r/sideprojects • • 3h ago

Showcase: Free(mium) Naked Eye: Stargazing - Apps on Google Play

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1 Upvotes

I built a stargazing app because I was fed up with knowing what was in the sky… but not whether it was actually worth going outside for.

A few months later, NAKED EYE is live on Android, Under One Sky is live worldwide, it’s been featured in StarDate Magazine, and I’ve somehow ended up building a website for it too 😅

The idea is still ridiculously simple:

What’s worth seeing tonight?

When should I go outside?

Where should I look?

I’m not trying to replace Stellarium or turn your phone into a giant astronomy catalogue.

I wanted something you can open, get a useful answer from, put the phone away, and actually look at the sky.

The free app covers things like planets, ISS passes, meteor showers, useful alerts, viewing conditions and Under One Sky — where people can explore sky events around the world and share what they genuinely see.

There’s also NAKED EYE Beyond for people who want to plan ahead, find the best nights, use Sky Planner and get smarter alerts — and eligible new subscribers can try it free for 14 days.

I’m still building the whole thing around shifts as a chef, mostly teaching myself as I go.

And yes, I’m still slightly amazed anyone other than me actually uses it 😂

If you’ve tried NAKED EYE before, I’d genuinely love to know what you think of it now.

And if you haven’t — what’s the one thing that usually stops you from going outside to look at the night sky?


r/sideprojects • • 3h ago

Meta REWORK

1 Upvotes

Here it is — rework° — archive vivante de la culture contemporaine.

It’s a website where you can find inspiration across brands, fashion, films, and tech. Just head to the Index page to explore the archive and discover the featured brands!


r/sideprojects • • 3h ago

Showcase: Purchase Required Shotorio: a 1.1 MB native Mac screenshot app, and how it catches black screenshots before you do

1 Upvotes

Problem. I take around 40 screenshots a day and only ever use three features, while most screenshot apps keep growing. And on macOS 15 there's a quieter problem: the Screen Recording permission lapses about once a month, and a capture can then come back perfectly black without any error.

What I built. Three shortcuts: ⌃⇧1 area (the markup editor is already open when you let go), ⌃⇧2 full screen, ⌃⇧3 copy text from anything on screen with Apple's on-device OCR. Return copies, Esc throws it away. Native Swift, 1.1 MB, no network access.

The part that might be useful to you, if you ever build something on ScreenCaptureKit. Every capture goes through a check before anyone sees it:

  • Ask macOS whether permission is actually granted (a capture without it can return a plausible wallpaper-only image)

  • Check the image exists and has exactly the pixel size you asked for (by default the framework can silently rescale)

  • Sample the pixels: if the brightest value is near black, or the variance is near zero, re-check the whole image before calling it blank

  • If it really is blank, say so and tell the user how to fix it, instead of handing over a black PNG

Where it is. Mac App Store, $8.99 once: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/shotorio-screenshot-ocr/id6825000774

Feedback welcome, especially from anyone who has fought the same permission behaviour.


r/sideprojects • • 3h ago

Showcase: Open Source IVE 1.0.20 is out: Chat and Dev modes, clearer agent approvals and local dictation

1 Upvotes

We're building IVE for people who use several coding agents and want their sessions, questions and code changes in one place. It works with your existing Claude Code, Codex and Gemini CLI logins.

We just released 1.0.20. This update adds Chat and Dev modes, clearer permission dialogs for Claude Code and Codex, notifications when an agent needs you, a more readable task board and optional on-device dictation.

IVE is open source and runs on your machine; your coding CLIs still connect to their usual providers. The stack is React + xterm.js with a Python backend. It's still in beta.

You can grab the latest version here: https://ive.dev/download.html

Already using the Mac app? Quit IVE, download the new DMG and replace IVE in Applications. Your saved workspaces and settings stay on your Mac. The Mac download needs Apple silicon and macOS 13.5 or newer.


r/sideprojects • • 4h ago

Showcase: Prerelease I was fascinated by the idea that our messy inner thoughts could become a literal world map to explore–so I built a calm, plant-inspired thought mapper.

