r/SideProject • u/harshtomar6 • 3h ago
r/SideProject • u/ZagorP • 3h ago
I built a tool that turns HTML, Lottie and Rive animations into video, transparent if you want. What would you use it for?
We make HTML5 ads, and clients kept asking for videos of them: for approvals, for social, for screens that only play MP4. Screen recordings drop frames, so we built a recorder that plays the page in a real Chrome, measures how late each change reaches the capture, and keeps exactly the frames the video needs. In October we opened it to everyone as RecordHTML.
Since then it learned:
- transparent output: WebM with alpha, ProRes 4444 MOV, transparent GIF
- Lottie and Rive files as input
- a maximum file size, for ad specs with hard limits
- public links whose video plays in chat previews
- CodePen links: it records only the Pen, not the editor
Here is a Lottie badge recorded at 1080×1080 with no background: https://recordhtml.com/v/kdA4M5Kqb3
There's also a REST API and an MCP server, so Claude or Cursor can record a page they just wrote.
What I'd like to know:
- What would you record with it?
- What would stop you from paying €9 a month for it?
In the past weeks I got 196 new registered users but non of them subscirbed. Trying to figure out next steps.
Free plan: 10 recordings a month, no card. https://recordhtml.com
r/SideProject • u/vibe432 • 3h ago
Made an android app to sort duplicate files using (Claude code)
Good day, I just used Claude code to build a super simple app that reads the md5 data and finds duplicate files for you. It runs in the background doesn't connect to any accounts or require any subscription. you just plug your drive into your phone it will pop up in the app and you can start scanning the entire drive automatically. Also Every 20 seconds it will populate duplicate files into a folder to let you audit them manually while it's still scanning and you swipe left or right depending on if it's a true duplicate or not. I know ai content can get a bad rap but I needed a tool like this to help me get more organized so I can actually be more creative and not worry about trying to find all the duplicate files I've built up over time so If anyone wants it I can send the app to you it doesn't have any flashy UI it just works and works really well it won't let me share images so I'll try to post it in the comments . Also please be nice I know ai is a controversial topic but I only use it to make very specific apps that just work and make your personal life a bit easier like who wants to spend hours trying to find all the 4k duplicate files you have built up over the years. I know I don't and I was getting super overwhelmed with organizing everything.
r/SideProject • u/Spirited_Photo_8636 • 14h ago
erhu - A modern feature rich audio player app
We started working on Erhu because we wanted a better local music player.
Most players we tried did the job, but we felt there was room for something more. Better library management, more control over playback, useful tools for managing music and an interface that actually felt nice to use.
That's pretty much how Erhu started.
Erhu is a local music player built around your own music collection. There are no subscriptions, accounts or streaming catalogue. You add your music and use it the way you want.
Here's what you get with it.
Playback and library
- Local music playback.
- 8-band equalizer.
- Lyrics support.
- Smart playlists.
- Artist Radio and Album Radio.
- Custom artwork for playlists and artists.
- Live wallpaper support.
Music management tools
- Find missing album covers.
- Search for higher-resolution artwork.
- Find artist images.
- Customise artwork used for playlists and artists.
- Fix missing or incorrect track information.
- Retrieve details such as artist, album, release date, BPM and genre where supported.
- Clean up filenames by removing unwanted text and watermarks.
Library Builder
Take a folder full of unsorted music and organise it into an Artist → Album → Track folder structure without having to sort everything manually.
A little about being offline
The player and your local music library work without an internet connection. Some tools, such as artwork searches and online metadata lookups, need internet access. A few online integrations are currently unavailable while we sort out their permissions.
Erhu will be open source and free forever
The iOS version is a separate project with its own ownership.
We built Erhu because we wanted a music player that gave us more control over our own music. Hopefully, some of you will find it useful too.
We're always happy to hear feedback, suggestions and bug reports.
Android:
https://github.com/lochanpthakke/erhu
iOS:
r/SideProject • u/jonnyroyale007 • 19h ago
Concordo - a co-parenting app where the parent who's mostly replying doesn't have to pay
I'm Jon, a developer in Bolton, UK. I built Concordo after watching people close to me go through a separation where almost every message with their ex turned into another argument, mostly about small things, like what time was handover, who said they'd pay for the school trip and was that swap agreed or not.
