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MiniStack (replacement for LocalStack)

ministack.org

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Re: MiniStack (replacement for LocalStack)

#41

Post by onion2k »

staticassertion wrote: post #6

I really don't see how any clone is going to manage to do what localstack couldn't - maintain compatibility with tons of AWS services while not getting paid for it. If this were viable, why would it not have worked before? The only things I can think of are that perhaps LocalStack was just a mess of a codebase that couldn't maintain velocity or attract contributors, or it just failed to steward new contributors or so…

If this were viable, why would it not have worked before?

Because something wasn't in place to make it work. There are millions of examples where the second mover won, often because the first mover was too early, or the tech wasn't there to make it work, or the market didn't understand the value, etc.

In this case I imagine there are three massive benefits that you'd have over being the first mover:

- AWS is more mature and therefore moving slower, so it's easier to keep up.

- AI is useful for building 80% working code, so there's a lot less to do to keep up.

- There's a lot of devs looking for ways to move off Localstack due to the price change, which gives you (potentially) a pool of willing volunteers to contribute to an OSS alternative.

You can also learn from Localstack's open source version about what's needed, what works, what doesn't work, etc.

Re: MiniStack (replacement for LocalStack)

#42

Post by oefrha »

oefrha wrote: post #23

Any project with Claude’s signature misaligned ASCII diagram just screams DON’T USE to me. If you can’t even bother to read your damn generated README, how do I know you have QC’ed anything else? At the very least supported features claimed in README / on website could be totally fake, which is extremely common among all the vibed Show HNs. https://github.com/Nahuel990/ministack/blob/a1b1d20a27d2238d...

I love how a comment pointing out glaring lack of human review of this project (with clear evidence) is flagged to death. With zero counter-argument no less. Can’t wait for the bright future of vibed crap with zero human quality control getting hacked every day.

Re: MiniStack (replacement for LocalStack)

#43

Post by tazsat0512 »

robshippr wrote: post #36

The real issue with LocalStack was always drift. Tests pass locally, then something breaks in staging because the S3 response format is slightly different or DynamoDB throttling doesn't match. After getting burned enough times we just switched to short-lived real AWS environments for integration tests. More expensive, but way fewer surprises in prod.

[dead]

Re: MiniStack (replacement for LocalStack)

#44

Post by sysguest »

switchbak wrote: post #9
staticassertion wrote: post #6

I really don't see how any clone is going to manage to do what localstack couldn't - maintain compatibility with tons of AWS services while not getting paid for it. If this were viable, why would it not have worked before? The only things I can think of are that perhaps LocalStack was just a mess of a codebase that couldn't maintain velocity or attract contributors, or it just failed to steward new contributors or so…

"LocalStack was just a mess of a codebase" - very true. I do think there's potential to semi-automatically create a compatible suite of services, but it'll require some very talented use of LLMs and some novel testing approaches. Not something I want to sign up for. I evaluated Floci, but that has the typical issues you'd expected with freshly minted vibe code.

idk maybe AWS should create one?

I mean, if we can use "virtual-AWS", it would dramatically lower entry-barrier for devs/companies who are scared of "tales of huge aws bills" and such

Re: MiniStack (replacement for LocalStack)

#45

Post by hrmtst93837 »

jillesvangurp wrote: post #39
staticassertion wrote: post #6

I really don't see how any clone is going to manage to do what localstack couldn't - maintain compatibility with tons of AWS services while not getting paid for it. If this were viable, why would it not have worked before? The only things I can think of are that perhaps LocalStack was just a mess of a codebase that couldn't maintain velocity or attract contributors, or it just failed to steward new contributors or so…

That's true if you assume making these things is manual work. But of course with well documented API service and AI coding tools, making a functional local equivalent of any given service is not all that hard.

[flagged]

Re: MiniStack (replacement for LocalStack)

#46

Post by arpinum »

I have detailed knowledge of dynamodb. This code does not properly mimic the service exceptions, input validations, eventual consistency, or edge cases. I would not feel comfortable developing against ministack or running tests against it. A lot of these services also have free tiers, so the use cases are quite minimal.