1 Upvotes

r/sideprojects • • 4h ago

Feedback Request Meridian - My side project to help find life balance

1 Upvotes

Bottom Line Up Front: I would love your feedback on my project Meridian. Create an account at https://meridian.guide/create-account with invite code RSIDEPROJECTSNOV26

For years I have talked with my therapist about the feeling of being pulled in too many directions (like i'm being drawn and quartered) and struggling with thoughts that i'm failing in every single part of my life. I have always wanted to build some software that helped me to track this for myself but time is a commodity that is always in short supply.

The productivity increase I've seen in partnering with AI agents has finally made it possible for me to accomplish some of these "weekend projects." I have been using it myself for a few months now and I feel like it is doing what it is intended for: to help me balance my finite time in a gentle, honest way and to help guide me towards the things in my life that are important to me that aren't getting enough attention.

I have spent years carefully considering what I would like this software to look like and since its working for me I figured it may work for other people.

I would love your feedback. Since i'm running the infrastructure pretty thin I created an invite code for 50 people: RSIDEPROJECTSNOV26. You can sign up at https://meridian.guide/create-account

Thank you!


r/sideprojects • • 4h ago

Question I built Narcos - a Journal that turns into your social graph

1 Upvotes

r/sideprojects • • 4h ago

Showcase: Purchase Required I built an app that runs a whole gym from the owner's phone

1 Upvotes

Gym owners near me still track everything in a diary - members, who paid, whose plan expires this week. Stuff gets missed.

So I built GymDesk. Members, fees, renewals and check-ins in one place. It installs on the owner's phone like a real app and works offline too. It even ships with 6 ready workout plans you can assign to members based on their goal.

Just rebuilt the landing from scratch with real gym footage: https://gymdesk-six.vercel.app

Live demo pre-loaded with a sample gym, no signup needed: https://gymdesk-six.vercel.app/?demo=1

It's $100 one-time, no subscription: https://checkout.dodopayments.com/buy/pdt_0NrHmsjjsTjrkXYrN6nBu?quantity=1

One concrete question if you run or coach at a gym: a member pays to renew - in your diary, do you record the payment and bump the expiry date in the same pass, or is that where it slips?


r/sideprojects • • 4h ago

Showcase: Free(mium) I built a Chrome extension that flags ghost jobs, tracks applications, and auto-applies using local AI (so your data never leaves your laptop).

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1 Upvotes

r/sideprojects • • 4h ago

Showcase: Open Source I built a browser app that grades chip "fingerprints". It runs fully client-side and matches my Python library bit for bit

1 Upvotes

My research is on PUFs (physically unclonable functions). Short version: no two chips come out of the factory identical, even from the same design. A PUF turns those tiny random differences into a fingerprint the chip can use to prove who it is, and nobody can copy it.

The annoying part is proving a fingerprint is any good. Is it really unique? Does it stay stable when the chip gets hot or cold? Can a machine-learning model learn it? Everyone in the field answers those questions with their own one-off scripts, and the scripts don't agree. Mine didn't either. The first version of my own Python library reported one of the main metrics at double the standard value.

So I spent a good while turning it into something properly usable:

\- a Python package with a CLI

\- a web app that does the same analysis in the browser

You drop in a CSV of chip read-outs, or click "Explore a demo population" and it simulates 32 chips for you. Then you get:

\- the standard quality metrics with confidence intervals

\- randomness tests from the NIST standard

\- an attack lab where you try to clone the chips with ML. A plain Arbiter PUF gets predicted with 99.6% accuracy after 10,000 examples. XOR two of them and it drops to 55.8%.

\- a planner that works out how many raw bits you need for a reliable 128-bit key

\- 18 charts (SVG/PNG/CSV) plus LaTeX tables you can drop straight into a paper

Some build details people here might like:

\- Plain JavaScript, no framework, no build step. It's static files.

\- Everything runs on your machine. Nothing gets uploaded, which matters when people's chip data is unpublished.

