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Bruno: Fast and Git-friendly open-source API client (Postman alternative)

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Re: Bruno: Fast and Git-friendly open-source API client (Postman alternative)

#231

Post by dumbo-octopus »

1vuio0pswjnm7 wrote: post #223
dumbo-octopus wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, that is that I mean. All the modern "ChatGPT" style API's use this, so if you're building anything that invokes them you can choose between buffering the entire response and modifying/relaying it once complete, or building up a toolchain of streaming-capable utilities. Of all the http-client applications I tested (Curl, Postman, Insomnia, Bruno), somewhat hilariously Curl has the best support. It will output all…

What if instead of JSON, i.e., strings of unknown length, used something more like netstrings. https://cr.yp.to/proto/netstrings.txt Personally I use a lame but effective simple 85.9 KiB static binary filter, a small C program, that removes the chunk sizes so the response is ready for use by other programs, e.g., in a pipe. Buffer is set at 8 KiB. Is there a way to experiment with one of these streaming JSON GPT APIs…

The unknown length isn't much of a problem for me in practice: GPT's are slow enough that getting a large chunk is almost impossible. I like the idea of the C filter, but in the end you're just piping the data to the program, why add the middle step? Is it to protect against too-large chunks in some way?

I don't know a public API that returns JSON slowly, but you could simulate it by just taking a JSON string, splitting it into 3-5 char chunks, and sending each of those in a `Transfer-Encoding: Chunked` response at ~100ms intervals.

Actually, now that I look at the underlying mechanism behind `Transfer-Encoding: Chunked`, it looks like it's already basically the same as the netstrings. What I'm referring to is the (variable length) contents of the netstring/chunk being sequential slices of a JSON object.

Re: Bruno: Fast and Git-friendly open-source API client (Postman alternative)

#232

Post by jasonjayr »

Sn0wCoder wrote: post #195
helloanoop wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hey there, this is Anoop - creator of Bruno. Happy to see Bruno at the top of HN We will never take VC funding. We received around 10 inbound reach outs from VCs till date and have denied funding from all of them. We will remain independent and I have written about it in detail here https://www.usebruno.com/blog/bootstrapping

Hi Annop. Thanks for sharing this looks like a good alternative to Postman. I see the company is based out of India (awesome) but wanted to know if the company has gone through the steps needed to sell to teams in the healthcare industry in the US/UK i.e.) HIPPA, SOX2, PCI, GDPR, etc.…

If they never take possession of the user's data into their environment, then most, if not all of those don't even come into play?

Like, that's kinda the whole point of offline-first, local-only tools, you can 100% use them in a an environment you control and take responsibility for. Once you take control of customer's data, there's a whole litany of due diligence that must considered, and often at considerable cost.

Re: Bruno: Fast and Git-friendly open-source API client (Postman alternative)

#233

Post by dumbo-octopus »

dotancohen wrote: post #105
ponector wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why not to do the same with postman? I still use it without the login.

From where do you download old Postman versions? More importantly, which was the last version recommended?

The "Lite API" mode of current Postman is actually decent, it's the only GUI client I know that supports streaming responses, but you have to use `Content-Type: text/event-stream`. You can't save/share queries, but the local history is decent enough for local development. I prefer it to the Insomnia mutable fixed length saved query implementation for "hacking around" with many different APIs.

Re: Bruno: Fast and Git-friendly open-source API client (Postman alternative)

#234

Post by amirathi »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #71
d0gsg0w00f wrote: post #13

Thank you. As soon as Postman asked for a login I uninstalled it and have been curling from text files ever since. My younger coworkers won't drop Postman though. Maybe this will help them switch.

Can't echo this enough. Thank you! Beyond just the login reqs from Postman, the whole Postman UI has become an overcomplicated mess in my opinion. I just want something simple to make remote HTTP calls. I can understand adding some useful extra things like variable interpolation and separate environments, but beyond that, Postman went way off the "enterprisey" deep end.

When you raise $$$ - the nice little API client needs to become "Enterprise API Platform"

Re: Bruno: Fast and Git-friendly open-source API client (Postman alternative)

#235

Post by jonS90 »

This makes me think of an alternative that no one seems to be mentioning: http/rest files. They're git-friendly and there are community plugins to operate them from every major IDE.

I believed the standard was created by jetbrains.

https://www.jetbrains.com/help/idea/http-client-in-product-c...