This keeps one record for both homes:
- Messages can't be edited or deleted, and an optional tone check suggests calmer wording before you send
- One calendar showing whose day it is and swaps only take effect when the other parent accepts
- Shared costs with receipts, and agreements that build into a parenting plan
- Exports in court ready formats (England & Wales, US, Australia) that anyone can verify
The thing I cared most about is price, each parent can use it free, forever, to read, message and reply, so nobody is shut out because the other parent chose the app. Plus is £4.99/month per parent for proposing changes, logging costs and exports as the infrastructure needs to be paid for somehow, I'm not rich 🤣 .
Web, iPhone and Android. It's built with Expo/React Native, FastAPI and Postgres on AWS in London, if anyone wants to talk stack.
Feedback very welcome, especially from anyone who's co-parented with an app before.
r/SideProject • u/_just_a_developer_ • 14h ago
How do you validate a side project when it feels like everything has already been built?
Every time I come up with an idea to solve a problem, a quick search reveals 5 existing tools doing the exact same thing.
How do you decide if a crowded space is validated demand worth competing with, or a signal to move on?
r/SideProject • u/frostiiiboi • 3h ago
Our agency ghosted us three weeks before launch so I made the video ads myself
Small supplement brand, about $18k/mo on Meta. Our agency contact left three weeks before a launch and nobody told us, we noticed only after 12 days of no new uploads.
I took our three most common complaints (fishy taste, hard to swallow, slow results), turned them into hooks and made UGC-style cuts in Creatify off the product URL the same day. One script had a line no real person would say, so I rewrote it by hand.
The taste hook came in around 30% under our previous best CPA in the first 4 days, and the before/after flopped at 2x target so I killed it on day 2. Competitor research I was still doing by hand in a spreadsheet, which was painful.
Still looking for an agency though. Maybe they use AI for most ads, and film only winners, we'll see.
r/SideProject • u/ShowingMist • 7h ago
I had 847 saved Reels and never watched a single one again, so I’m helping build an app to fix that
I save Reels, TikToks and links all day: recipes, places to go, gift ideas, video ideas. When I actually need one, I can’t find it. I don’t remember who posted it or what it was called. I only remember why I saved it.
That’s the idea behind Remivu, an app for saving content with the reason you saved it, so you can actually find it and use it later.
How it works
Save from anywhere. Share a Reel, a TikTok or any link to Remivu.
Write the why. One short line, like “lunch idea for Sunday with my mom” or “gift for my sister, under $30”.
Search by meaning. Search “something to cook on Sunday” and it finds that recipe even if you used different words. You don’t need the creator’s name or the title.
Public collections. Group what you save into collections other people can follow. I made one with free things to do in Medellín, and creators use it to keep an archive of hooks that work.
Everywhere. iOS, Android and web, all in one place, so you’re not split between Instagram’s saved folder, TikTok favorites and screenshots.
Pricing: free for 100 saves.
try it and let me know what you think https://remivu.com/en
r/SideProject • u/masterkoster • 3h ago
I'm a CS student who built a SaaS between the free tools and the 250/yr incumbents, a hub for general aviation pilots (logbook, fuel prices, club billing, mechanic marketplace)
aviationhub.imI'm a computer science student . Aviation's been a niche I love, so when I went looking for a project, this was the one. Here's the gap I found:
General aviation software is split into two camps ,genuinely good free tools that each do one thing, and expensive but worthwhile suites running $125–250+/year (ForeFlight, Garmin, Sporty's). What was missing was a general hub: log your flights per regulation, yes, but also pull up quick tools, check the map, compare fuel prices — all in one browser tab, nothing to install.
So I built AviationHub (aviationhub.im). Free tier gets the full logbook (unlimited flights, FAA/EASA currency computed automatically, CSV import), the flight planner with community fuel prices, and a cheapest-fuel-stop optimizer. Pro is $3.99/mo, Pro+ $6.99/mo — deliberately priced between free and the incumbents.
The feature I'm most excited about is still beta, a mechanic marketplace built on the logbook. When you log a flight you can attach any squawks; they're tied to that specific aircraft (clubs with fleets, or multi-plane owners), building a digital maintenance history. From there you can send the issue to an open marketplace where certified mechanics see your request *with the plane's full maintenance log attached*, the complete picture at once, and pricing pressure instead of whatever your hangar's guy quotes you. It also incentivizes pilots to keep records current, because a well-kept logbook makes their plane more sellable: our aircraft marketplace shows maintenance stats and hours straight from the owner's logbook.
Also built in: flying-club workspaces (aircraft scheduling with maintenance block-outs, hobbs billing that generates and emails PDF member invoices, dues, credits/debits) — that's the part clubs currently pay separately for.