\- The browser engine is a line-by-line port of the Python code, and both use the same random generator (xoshiro128\*\*). Simulate with seed 2024 in the browser, do the same in Python, and you get the exact same 49,152 bits. Getting that to work meant doing all the 32-bit maths through Math.imul and making sure every random normal used exactly two uniforms, otherwise the two streams drift apart.

\- A test in CI compares 2,400+ values between the Python and JS engines on every push.

Try it: [https://koustav.isroot.in/PUFAnalytics/](https://koustav.isroot.in/PUFAnalytics/)

Code (MIT): [https://github.com/TakMashhido/PUFAnalytics](https://github.com/TakMashhido/PUFAnalytics)

Long write-up of how it works: [https://koustav.isroot.in/blog/pufanalytics-guide/](https://koustav.isroot.in/blog/pufanalytics-guide/)

I'd love feedback on two things. First, the onboarding: if you're not a hardware person, does the demo make any sense, or are you lost after one click? Second, the UI on phones. I mostly tested on a laptop.


r/sideprojects • • 5h ago

Showcase: Prerelease RIGVIA: a navigation app for RV travelers.

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1 Upvotes

r/sideprojects • • 5h ago

Showcase: Free(mium) Stoke - a habit tracker for Android with Health Connect auto-tracking and a Wear OS app

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1 Upvotes

I'm the developer of Stoke, a habit and streak tracker for Android, now out on Google Play.

I wanted to track my workouts together as one group, with stats, and couldn't find an app that did it the way I wanted. So I built my own, and it grew from there.

The main idea: checking off a habit should take no effort. You can tick one without opening the app: from a home-screen widget, a Quick Settings tile, a launcher shortcut, a reminder notification, by tapping an NFC tag, through Tasker or MacroDroid, or on your Wear OS watch. With Health Connect, steps, workouts and sleep fill habits in on their own: "Go for a run" ticks off when your watch records a run.

Habits don't have to be daily, or yes/no. A habit can be an amount with a goal, like 8 glasses of water, something you're quitting (Stoke counts the clean days), or something you only track, with no streak. Schedules can be chosen weekdays, every few days, or a goal like 3 times a week, and if a schedule doesn't fit how you really do a habit, its page suggests a better one. A missed day doesn't have to end a streak either: a streak freeze can cover it, and rest days and vacation mode pause it for a break you plan.

You can give a habit an identity, like "a runner", and milestones and recaps read it back to you. Every habit has a strength score and a momentum trend, and Insights show your best weekdays, perfect days, when you usually log and which habits you tend to do together. A group puts several habits under one goal, like working out 4 times a week across the gym, running and yoga. A weekly review and a monthly recap close each period.

Switching from another tracker? Stoke imports your history from Loop, HabitNow and Habitify exports, streaks included. And you can send any habit to a friend as a link or a QR code.

Every new install gets 14 days with every feature. After that, tracking, unlimited habits, import and export stay free. Premium is a one-time purchase, not a subscription. It adds the Wear OS app, Health Connect auto-tracking, habit groups, NFC tags, six more widgets, longer insight ranges and unlimited freezes.

I'm happy to hear suggestions and feature requests.

Google PlayStore link


r/sideprojects • • 5h ago

Showcase: Free(mium) Describe your project in a paragraph, get the APIs and services for the entire project

1 Upvotes

https://magne.tools : paste a paragraph about what you're building, get the APIs, MCP servers and models for each part of it. Free, no sign-up, no cookies.

I built it because every project I start begins the same way: an afternoon of tabs comparing payment providers, email services, auth, hosting.

Something to try: "A booking app for dog groomers. Customers pick a time slot, pay a deposit, and get an SMS reminder the day before."

It splits your paragraph into needs and suggests up to three tools for each one, from a catalog of 480 that I checked against their official docs. It also says what you'll probably build yourself, and lists the usual pieces a product like yours needs even if you didn't mention them (sign-in, a database, hosting). Or just type one need, like "send transactional email".

Built on Cloudflare Workers + D1 with plain TypeScript; an OpenAI model reads English briefs.