Re: Bruno: Fast and Git-friendly open-source API client (Postman alternative)

#236

Post by helloanoop »

Hey everyone, this is Anoop - creator of Bruno. Happy to see Bruno at the top of HN!

I will try to address some common questions in this comment.

> Well based on historical experience with Postman and Insomnia most probably Bruno will go the same way once they get enough users hooked in. Especially once a VC gets into the fold.

We will never take VC funding. We received around 10 inbound reach outs from VCs till date and have denied funding from all of them. We will remain independent and I have written about it in detail here https://www.usebruno.com/blog/bootstrapping

> I didn't stick with Bruno. I think it was due to not having an equivalent to Postman's pre-request scripts.

Bruno has come a long way, we support pre-request scripts and a lot more

> But can it handle oauth2? I had to write a httpie script recently just to test an oauth2 api.

We have released oauth2 support, some rough edges are being polished

> Good thing it's open source. Money being involved, I don't have long term hopes for it's openness.

I understand this is a hard problem. We are fully bootstrapped and independent. We earn money via selling the Golden Edition. We will build more developer products in the long term, and the goal is to make even the golden edition features also open source in the future. I am committed to this cause.

> History goes in circles. New API client appears, adds features, userbase grows. Forced login is added, users are angry and look for alternative. New API client appears.

I have felt this pain. That's one of the reasons why I denied VC funding and chose to remain independent. Having seen 10 years of this cycle, its enough. We don't want to repeat the same saga.

Some good links where I have discussed about opensource, freedom and monetization

- https://www.usebruno.com/blog/bootstrapping

- https://github.com/usebruno/bruno/discussions/269

- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7bSMFpbcPiY

We are also working on standardizing and improving the Bru Lang to bring more features in Bruno. See: https://www.brulang.org/

If you'd like to pre-order the golden edition: https://www.usebruno.com/pricing

Thank you for all the love and kind words, HN!

Re: Bruno: Fast and Git-friendly open-source API client (Postman alternative)

#237

Post by duxup »

d0gsg0w00f wrote: post #13

Thank you. As soon as Postman asked for a login I uninstalled it and have been curling from text files ever since. My younger coworkers won't drop Postman though. Maybe this will help them switch.

I just liked when I could start postman and it would just start fast.

As it is the things I test start up faster than postman who is … I don’t know what it was doing when I quit on it.

Re: Bruno: Fast and Git-friendly open-source API client (Postman alternative)

#238

Post by YetAnotherNick »

ryandrake wrote: post #178
YetAnotherNick wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I do hate Postman because its overcomplicated in everything. But attitude like yours has shifted people and money away from developer tools. Instead of all the possible tools we could have from many developers, we are now totally dependent on big tech to sponsor it, like VSCode etc. And over time it would move in direction that will promote another service from the same company like copilot and vscode.

Developer Tool Developers are hurting themselves. I think it is reasonable to not want to have to log in to every darn thing you use on the internet. Especially developer tools. Someone needs to invent a hat that developers have to wear: when the developer starts to write signup, login or authentication code, a hand pokes out of the hat and slaps him.

Judging by vscode's or copilot's or postman's popularity, login is not the issue. The issue is the quality of the tool and number of developers they can hire.

Re: Bruno: Fast and Git-friendly open-source API client (Postman alternative)

#239

Post by nitinreddy88 »

helloanoop wrote: post #236

Hey everyone, this is Anoop - creator of Bruno. Happy to see Bruno at the top of HN! I will try to address some common questions in this comment. > Well based on historical experience with Postman and Insomnia most probably Bruno will go the same way once they get enough users hooked in. Especially once a VC gets into the fold. We will never take VC funding. We received around 10 inbound reach outs from VCs till date…

Thanks for the awesome work. Pre-ordered one to support

Re: Bruno: Fast and Git-friendly open-source API client (Postman alternative)

#240

Post by helloanoop »

jonS90 wrote: post #235

This makes me think of an alternative that no one seems to be mentioning: http/rest files. They're git-friendly and there are community plugins to operate them from every major IDE. I believed the standard was created by jetbrains. https://www.jetbrains.com/help/idea/http-client-in-product-c...

What sets Bruno apart?

Nice GUI Clients: Postman, Insomnia, Paw (ease of use)

Nice CLI Clients that use plain text files: Jetbrains Http Client, Hurl, Httpie (privacy)

Bruno: The only GUI client with a Nice UI that works on top of plain text files

It's the best of both worlds.

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