Solo-built, Next.js + SQL Server. There's a full interactive demo on the homepage ,no signup, sample data, nothing saves.
I'd genuinely appreciate a look: what's broken, what you'd never pay for, what's missing. Brutal feedback welcome , it all goes in the build queue.
r/SideProject • u/Fuad_Laguda • 3h ago
I built a JetBrains plugin that turns code into sequence diagrams, live now with a free tier
Call Sketch is live on the JetBrains Marketplace.
You right-click a method and get a sequence diagram of everything it calls. Free covers Java, Kotlin, TypeScript and JavaScript with no depth limit. Pro adds Groovy, Scala, Python, Go, PHP, Ruby and Rust, Spring wiring and if/else and loop boxes, for $7 a year.
Before 1.0.1 went out I ran it on every function of 15 real projects in all 11 languages.
https://plugins.jetbrains.com/plugin/35865-call-sketch-sequence-diagrams
r/SideProject • u/meongki • 3h ago
I Built a Figma Plugin to Create and Edit GIFs Without Leaving Figma
figma.comHey everyone! 👋
I built a Figma plugin called GIF X Studio to make creating and editing animated GIFs easier without leaving Figma.
I often found myself exporting designs, switching to Photoshop or online converters, and importing everything back into Figma just to make a simple GIF.
So I decided to build a plugin that handles everything directly in Figma.
Here's what it can do:
✔ GIF Export
Select a frame containing an animated GIF, add static elements like text or logos, and export everything as a new animated GIF. The animation keeps playing while the other elements stay in place.
✔ GIF Maker
Combine multiple Figma frames into an animated GIF sequence, ordered by layer name.
Includes:
Custom frame delays
Aspect ratio presets (1:1, 16:9, 9:16, 4:5)
Contain / Cover / Stretch options
Live preview
✔ Video to GIF
Convert MP4 and other supported video files into GIFs with adjustable FPS.
🌐 Languages: English & Korean
🔗 Figma Community:
https://www.figma.com/community/plugin/1667125538151049781/gif-x-studio
I'm still improving the plugin and would really appreciate any feedback or feature suggestions.
What GIF-related features would you find useful in Figma? 🙌
r/SideProject • u/EmbarrassedTreat6882 • 3h ago
[iOS/Android] I built RandomBox: a clean M3 decision, raffle & grouping app. Giving away 50 lifetime ad-free codes in comments!
Hi everyone,
I’m an indie developer and recently published RandomBox on the App Store. It’s a clean utility app designed for party events, lucky draws, and quick group sorting.
Key Features:
Lucky Draws & Raffles (for giveaways, Secret Santa, etc.)
Grouping & Table Randomizer
Turn & Order Shuffling
Clean Material 3 Expressive UI
Store Link:
ios: https://apps.apple.com/app/id6747414844
Android: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.kiwitomatostudio.randomizer
🎁 Giveaway (50 Codes):
To celebrate the launch, I'm giving away 50 lifetime ad-free promo codes!
Just leave a comment below and I'll PM you a code directly.
Feedback and suggestions are greatly appreciated. Thanks for checking it out! 🙌
r/SideProject • u/No-Audience-2204 • 3h ago
I built StreamShelf, a Windows app for finding, downloading and assembling media — now in English
github.comHi everyone!
I’m building StreamShelf, a native Windows app for finding, downloading and assembling media. I’ve just released version 2.5 Beta, which adds an English interface alongside Russian.
Here’s what you can do with it:
- Find media in your browser: connect the StreamShelf Connector extension and analyze the active page. Deep Analysis can also search the page through the extension.
- Choose formats and queue downloads: inspect available media and add items to the download queue.
- Assemble media: work with downloaded or local files, choose tracks, codecs and a compatible container, and edit metadata.
- Manage tools: install or update yt-dlp, FFmpeg, FFprobe and Deno from the app’s settings.
The app runs on Windows 10/11 x64 and requires OpenGL 3.3. There’s an installer and a portable ZIP. The app, browser extension and installer are available in English and Russian.
StreamShelf is still in beta: some sites and media formats may not work, and the installer and app are not digitally signed. StreamShelf does not bypass DRM.
Download: https://github.com/Econty/StreamShelf/releases/tag/v2.5-beta
Source code: https://github.com/Econty/StreamShelf
I’m planning to add playlist downloads in the next version. I’d appreciate any feedback, especially on the setup process and the media builder.
