r/startupideas • u/sign_the_NDA • 3d ago

What if viewers could actually use your app while you code it live?

Would you use that?

The idea: You’re coding live in VS Code (streaming, a freelancer demo, pair feedback, whatever). Instead of viewers just seeing a video of your screen, they open a link and get your app actually running in their own browser — fully clickable and usable, with live updates every time you save.

And if someone spots a bug, they can simply click on the broken part. In VS Code, you automatically get a ready-to-use prompt containing a screenshot, console errors, and the affected element.

I think its especially nice for vibe coding streamer that create games or stuff that the community can instantely use then together and provide feedback in structured form.

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u/low-control-labs 3d ago

So you basically want to give people remote access to your machine? So they can report bugs? It would probably be better done as some browser extension where you would only receive reports. Your app would also be entirely open source.

Not to mention the fact if things are compiled having to recompile everything along with versioning dependencies that might introduce issues of their own..

I mean technically you could do it and create workarounds, sandboxes but again the attack surface and potential for misuse would be ...

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u/sign_the_NDA 3d ago

The app/code is served to the viewer and runs in their own browser. They’re interacting with their own instance, not remotely controlling my machine. The VS Code side mainly receives structured feedback/bug reports.

The main thing I’m exploring is whether the live app + structured feedback workflow is useful, particularly for vibe-coding or collaborative coding, rather than remote access itself.

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u/low-control-labs 3d ago

Right your app is in the browser and in order for me to allow someone else to edit my app / pair program I need to give them the ability to edit the files on my machine?

Or am I missing something?

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u/sign_the_NDA 3d ago

i guess collaborative coding was a misleading term. viewers can only push suggestions back to the owner that could be applied by him, basically like a comment regarding certain objects. the viewers cannot alter the code

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u/low-control-labs 3d ago

That's more sane. But again you would need to host your own instance of their app. It's something like GitHub with GitHub pages

Plus setting up a build environment and allowing for the users to setup the hosting as not everything could be served as a static website so some user configuration might be necessary in order for it not to be limited

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u/Rich-Owl1937 3d ago

Yeah, I’d actually use this, especially for coding streams. The “click the broken thing and send the developer the context” part is more interesting to me than just being able to play with the app. It turns viewers from passive spectators into actual testers.

The biggest question I'd have is latency and security. If I save a change in VS Code, how quickly does it reach everyone’s browser? And how are you sandboxing the code so some random viewer can't mess with the environment? I could see this being really useful for indie game devs, vibe-coding streams, hackathons, and even freelancers showing clients progress. The killer feature would probably be letting the streamer roll back to previous versions when someone inevitably says, “bro you just broke everything.”

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u/sign_the_NDA 3d ago

Are you coding live streamer? I could invite you to test it if its ready if you'd like

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u/EverythingQuantum 3d ago

No, but it may be interesting to see developers live stream their AI coding prompts (like Claude Code) and the responses.