Show HN: SQLite Online – 11 years of solo development, 11K daily users
(sqliteonline.com)221 points by sqliteonline 5 hours ago
221 points by sqliteonline 5 hours ago
Thank you! I hope it will capture your interest with new features in the future.
hey, not to give you "armchair" advice, but I feel like a tool that's existed for 11 years and has 11k daily users is a super serious achievement.
I'd vicariously love for you to be able to make some/more revenue with this!
+1 on @redox99's comment that charging in rubles is most probably confusing, and that a flat $10 usd/month would be easier. I also would think that renewal should actually be on by default, not off - if people want the service and/or to support you, having auto renewal off is more of a hassle for them (the customers who want to pay you!) as they'd have to have to... re-enable their service? every 30-90 days?
and another point I wanted to bring up is that it feels to me like a small text-based advertisement from ethicalads.io (the folks behind the ads on Read the Docs sites) or carbonads.net (btw I have no affiliation to either) could definitely... bring in some not-bad revenue pretty much immediately?
again, huge congrats on your project and I truly wish you'll be able to find some path to monetization. cheers!
Thank you. I have been considering various monetization approaches, evaluating their convenience and potential demand. Unfortunately, certain external factors currently prevent me from implementing everything as I would like. However, I still have several ideas that I hope will be engaging, in demand, and easy to pay for.
I get this message:
The site takes a long time to load: is your internet slow?
If you have an old version of the browser update to the latest or use the latest version of chrome.
Close all tabs with the site and reload the last one.
support: z@sqliteonline.com
Current Firefox on Linux. This is the console message:
downloadable font: Glyph bbox was incorrect (glyph ids 33 55 62 81 82 83 84 87 88 89 90 112 119 120 123 139 159 162 164 166 178 184 185 217 218 272 273 274 275 279 281 284 290 291 292 309 310 319 321 323 326 329 330 331 332 333 334 339 341 347 349 351 352 353 354 357 358 361 366 367 370 371 414 431 436 444 445 458 460 464 465 483 505 508 511 514 516 517 518 520 521 538 539 546 568 574 579 580 585 586 594 596 599 602 603 616 618 622 627 629 630 633 634 638 643 645 651 654 665 675 685 686 688 691) (font-family: "FontAwesome" style:normal weight:400 stretch:100 src index:1) source: https://sqliteonline.com/fonts/fontawesome-webfont.woff2?v=4...
using deprecated parameters for the initialization function; pass a single object instead sog3.js:2251:21
Uncaught (in promise) ReferenceError: RTCPeerConnection is not defined <anonymous> https://sqliteonline.com/f/agw31.0.26.min.js:49 async* https://sqliteonline.com/f/agw31.0.26.min.js:87 async* https://sqliteonline.com/f/agw31.0.26.min.js:89
You may be using an outdated browser version that doesn’t support some features. Please update your browser to the latest version for the website to work properly.
I also get the glyph message on my Firefox 144.0b8 and it runs fast here, so I guess that shouldn't be the reason...
RTCPeerConnection is available in Firefox and Chrome since 2017... son unless the browser is veeery old... Maybe something blocking RTC?
I am really struggling to figure out what this is or how it provides value.
Edit:
This discussion isn't exactly what I was hoping for. I was looking for ways to better highlight the features or value proposition of this site. Not defenestrate it altogether.
E.g.: A simple modal that says "Welcome to SQLite Online! You can <core value proposition> with this tool." would have radically altered my initial perception.
For me: Try queries without the hassle of setting up a database. Learn SQL. Experiment. Etc.
The just-use-rsync line of thinking doesn't go away https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9224
I'm at the point where I know exactly what comment that is because of the comment ID of 9224. Don't even need to mention rsync, Dropbox, or anything else.
> For me: Try queries without the hassle of setting up a database.
sqlite3 some-file.db
This method is not available on all devices and does not support sharing or collaboration.
The website, however, works on any platform and allows working together in a single shared database.
Implicit assumptions: You know what a CLI is, you have one on your system, and how to install the sqlite3 binary somehow.
When I just started out with linux I was so frustrated with people just listing reams of commands, or files I needed to edit without stating I needed to look in /etc
sqlite3 :memory:
Yes, we plan to add starter tips with explanations of their purpose.
> You can <core value proposition>
It may be difficult to briefly describe all the website’s capabilities right now, but the key features include:
* Federated queries across external and internal data sources.
* Using query history as a source for new requests.
* Collaborative access to databases — both server and local, with structure synchronization.