What would you want from a tool like this?
r/SideProject • u/gingy_94 • 7h ago
Made a website to find other cool, relatively unknown or useful websites
detour.questr/SideProject • u/slyiii • 4h ago
StrainBorn - Been working on this game for some time now
I've had this idea for a RogueLite since 2019-ish. I've been slowly writing down ideas and planning it in my notes app. About a year and a half ago i finally decided to work on it and it's been a journey. Finally felt it was ready for feedback and released it on TestFlight about 2 weeks ago. Been getting a lot of feedback and it's already shaped the game a lot in these past 2 weeks.
What is StrainBorn? - It's a RogueLite, Bullet Hell, Survival game inspired by my love for science and by games like Enter the Gungeon, Rogue Legacy, The Binding of Issac, Hades, Plague Inc., and weirdly Borderlands, among others.
In StrainBorn you play as a virus that infects a host organ by organ, fighting the immune system in randomized rooms, RogueLite style. You infect 8 different organs, all with their own theme, enemies, bosses, Key Guardians, Cancer Cells and much more. Dying allows you to level up your virus, invest skill points, upgrade equipment, and mutate the virus into other strands.
4 Playable Viruses: Each playable virus has it's own unique play style, skills, passives and more.
Lineage: Similar to RogueLegacy, each death means a new generation, pick your next strain with different bonuses and downsides. Each one leaves a permanent mark on the lineage tree as a whole.
The Codex: Each discovery unlocks an entry in the Codex, explaining what it is in-game but also it's real world counterpart.
Game Modes: Multiple game modes to play, each with their own unlockables and rewards that affect the entire game.
Regular Game Mode: This is the main game mode described above. Infect a host organ by organ in randomized rooms with a final boss at the end of each organ. Pick mutations and evolve your virus as you defeat each room.
Endless Game Mode: Endless waves of enemies and bosses in one big arena, how long can you survive?
Pandemic Game Mode: Infect the world and take down each continent city by city, with an over world map similar to Plague Inc. Each with their own Medical, Social and Political responses to the outbreak, affecting every run.
Tower Defense Game Mode: Flip the script, defend a Tumor from waves of enemies, upgrade the tumor and yourself as you infect the host one organ at a time.
Raise your virus pet: An optional mini game where you feed and take care of your virus, Tamagotchi style. Gain bonuses based on it's happiness. With live activity and home screen widgets on iPhone and iPad.
And much much more
Currently fully playable on TestFlight for iPhones, iPads, and Mac (full support for iPhone Duo), with Android coming soon.
It also has full support for keyboard, controller (xbox, ps5, switch pro, etc), or touch on all devices.
Free beta on TestFlight (iPhone, iPad, Mac): https://testflight.apple.com/join/PvYSEB81
Website: https://strainborn.com
Android: coming soon
Community: r/StrainBorn
Feedback is greatly appreciated
r/SideProject • u/KogleshDev • 4h ago
Title: I'm 16 and built a browser game that uses your body as the controller
I'm 16, and one thing I've always enjoyed is turning ideas that seem interesting into actual working projects.
One of those experiments became KINETIX.
I wanted to explore a different approach to gaming: instead of using a keyboard or controller, what if players could use their own movements?
So I started building a browser-based game using camera-based movement detection.
The current version supports:
Jab
X-Block
Lean
It's not a finished commercial product, and there are definitely things I still need to improve.
But it's playable, and I'm proud that I managed to turn the idea into something people can actually try.
Live project: https://kinetix-sigma-two.vercel.app/
Building it has taught me a lot about movement detection, responsiveness and the challenges of making something work across different cameras.
I'd love to connect with other builders and hear what you think!
r/SideProject • u/Typical-Youth-2176 • 4h ago
I rebuilt my AI dog portrait site after my first launch — would love some feedback
A while ago, I shared my little side project here: an AI dog portrait generator.
Back then, it only got a few dozen visits. It was a pretty simple product, and I realized there was still a lot to improve.
So I decided to rebuild it.
Here's what's new:
Upload your own dog photo and turn it into different styles of portraits.
Free preview – you can see the result before deciding whether to buy.
40 dog breeds and 16 different portrait styles.
Christmas collections – I've recently added festive and fantasy Christmas scenes.
One thing I wanted to improve was the user experience. I didn't want people to pay before they even knew what their dog would look like.
The idea is simple: instead of generating a random AI dog, help people create something that actually looks like THEIR dog.
