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Tell HN: My Web App has 13 Users

news.ycombinator.com

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Re: Tell HN: My Web App has 13 Users

#151

Post by Sgoettschkes »

I looked up your page (I'm a web developer, interested in testing, using zombiejs right now), and there are two things. First: Way to much text. Second: I don't care what you use as an underlying software stack. Tell me that you parse the whole page, executing js and everything, and get the result back to me. Thats your message. And then add some text somewhere to tell me that I can write phantom.js tests which are executed against the page.

What I really don't know is why I need a phantomjs web worker. I mean if I am that deep into testing, I have a CI which does this for me. No need to add another external service to the stack. I'm also worried that 1000 requests for $29 are a little much? I don't know about phantomjs, but zombiejs was installed in way under a minute (using npm). So while you are saving me a few minutes for installing phantom.js (doesn't look like rocket science to me), you are taking my time for integrating your API and you are charging me?

I think by refining your messages and thinking about what exactly it is you are selling you might have a decent service there.

Re: Tell HN: My Web App has 13 Users

#154

Post by tianshuo »

I didn't understand the product on the first scroll. You should put the product in easier words. What is the use case? Why should I use it? A video demo/lots of screenshots would fit better. And get a template from wrapbootstrap.com

Re: Tell HN: My Web App has 13 Users

#155

Post by mh- »

ryanjm33 wrote: post #141
nanch wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would be an interesting third party tool. Does anyone do this already? Something as simple as receiving a list of usernames over time.

Cohort.ly does a great job. They are in private beta so you can request access. It has been really beneficial to us. http://cohort.ly/

I really dislike this trend of only having videos to share info about a product or service.

Not even a blurb on there.

Re: Tell HN: My Web App has 13 Users

#156

Post by mh- »

nanch wrote: post #79
charliepark wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Joel, what are you using for your cohort analysis? An internally-built tool? A third-party service?

Would be an interesting third party tool. Does anyone do this already? Something as simple as receiving a list of usernames over time.

have a look at https://github.com/Doist/bitmapist - some more info here http://amix.dk/blog/post/19718

Re: Tell HN: My Web App has 13 Users

#157

Post by pd_drawexpress »

yoshyosh wrote: post #119
pd_drawexpress wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seven years is a long time. I am pretty on the same timeframe as well. I took a chance to redo everything over and this time with 5 months I have already launched my new product. My HN launch is kinda depressing as it just gave me 6 visits LOL. That traffic graph is my new motivation factor. I love to improve my writing to write blog like you but for now I am sticking to similar goal and that is to release an upgrade…

I have to wonder if releasing an upgrade is better than other things. Also you should leave your contact in your profile! My first reaction was to email you, but I have no way to reach you.

I think releasing frequently give me an opportunity to keep user interested. So far it pressured me to keep on adding values. Either way I think it does have possible effect until I burned out :). BTW, I updated my profile so feel free to contact me.

Re: Tell HN: My Web App has 13 Users

#158

Post by robertocr »

joelg87 wrote: post #61
charliepark wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Joel, what are you using for your cohort analysis? An internally-built tool? A third-party service?

Hey Charlie! We've been back and forth on this in the lifetime of the startup, but we're now doing all metrics ourselves, so it is internally built. I built an early version of the cohort analysis (which didn't scale, but that didn't matter) just a few months in and it was massively valuable. It's not too hard to knock something together.

Internal BI is the way to go. It gives better vision to those who make decisions. Congratulations! :)

Re: Tell HN: My Web App has 13 Users

#159

Post by gcb0 »

gingerlime wrote: post #126
tg3 wrote: post #85

My advice: stop advertising PhantomJS and let me sign up for your service. Why did I have to scroll down 80% of the page to get to a sign up button? And nothing on your page convinced me that I should. I am in your target market - I build websites for a living, and I hate testing in multiple browsers. Convince me, in one sentence, why this is a good idea, and give me the option of doing something about it. Good luck.

The thing I missed the most is knowing which browsers / OS combinations are supported. Can you specify using the API that you want a screenshot in IE9 or evaluate javascript with Firefox version 18 on Mac?

He only uses a webkit browser.

Really, setting up phantomjs is easier than making a http request with any language, so i can't see any added benefit for his service unless my IP block is already blocked and now i want to use his :)

Now, back to being serious, i integrated phantom in my test makefiles in minutes. Not even hours.

Re: Tell HN: My Web App has 13 Users

#160

Post by gcb0 »

mbesto wrote: post #130

Exciting dude! I'm in the same position. I've got 57 subscribers (probably 7 from friends, ha!) already on my web app, and it hasn't even launched[1] (psst - we're launching tomorrow). I was excited to learn that the latter part of sign-ups included people I had never heard of. One of them being a former Olympic silver medalist diver who does triathlons that signed up! That's a pretty cool feeling. [1] - http://www.c…

You need more friends :)
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