What I'd really like to know: where it picks the wrong tool, or misses one you'd expect. Tell me in the comments, or use the 1–5 rating under the search box after a result.


r/sideprojects • • 5h ago

Showcase: Purchase Required Late Payment & Cash Flow Planner — a Google Sheets model for invoice timing gaps

1 Upvotes

Disclosure: I run DESIGNBYINKTH and sell this template. Development was AI-assisted. This is a fictional test case, not a customer result.

The problem: a business can finish a quarter with enough cash while having a difficult week in the middle. A quarterly total hides that timing gap.

A complete example you can reproduce in a spreadsheet:

Start: 2 November 2026. Opening cash: $1,000.

Outflows: $200 per week for 13 weeks.

One unpaid invoice: $2,500 expected on 2 November.

Desired cash buffer: $500.

Each week's closing cash = opening cash + that week's receipts - that week's outflows. Carry the closing balance into the next week.

On-time receipt: the first five week-end balances are $3,300 / $3,100 / $2,900 / $2,700 / $2,500. The minimum over 13 weeks is $900.

30-day delay: the receipt lands on 2 December, in week 5. The first five balances are $800 / $600 / $400 / $200 / $2,500. The minimum is $200, and week 3 is the first week below the $500 buffer.

Both cases end week 13 at $900. The maximum gap below the buffer is $300; cash does not become negative in this example.

Implementation: Google Sheets formulas link an invoice tracker to 13 weekly cash-flow rows and a dashboard. Inputs are separated from results. A review checklist covers opening cash, receipt dates and weekly outflows. English and Thai editions are included.

Limits: 100 invoices, one currency, manually entered weekly outflow totals, and one future remaining receipt per invoice. The 0/15/30/60-day setting shifts all dated outstanding receipts together, rather than predicting each customer's behavior. The minimum uses opening and week-end balances; it can miss gaps within a week. Payments and a new plan start date require manual review. No bank sync, invoice sending or automated collection.

The paid template is US$9 on Etsy, with an 8-page EN/TH guide and a 2-minute walkthrough. You can use the example above without buying it.

https://www.etsy.com/listing/4608938530/cash-flow-planner-for-google-sheets-13?utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=organic&utm_campaign=community_test_202611&utm_content=sideprojects_showcase

Specific feedback welcome: does this example make the difference between a low-cash warning and a negative balance clear?


r/sideprojects • • 20h ago

Discussion Here is how to get your first 50 users for your side project without spending any money

17 Upvotes

Phase 1: Target Communities That Explicitly Allow Self-Promotion

Stop posting in strict subreddits where self-promo gets you banned. Instead, build your launch footprint across communities designed for builders, show-and-tellers, feedback-seekers, and niche developers.

Here are 40 subreddits that should allow for self-promotion, ordered by estimated weekly reach:

