It's been pretty smooth sailing, I just use them for the ease of setting up a DB. Though recently I switched my setup to self hosting with Coolify

I also avoid using their SDK and just use a query builder

Yeah I get it. Atm I feel like I get a lot of value but that might change as I learn more about SEO

Also a lot of the times you can kinda figure out how to do stuff manually without their tools, also I don't wanna become a paying user long-term because I hate the credits things

Regarding vendor lock, imo Firebase is not versatile enough to stay with their platform and I personally know many instances of people having to move away because their app required more functionality that relational DBs provide (complex joins, better indexing, etc)

And it wasn't easy to move

Regarding pricing - I don't remember about the prices, I usually use the Supabase free tier and it's enough. The only caveat is that if your project isn't active and you're not paying $25/m a month they'll stop it from time to time and you'll have to go back to the dashboard to resume it

I'd switch to Supabase

Saying this after using firebase for years, the vendor lock in is super strong and with Supabase it's really easy to migrate as it's just postgres under the hood

Also I prefer the flexibility of a relational DB

When I started this project I knew it will be hard and will take time, and it feels good to finally see the light at the end of the tunnel.

With 80% of the project finished, now it's time to focus on the remaining 20% of the work before releasing to the public.

Let's go 🔥
#buildinpublic

these videos actually made me sign up to ahrefs because I already spent so much time watching their free content and learning about their platform incidentally

Before we launch I do want to make the budget formula and how we do it transparent for users.

I have more ideas to make this a lot more accurate, for an MVP this should be good enough

The only caveat is that family > 4 costs may be less accurate since we:
1. Assume a family of 4 is going to take a bigger house
2. When analyzing Airbnbs we don't make that distinction now and just double the median price of the houses

Another pro tip: Use the steam to create diagrams on the glass 😂

Get a VPS from Hetzner for 4€ a month

Install Coolify and you can add most DBs with one click install

Easy peasy 👌

Alight I’m super tempted to do this
Mind DMing me?

Home in Israel
But unfortunately we don’t celebrate new years here so normal day for me 😅

I started my indie hacking journey in September, besides travel my focus has been to create a website that will help me and other travelers save a lot of time and potentially money picking destinations and making travel plans

Same. I work more, but the freedom to choose when/where to work is unparalleled for me.

My goals for 2025:
- Start sharing in social media and connecting with like-minded indie hackers
- Release my project in Q1 and continue working on more projects and marketing this one
- Become Ramen Profitable by end of 2025

Not anymore, today I primarily use TypeScript

I used PHP back then when it was all the rage, like ~12 years ago

And thank you for showing interest in my nomads website ❤️ It will be out in the next few months and hopefully I can start sharing more here about it

PHP