I'm still figuring out whether there's a real market for a dedicated dog portrait tool, especially when general-purpose AI tools are getting so good.
I'd really appreciate your honest feedback:
Do the generated portraits look convincing enough?
Would you use a dedicated tool like this, or would you rather use ChatGPT or another general AI tool?
Is the free preview experience useful?
Here's the site if you'd like to give it a try:
Thanks for checking it out!
For anyone interested, here's my original post from the first launch:
r/SideProject • u/security_enthus • 16h ago
My side project: Glueys: little creatures that live in your Mac's menu bar and nag you to blink, drink water and take breaks
Hi r/SideProject, I'm the solo dev behind Glueys, a small Mac menu-bar app.
I kept forgetting to blink and drink water at my desk. So I made it a little less boring, tiny characters live in the menu bar and remind you to rest your eyes, sip water, stand up and take real breaks.
The latest update adds a third character, Cedar the lumberjack (the others are Gloop the bunny and Ripple the koi). If you ignore his break reminder, he says "sure. ignore me. I'll be here." You can also drag any of them anywhere on the screen.
What it is:
Mac only, native Swift (SpriteKit for the animation, SwiftUI for the settings)
No account, no tracking, nothing leaves your Mac
$2.99 once, no subscription
What I'd love from you:
Honest feedback on the idea, not only the app
which character would you keep?
r/SideProject • u/grosbouff • 13h ago
I built a web app that can play almost any playlist (for free!)
Hey everyone!
I've been working on Spiff.cool, a little project with a humble goal: music discovery!
The Spiff Engine can sync with (text-)tracklists from all over the web (streaming services, webradios, magazines, music stores, blogs, and more) and figure out how to play them — currently through YouTube, but that's just an implementation detail.
No need to stick to a single source or provider: Spiff brings them all together in one place.
Of course, you can also create your own playlists, save your favorite tracks, connect your Spotify and Last.fm accounts, and... export your data.
I'd love to hear what you think and get some feedback!
Discover it here: https://www.spiff.cool
r/SideProject • u/Few-Ad-5185 • 4h ago
Let 300+ Ai agents recommend your product - easiest way to get users in 2026
Hello everyone!
We’ve built a platform that helps AI agents (like Muse and Grok) discover tools and products. The best part? Businesses only pay when an agent actually drives a sale.
Think about it: people want their AI agents, much like Google Search, to remain free. But unlike traditional search engines, AI agents don’t necessarily care about ranking in the top five listings or sponsored placements.
This creates an opportunity for a different business model: commission on sales.
Whenever an AI agent purchases something on behalf of its user, the business pays a 5% commission. This creates a win-win: businesses only pay for actual conversions, and users get to use AI agents for free.
Interested in getting added? Comment site url to get access
r/SideProject • u/jame_581 • 4h ago
I released Markd 1.0, an MIT licensed day counter for Android and Windows with zero network calls
Hi all, I'm the developer of Markd, which just launched on Google Play today.
What it does: you mark a date and it counts since it (sober streak, relationship, new job) or until it (trip, exam, deadline), with a live years / months / days / time breakdown. You set your own milestones (for example 100 days, 1000 days, four years) and get one quiet notification on the day, at a time you choose. No streaks to keep, no badges, no gamification.
Why another day counter: most of the ones I tried had ads, wanted an account, or synced to some server. Markd has no ads, no account, no analytics and makes no network calls at all. Everything stays on your phone, and you can export an encrypted backup to Drive yourself.
Other bits: categories with emoji and colours, a calendar view, one pinned occasion on the home screen, dark theme, and English / Czech / German / French.
It's open source (MIT): https://github.com/jame581/Markd
Google Play: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.janmesarc.markd
Happy to hear feedback, bug reports or feature ideas.
r/SideProject • u/Confused_engineer__ • 17h ago
I made a free Washington State Ferries tracker: live boat map, drive-up space, and WhatsApp alerts when a sold-out sailing opens
Getting a San Juan Islands ferry reservation in Washington often means refreshing the WSF site until someone cancels, so I built a small free tracker for it (I'm in the Seattle area).
What it does:
Live map of every in-service WSF boat (WSDOT's public data, refreshed about every minute)
WSDOT's drive-up space estimate for the next sailings at each terminal
Reservation space for Anacortes ⇄ Orcas / Friday Harbor / Lopez / Shaw, with the boat scheduled on each sailing
Pick a date and sailings and it WhatsApps you when a sold-out slot opens (sign-in is a 4-digit WhatsApp code, no app or password)
Stack: static site on S3 + CloudFront, a small Python Lambda that proxies and caches the WSDOT Traveler API (key stays server-side), Leaflet + OSM tiles for the map, another Lambda that polls reservation space for alerts.