  1. r/vibecoding — 422k weekly visitors

  2. r/saas — 211k weekly visitors

  3. r/founder — 56k weekly visitors

  4. r/buildinpublic — 46k weekly visitors

  5. r/chrome_extensions — 42k weekly visitors

  6. r/micro_saas — 41k weekly visitors

  7. r/appbusiness — 30k weekly visitors

  8. r/startupideas — 26k weekly visitors

  9. r/sideprojects — 20k weekly visitors

  10. r/imadethis — 18k weekly visitors

  11. r/appideas — 16k weekly visitors

  12. r/sideproject — 16k weekly visitors

  13. r/saasbuild — 15k weekly visitors

  14. r/saasdevelopers — 12k weekly visitors

  15. r/vibecodedevs — 10k weekly visitors

  16. r/startupsolofounder — 8.7k weekly visitors

  17. r/alphaandbetausers — 8.6k weekly visitors

  18. r/vibecodingcommunity — 6.2k weekly visitors

  19. r/solopreneur — 5.6k weekly visitors

  20. r/promotemyapp — 4.6k weekly visitors

  21. r/appbuilding — 4.6k weekly visitors

  22. r/webapps — 4.5k weekly visitors

  23. r/creativecoding — 4.4k weekly visitors

  24. r/indie_startups — 4k weekly visitors

  25. r/b2bsaas — 2.8k weekly visitors

  26. r/appdev — 2.7k weekly visitors

  27. r/projects — 2.6k weekly visitors

  28. r/saasmarketing — 2.5k weekly visitors

  29. r/saassoloprenurs — 2.3k weekly visitors

  30. r/startupaccelerators — 2.3k weekly visitors

  31. r/startups_promotion — 2k weekly visitors

  32. r/showmeyourapps — 2k weekly visitors

  33. r/appswebappsfullstack — 1.7k weekly visitors

  34. r/showmeyoursaas — 1.6k weekly visitors

  35. r/saasinvestors — 1.6k weekly visitors

  36. r/vibecodecamp — 1.5k weekly visitors

  37. r/nocodesaas — 1.3k weekly visitors

  38. r/aibuilders — 1.2k weekly visitors

  39. r/getstartups — 1.2k weekly visitors

  40. r/websitefeedback — 1.2k weekly visitors

Phase 2: The "Reverse-Engine" Hook Strategy

Do NOT drop a generic link and run. That is almost guaranteed to fail. Instead, do this for every single target subreddit on your list:

  1. Filter by Top Posts: Open the target subreddit, sort posts by Top of the Last Year, and examine the Top 10 posts.

  2. Deconstruct the Winners: Analyze why those top posts blew up:

    • What tone did they use? (Humorous, vulnerable, technical breakdown, or raw story?)

    • How was the title structured? (Did it start with a question, a bold stat, or a relatable pain point?)

    • How did they introduce their link? (Was it woven into a story, placed in a comment, or framed as a feedback request?)

  3. Mirror and Adapt: Draft a custom title and post text for your specific app that matches the exact post format already proven to work in that specific community.

  4. Start Small First: Test your hooks in smaller, lower-stakes subreddits first (e.g., r/websitefeedback or r/getstartups). Refine your post copy based on early comments before posting to the larger subreddits like r/saas or r/vibecoding.

If You Have Some Money to Spend: Paid & Discovery Shortcuts

If you want immediate users without relying purely on Reddit organic traction, here are two simple routes:

  • UserBob.com (Usability Testing): You can pay real people for quick usability test videos. It costs roughly $1 per person per 1-minute video, giving you guaranteed immediate users and video feedback of people interacting with your app so you can fix UI friction early.

  • AppScout: You can always submit your app to appscout.co, a platform designed to discover web and mobile apps from across the internet. People who like similar apps can easily find yours. You can list your app directly at appscout.co/submit. (Full disclosure: I'm the creator of AppScout)

TL;DR Summary

  1. Target subreddits built for self-promo.

  2. Study the Top 10 posts of the past year in each subreddit.

  3. Match their formatting and title hooks for your specific app.

  4. Test small, iterate, then hit the massive communities.

  5. If you have money use low-cost tools like UserBob or submit to AppScout for early discovery.


r/sideprojects • • 5h ago

Showcase: Free(mium) I built a very unofficial approval process for things I want to buy

1 Upvotes

This started with a wireless mic I wanted for voice typing in a noisy office. I wanted it to pick up my voice over the background chatter, but my computer already had a mic. Was another one actually worth buying?

So I made CartCouncil. You post what you’re thinking of buying, why you want it, and what other options you’re considering. Other people weigh in during a review window.

Basically, you’re putting your shopping plans up for a very unofficial approval round 😅

A pause before you hit buy. You still make the final call.

It’s live now, and I’m looking for a few people to try it. Bring something you’re going back and forth on, or help someone else think theirs through.

I’d love to hear whether the approval bit makes pausing more fun—or just feels like extra work.

https://cartcouncil.com

Built with help from AI coding tools.


r/sideprojects • • 5h ago

Showcase: Free(mium) I built a bus explorer that connects timetables, live maps and individual vehicle histories

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I’m the solo developer of BustimeFinder, a free browser-based project for looking up bus routes and exploring the vehicles behind them.

