Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Show HN: We built an open source, zero webhooks payment processor

github.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

211–220 of 230 posts

Re: Show HN: We built an open source, zero webhooks payment processor

#211

Post by port11 »

littlecranky67 wrote: post #180
CuriousRose wrote: post #141

Congratulations on the beta launch, an impressive product we will consider integrating. As a relatively new developer, I'm curious why the dependancy on React? Was there no way to get the UI you wanted without implementing a framework like React? We are Svelte based, so it's frustrating for us to have to drag in React for libraries like this.

> We are Svelte based, so it's frustrating for us to have to drag in React for libraries like this To be fair, chosing Svelte over React explicitly means that - if the React installed/userbase is 10-50x as big, you will be frustrated with this a lot. But in the end I don't get the frustration, in the end react is not a framework and you can render any component into a single HTML node that is part of your Svelte syst…

Of course this means importing a ton of new libs and frontend code just to render billing. It's the same with the dependency on, say, Next. It's too many moving parts, could've been done without tying yourselves down to specific ‘cultures’. That said, it's a great endeavour and my hat is off.

Re: Show HN: We built an open source, zero webhooks payment processor

#212

Post by agreeahmed »

nkmnz wrote: post #207
agreeahmed wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Glad to hear the pain points resonate with you, and we’d love to hear any thoughts you have on how we could address them better. Re open source: the SaaS is under AGPLv3, and the rest is MIT. Re “processor”: often when payment providers first get started they don’t fit into one of the established payment vendor categories because they need to piggyback off someone else’s infrastructure. We figured it would be better…

Oh I did not realize the whole „SaaS“ is open source, too! To be honest, the „payment processor“ part primed me in a way that I didn’t even investigate about the backend, I assumed it to be closed source due to that. Thank you for the clarification! About the „processor“: IANAL, but I would assume that a payment processor has liabilities and regulations similar to that of a bank - line it’s the case for PayPal or Str…

Yes, we have similar compliance things we consider to Stripe and PayPal. We believe the best experience will only need one onboarding, which would mean we need to process the payments (even if we use Stripe under the hood to do so for now). That’s why we decided not to build a BYOK flow.

This thread has been eye opening for revealing how much more clearly we could be explaining the funds flow story. Thank you for your feedback!

Re: Show HN: We built an open source, zero webhooks payment processor

#213

Post by trollbridge »

agreeahmed wrote: post #200
trollbridge wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you elaborate on how hard it is to use a different payments provider? I use Clover API with my bank being the acquirer, which is much cheaper than Stripe.

Very interesting. How do you handle billing with that setup? Are there billing SaaSes that will integrate with that set up, or did you have to build your own? Since we’re the payments provider (using Stripe under the hood), we’re not currently able to support “bring your own provider” unfortunately.

My bank is an acquiring bank. They are also local so I far prefer having a direct face to face relationship with them.

They use Clover’s platform to provide devices and APIs (you could in theory use another vendor’s devices if you really wanted to).

In general, I don’t want someone else to be my payments provider since we do a lot of subscriptions, which would leave me completely locked in to a provider. Already been there done that with PayPal.

Re: Show HN: We built an open source, zero webhooks payment processor

#214

Post by agreeahmed »

trollbridge wrote: post #213
agreeahmed wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Very interesting. How do you handle billing with that setup? Are there billing SaaSes that will integrate with that set up, or did you have to build your own? Since we’re the payments provider (using Stripe under the hood), we’re not currently able to support “bring your own provider” unfortunately.

My bank is an acquiring bank. They are also local so I far prefer having a direct face to face relationship with them. They use Clover’s platform to provide devices and APIs (you could in theory use another vendor’s devices if you really wanted to). In general, I don’t want someone else to be my payments provider since we do a lot of subscriptions, which would leave me completely locked in to a provider. Already been…

If you want to have a direct relationship with your acquiring bank then yours would is a pretty optimal flow.

For folks who just want to get set up and get going quickly and don't mind working with a payfac to do so, we feel they should have more options, especially when it comes to DX.