* Automatic chart generation based on queries.
* And much more, including hidden features that are not yet easy to summarize.As an educator I would've loved to have this last time I was teaching SQL.
1: No install
2: Ephermal (just reload if you've messed up?)
3: Good syntax highlighting
4: Visual UI to navigate the model
Why to pay for it though? That's a harder nut to crack, the UI is quite nice compared to many I've seen so maybe sell as an addon for those that provider hosted databases, collaborative spaces or as a desktop app. No obvious slam dunks though.
Yup, I think it would be a big help if the home page ('/') was a landing page explaining who it's for and why, and why. Is this for students? For prototyping? For quick analysis? Sample data? Importing real data? Use cases are key.
And then have a big hero button leading to the the actual tool ('/app' or '/playground' or whatever). Maybe preloaded with different sample data depending on the use case.
Right now, being dumped into a complicated interface with zero explanation is very confusing. (None of this is to criticize the project itself, just to help identify it to the people who might find the most value in it!)
No?
I don't have the time to spend 10 minutes getting to know a product's features to try to figure out what it might be for.
Just tell me what it's for.
I mean, it's great if people can figure out other uses for it too. If they want to use it in a new way, awesome -- don't get me wrong. But products are generally built with specific purposes in mind. So don't hide those.
Thank you for your feedback. The idea was to make the product understandable without additional explanations, but it seems I didn’t achieve that. I have a lot to improve.
Agree with your edit saying that there should be a landing message that gives a quick overview. But with in a few moments I was able to see that you can create a database and then start inserting tables/records into it. Seems like a pretty good tool to learn how to create and manage a database without the hassle of having to download sqlite and start testing commands that might be new to you in the CLI
Great job and many kudos for the determination to maintain a tool for 11 years!
I thankfully have no use for the tool since I no longer have to code SQL - the world is a better place for it.
It raises the question how many more "bus tools"[1] are there? Tools maintained and developed by a single developer with whom, when hit by a bus, the tool would die.
[1] no offence meant but "bus developers" is the term I learnt, it seems a little cruel to speak of folks being hit by buses - is there something better nowadays?
Thank you. Our entire life is but a moment: something disappears, and something new emerges.
I aim to make the product convenient and as straightforward as possible. It's better to extend its use when needed than to worry about when to stop.
Sure it is. A subscription's defining trait is continuity of access contingent on periodic renewal, whether manual or automatic. People subscribed to things way before online payments or even credit cards were common. A modern, if niche, example is Tarsnap.com. Once in a while, I get an email from Colin telling me to pay up if I don't want my backups deleted.
I'd highly suggest getting a designer, or somehow thinking with more of a product mindset? I fail to understand what it does quickly, which shouldn't happen to a potential customer.
The dev is asking on the site for people to support the development with subscriptions, but they say here they have basically zero subscribers. So 11k daily users hasn't translated to something that people want to actually pay to support. That could change.
Imagine how many more users could be using if it had a product mindset.
That's an absurd comparison.
At the time there were dozens of search engines and new ones every day. Everybody knew what search engines were, and what they offered. Google did not invent the form field -> SRP pattern; people were already used to that. Google was able to rise above the field because 1. yes the homepage was nice, but more importantly 2. the results were so much better than competitors.
I don't understand the comparison to SQLite online because what are the well-known competitors, and what is it even trying to do?
Not even going to touch the ChatGPT comparison.
Thank you! I will strive to improve the interface and make it more intuitive.
If you're making enough money, you can hire a designer every now and then to tell you where your UX suffers and how to fix it. No investors necessary.
(or: just solicit feedback in a space frequented by designers, and harness the power of being wrong on the internet ;)
And what currency is it in? Seems so odd to not put it in dollars or euros.
And FURTHERMORE, the $ sign is incorrectly to the right of the numbers. It should be $10. Personally, this shows such a lack of product thinking, and simply hacking away at a tool instead of delivering a service.
Don't localise messages if you don't have anyone to proofread. Browsers have built in translation nowadays that users can activate if they need.
Not the parent, but I see that several messages related to buying a subscription are translated into the locale of my browser. In my language, it just feels a little amateurish. In other languages, perhaps it might contain something totally wrong.
So it will be safer to just use languages you are comfortable with, like English and Russian. Especially on pages that concern money. :)
Thank you. I used an LLM for translation, hoping to achieve a high-quality result and make the service convenient for users. It seems I was mistaken.
What a nice tool. Thank you for building and maintaining the product. I casually use it to validate SQL joins