Re: MiniStack (replacement for LocalStack)

#47

Post by [deleted] »

oefrha wrote: post #42
oefrha wrote: post #23

Any project with Claude’s signature misaligned ASCII diagram just screams DON’T USE to me. If you can’t even bother to read your damn generated README, how do I know you have QC’ed anything else? At the very least supported features claimed in README / on website could be totally fake, which is extremely common among all the vibed Show HNs. https://github.com/Nahuel990/ministack/blob/a1b1d20a27d2238d...

I love how a comment pointing out glaring lack of human review of this project (with clear evidence) is flagged to death. With zero counter-argument no less. Can’t wait for the bright future of vibed crap with zero human quality control getting hacked every day.

[deleted]

Re: MiniStack (replacement for LocalStack)

#48

Post by ramon156 »

oefrha wrote: post #23

Any project with Claude’s signature misaligned ASCII diagram just screams DON’T USE to me. If you can’t even bother to read your damn generated README, how do I know you have QC’ed anything else? At the very least supported features claimed in README / on website could be totally fake, which is extremely common among all the vibed Show HNs. https://github.com/Nahuel990/ministack/blob/a1b1d20a27d2238d...

ASCII with rounded corners is already a red flag, let alone not being able to check if it's aligned. Claude LOVES these.

Something more realistic would be:

+-----+

| foo |

+-----+

Re: MiniStack (replacement for LocalStack)

#49

Post by dspillett »

heliumtera wrote: post #37
sebmellen wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We live in the golden age of slop. It seems a surprisingly small number of people have the visceral AI disgust response.

Maybe that visceral response being against the rules (assume good faith) and actively being punished explains the small number of people doing it?

My visceral AI disgust response here is just a subset of my more general lazyly-slapped-together-without-sufficient-testing-or-other-review disgust response. If it doesn't look bad in that way, whether hand-made or ghostwritten, then I'll not react to it that way. But if someone can't be bothered to do a simple clean-up pass on that documentation, what mess could they have left in the code too?

As far as I'm concerned the social contract (“the rules”) has already been broken by people taking insufficient care, and my reaction to that is a healthy one from the PoV of self-preservation. Acting in good faith works both ways, or it doesn't.

Re: MiniStack (replacement for LocalStack)

#50

Post by dspillett »

ramon156 wrote: post #48
oefrha wrote: post #23

Any project with Claude’s signature misaligned ASCII diagram just screams DON’T USE to me. If you can’t even bother to read your damn generated README, how do I know you have QC’ed anything else? At the very least supported features claimed in README / on website could be totally fake, which is extremely common among all the vibed Show HNs. https://github.com/Nahuel990/ministack/blob/a1b1d20a27d2238d...

ASCII with rounded corners is already a red flag, let alone not being able to check if it's aligned. Claude LOVES these. Something more realistic would be: +-----+ | foo | +-----+

> ASCII with rounded corners

To be that guy for a moment: those are not ASCII as those characters are not in the standard 7-bit ASCII set. The closest you get to rounded corners with just ASCII is something like:

    /-----\       .-----. 
    | bah |  or   | bah |   (the latter usually looks best IMO, but that can depend on font)
    \-----/       `-----'
You'd get away with calling the linked diagram ANSI. While that is technically incorrect most people accept the term for something that uses one of the common 8-bit character sets that include those box-drawing characters (CP437, CP850, ISO-8859, Win1252, …), because that is what MS has for a long time called Win1252 in its tools.

> is already a red flag

I wouldn't call using box-drawing characters a red flag, I've known people use them this way for years and do so myself. The LLM generates them because they were in its training data because people use them. It might be something to consider amongst other flags but I don't consider it a strong signal on its own. The red flag for me is the alignment - if you are going to have your documentation ghostwritten at least make the effort to do a cursory editing pass afterwards.

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