’s no multiplayer, no cloud sync, no accounts. That’s the point: zero friction, zero commitment, pure delight [S1][S3].
The bottom line
Try it tonight if: You want an immediate creative spark without installing anything. You enjoy generative art, tiny games, interactive toys, or just the feeling of I made that happen in under a minute. You appreciate the craft of a developer who ships a new surprise every single day.
Skip it if: You’re looking for a productivity tool, a learning platform, or something with progression, accounts, or community features. This is a gallery of moments, not a platform.
ElectricSheep reminds us that the web’s original promise — click a link, see something wonderful — is still alive. One HTML file. One moment of delight. Twenty-plus times and counting [S1][S2].
Sources
- [S1] ElectricSheep Repository — Daily Creative Coding Surprises — GitHub (JoshLedgard/ElectricSheep) (2026-11-07)
- [S2] ElectricSheep Live Gallery — Browse All Surprises — GitHub Repository File Listing (2026-11-07)
- [S3] Shadow Desk — Interactive Shadow Stage (Example Surprise) — GitHub Raw Content (2026-11-07)