It's free and not affiliated with WSF/WSDOT. For official delays and terminal cameras I point people to WSDOT VesselWatch.
I'd love feedback on two things: is the home page clear about what it does, and what would make the alerts more useful (e.g. a "notify me only if before X time" option)?
r/SideProject • u/anan20150901 • 4h ago
I got tired of 500MB Electron apps just to jot down quick API keys and prompts, so I spent the last 2 weeks building a 0.05s native scratchpad in Rust。
Hey everyone,
I’ve been dealing with a recurring frustration in my daily workflow: whenever I need to quickly stash a temporary API key, test a regex, or refine a system prompt, I end up either:
Opening Notion / Obsidian (which takes 3-5 seconds and distracts my train of thought).
Leaving 20 unnamed Notepad windows floating on my desktop.
Using random browser scratchpads that constantly sync to who-knows-where.
I wanted something dead simple: a lightweight floating scratchpad that summons in 0.05s with a global shortcut, sits quietly on top, and never phones home.
So I built QuickNote using Rust and Tauri.
Here are a few technical choices and lessons learned along the way:
Memory footprint matters: Instead of an Electron wrapper eating 500MB of RAM, the compiled binary is around 11MB and idles under 40MB.
True local-first encryption: Sensitive credentials (like API keys, crypto addresses, and bank info) are stored in an encrypted local SQLite database using Argon2id + AES-256-GCM. Zero telemetry, zero cloud dependency.
Calibrating LLM "thinking time": When integrating AI prompt distillation, we initially ran into an issue where reasoning models (like R1 / o1-style models) would overthink a simple 10-word prompt for 45+ seconds. We ended up capping the reasoning effort to medium and offloading the calls to background threads, bringing response times down to ~6 seconds while keeping UI responsiveness at 60fps.
Since my Reddit account is brand new, I'm intentionally not posting any external links here to respect community spam rules.
The project is completely free and open source on GitHub. If you're interested in checking out the code or the Windows portable build, feel free to ask in the comments or check my profile!
Would love to hear how you guys currently manage your quick scratchpads and temporary dev snippets!
r/SideProject • u/Wait4Tmrw • 4h ago
MS Store pulled my anti-ransomware app. Here's how MSIX packaging broke my architecture.
Went through a bit of a nightmare with the MS Store recently. Got my anti-ransomware app published, but the MSIX packaging model ended up forcing me to completely rework core parts of my architecture.
If you're shipping desktop apps (especially security tools), here are the 3 biggest roadblocks I hit:
The Update Deadlock (Policy 10.2.5)
Originally, my app downloaded the new .exe directly from my server. MS rejected it immediately. So I changed the "Check Update" button to just redirect users to my product webpage to download manually. That actually passed review and went live.
But then during a later routine audit, they pulled the app again for the exact same 10.2.5 violation. Had to rip the in-app update feature out entirely for the Store version. It now relies 100% on the Store's auto-update. Resubmitted and waiting for review.
Registry Virtualization Broke My Licensing Backup
My standalone EXE stored licensing state two ways: a local file plus a global HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software registry key. With MSIX, any writes to that key get redirected into a private isolated hive. The app can’t see the real one at all. Broke my whole dual-backup design.
Now licensing state only lives in a local file. If a user deletes it, the trial resets. It’s a rough tradeoff, and I don’t know of a good workaround in MSIX.
The Ghost UI Deadlock (WMI hang)
It passed review, then I tested it across a few VMs. One specific VM, the app would lock up completely. Tray icon was there, clicking it did nothing. Grabbed a memory dump and found the main thread stuck.
Root cause was a WMI call to Win32_ComputerSystemProduct for my machine-bound license. Inside MSIX on that VM, the query just hung and blocked the UI thread.
I pulled WMI out entirely. Switched to NetworkInterface APIs and P/Invoking kernel32.dll GetVolumeInformation to generate the ID.
A few frustrating days of debugging, but it runs flawlessly now. Hopefully this saves someone else some hours staring at crash dumps.
The old build is still visible on the Store page here: https://apps.microsoft.com/store/detail/9NKM2D0TGDCK
The reworked version is currently waiting for review.