Re: Show HN: We built an open source, zero webhooks payment processor

#216

Post by ekjhgkejhgk »

inhumantsar wrote: post #208
ekjhgkejhgk wrote: post #192

GNU Taler already exists and was built by actual experts. https://www.taler.net/en/ Copy pasting the front page: > We provide a payment system that makes privacy-friendly online transactions fast and > Payments without registration > Data protection by default > Fraud eliminated by design > Not a new currency! > Empowers communities to run their own payment infrastructure > Free Software

imho this is a non-starter for mass market payments. let's say a customer has found your website and wants to buy something. they first have to install a third party wallet app, fund the wallet by buying coins thru an exchange, then use the app to make a payment to the merchant. it's the same UX problem crypto has tried (and failed) to work around, but with extra friction since it still depends on local currencies an…

Unless I'm missing something, this is a complete nonsense comment.

Obviously you have to install the app, that's true for any app. But you only have to do it the first time around.

Are you just saying that this payment app has the first time friction of downloading the app. That's the same for all apps. Are you just saying that friction exists, and is a barrier to entry?

Re: Show HN: We built an open source, zero webhooks payment processor

#217

Post by probablypat »

agreeahmed wrote: post #106
baobabKoodaa wrote: post #40

For what it's worth, the landing page is one of the most beautifully designed things I have seen in a long time. Congratz on the launch, didn't want to be so negative. I just hate that this is built on top of Stripe :(

Thank you, that's very kind of you. Funny thing about the site: we deliberately tried to keep it single-page because we spent all of the past year building / testing the billing engine, data model, and SDK.

Do you have any more details on how you designed the site? I see that it was in framer.

Re: Show HN: We built an open source, zero webhooks payment processor

#218

Post by agreeahmed »

port11 wrote: post #211
littlecranky67 wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We are Svelte based, so it's frustrating for us to have to drag in React for libraries like this To be fair, chosing Svelte over React explicitly means that - if the React installed/userbase is 10-50x as big, you will be frustrated with this a lot. But in the end I don't get the frustration, in the end react is not a framework and you can render any component into a single HTML node that is part of your Svelte syst…

Of course this means importing a ton of new libs and frontend code just to render billing. It's the same with the dependency on, say, Next. It's too many moving parts, could've been done without tying yourselves down to specific ‘cultures’. That said, it's a great endeavour and my hat is off.

Appreciate the feedback. This work happens in all frontend "cultures" (a phrase I will be lovingly borrowing, thank you). But a payment provider can't really take this work off a developer's plate unless it provides an SDK that works inside of that culture. So yeah, we hope to ship the best payments experience for React. But eventually also for Svelte and Vue. Because that's what you'd have to do to solve this problem.

And the problem goes substantially beyond billing UI. There's all the unseen tedium that devs need to implement in order to derive proper app behavior based on their customers' billing state. Most of this work is transposing billing state (and its derivatives) and then lugging it to the client where it will be used to show upgrade buttons, gate feature access, show outstanding usage balances, etc.

Re: Show HN: We built an open source, zero webhooks payment processor

#219

Post by literallybatman »

probablypat wrote: post #217
agreeahmed wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you, that's very kind of you. Funny thing about the site: we deliberately tried to keep it single-page because we spent all of the past year building / testing the billing engine, data model, and SDK.

Do you have any more details on how you designed the site? I see that it was in framer.

Yooo, founding designer here.

From a technical perspective, building it on framer was pretty easy, though, it has some limitations with more complex SVG imports. I mirrored the Shadcn global.css color variables from the portal on the website for a more consistent vibe. Definitely recommend that.

From a design perspective, I wanted something radically simple, with taste. The narrow width visually demonstrates simplicity at a glance. I love narrow sites. Instinctually feel amazing. The double dashed borders will eventually turn into “flowing” lines. Which is a Flow of funds reference. We also worked with primary studio to help us choose some colors, typography, and patterns we’ll likely introduce later.

Hope this helps!

Re: Show HN: We built an open source, zero webhooks payment processor

#220

Post by bestouff »

UX (from a dev standpoint) : I want to know if it works in France. I click on "which countries are supported". It reveals a link to the docs instead of a countries list. OK, I click the link. I'm in the "getting started" section with no obvious link to the countries list.

I gave up there and probably won't come back.

Post reply on HN