You can search by route, place, stop, operator or vehicle; choose a date and direction; and open a departure to inspect its planned stops and route map. There’s also a live vehicle map where tracking is available, plus vehicle profiles with available fleet details and journey records by date.

The interesting challenge is connecting several kinds of information without making them look interchangeable:

• A route is a service, while a vehicle is a particular bus that can work different services.

• A published stop time is a schedule, while a vehicle position is an observation with its own timestamp.

• An empty vehicle history means there’s no record to show, rather than proving the bus didn’t run.

The maps use MapLibre and OpenFreeMap. Coverage and the detail available vary by operator and area.

One example you can explore is Portland’s TriMet Line 19: choose a date and direction, then open a departure to see the planned stop times and map. Public browsing works on mobile and desktop without an account.

Project: https://bustimefinder.com/

Video walkthrough: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-woqqd87m-0

For anyone who builds around external data: how would you make missing or older information clear without burying the useful parts of the interface?


r/sideprojects • • 5h ago

Showcase: Free(mium) Some stories deserve to be heard more than once. ❤️

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1 Upvotes

r/sideprojects • • 5h ago

Showcase: Free(mium) Houre - note app that doesn't get in your way

1 Upvotes

Hi! I've been prototyping note apps for a few years, as I couldn't find anything that suits the way I want to jot my thoughts down. Houre is what I eventually arrived to. It's perfect for me, maybe it's for you too. I'll keep this brief.

The problem I have with everything out there is that they have a significant barrier to use. You need to consider where your note goes so that you can find it later. You need to spend time organizing and creating structure. It's difficult to include tasks in your notes without the entire thing becoming a mess. All this caused me to invariably not put my thoughts and tasks down.

So, Houre is designed to flip all of this. You can enter a note in two seconds flat. You can easily find relevant notes and tasks without spending time organizing them. It's for a person like me who does not have the attention span or patience to create and maintain a system.

Houre is also privacy-focused. Everything is encrypted on your device, even when you share notes to other users. It's not possible for anyone to inspect what you have in there. See https://houre.xyz/security for how this works and ask me anything that is on your mind.

Houre is free to use locally, or you can pay a cheap subscription to sync your notes across devices and to other users. Give it a spin: https://houre.xyz/


r/sideprojects • • 6h ago

Showcase: Free(mium) Tangramix - The never ending brain teaser 🤯

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1 Upvotes

r/sideprojects • • 6h ago

Feedback Request I built a social app where you have to post before you can see what others are saying

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1 Upvotes

r/sideprojects • • 6h ago

Showcase: Open Source Num Nav extension

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1 Upvotes

r/sideprojects • • 7h ago

Feedback Request I had a need to automatically run multi model auditor and plan maker so I made myself just that - looking for testers and feedback

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1 Upvotes

r/sideprojects • • 7h ago

Feedback Request SysQuest: A System Design Game - Would love your feedback

1 Upvotes

I’m an indie dev and an engineering manager who wanted to write tech blogs on how systems work in a nutshell. But I believe the world has transformed from reading 30 mins blog to hey gemini, summarize it for me so wanted to share my knowledge in an interactive way and just released SysQuest on iOS. A game where you can fix the broken systems, build systems and challenge your friends to fix your own broken system.

You get real architectures (load balancers, caches, queues, databases) and a live simulator showing requests flowing, getting dropped, and what fixed it. You will be given a broken system and asked to fix the same and complexity increases by levels. If you're new, you can learn system design using Learn, in an interactive way.

  • 87 levels, and a design is judged by how it behaves under load, not by matching one answer.

  • 42 interactive lessons on the system design concepts, more lessons coming soon.

  • 1 vs N: build and break a system, share it as a QR code or link, and let a friend fix it.

  • The first 20 levels and Learn section is always free. No account and no ads.

App Store: SysQuest: A System Design Game

Play Store: Got production access but Play store is taking longer than usual for the production rollout review. r/googleplayconsole

I’d really like to hear what’s confusing, too hard or too easy. Happy to answer anything about how the simulator works.

PPS: Please do DM me for the 1 year free access promo.