4 ms·

Show HN: Lemon – Alternative UI for AWS

40 points by igorzij 5y ago

igorzij 5y ago
Hi all, Igor & Mo here from Lemon. We believe that developers deserve better than what AWS UI is today. It's incomprehensible, like an airplane cockpit. Whereas Lemon is built to feel more like your phone - no manual needed. Lemon is easy to use, like Vercel or Heroku. You can deploy containers, webapps, functions, databases, etc. Networking and permissions are automatically configured, CI / CD just works, instrumentation connected. But it's not a PaaS - it manages your AWS account, and you retain full control. Lemon has first-class support of Terraform, so you can customise every bit. It supports multiple environments and can export Terraform to a dedicated "infrastructure repository" if you connect one. And it will pick up your custom TF from that repo too, so it's a two-way sync. By default Lemon uses ECS Fargate to deploy your containers. Kubernetes is supported too, as well as Lambda. Static webapps go to S3 and served via CloudFront. Every environment gets independent configuration so you can have high-load production and many short-lived cost-efficient dev environments, even one per branch if you'd like. We've also just launched on ProductHunt: https://www.producthunt.com/posts/lemon-4 https://www.producthunt.com/posts/lemon-4
QuinnyPig 5y ago
This really needs an “about us” page. Trust (particularly with access to something as sensitive as an AWS account) is important here.
- igorzij 5y ago
  Thanks!! Super helpful, we haven't considered this
austinshea 5y ago
Can this be launched internally, such that I am not leaking internal details out to a 3rd party? I can't imagine adopting this in the companies I've worked for, without that avenue.
- swayson 5y ago
  +1
  - igorzij 5y ago
    What'd you think of an "intermediate" solution like Mongo Atlas for example - hosted dedicated instance in your region, but managed by us?
- igorzij 5y ago
  We are working on a self-hosted version, as well as a standalone mac app Both on the roadmap for Q4
itisit 5y ago
Great. More abstraction.
- dang 5y ago
  "Don't be snarky." "Please don't post shallow dismissals, especially of other people's work. A good critical comment teaches us something." https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html "Be respectful. Anyone sharing work is making a contribution, however modest." "When something isn't good, you needn't pretend that it is, but don't be gratuitously negative." https://news.ycombinator.com/showhn.html https://news.ycombinator.com/showhn.html
  - igorzij 5y ago
    Thanks!! One of our fundamental challenges was and to some extent still is to strike the right balance. On the one hand, some high-level concepts are clearly needed because it's got so complex in the last decade. But on the other hand it can't be opague, low-level access and control are still needed because no stack is the same. We believe we got this somewhat right by combining click-ops and Terraform into one seamless experience.
bwship 5y ago
We are tackling this same issue, but in a different way. A unified UI for AWS and LocalStack. https://getcommandeer.com https://getcommandeer.com
- igorzij 5y ago
  Very cool! We're also considering building a mac app, that elegantly solves all the access control / compliance concerns The downside is that in client-only arrangement state is no longer centrally managed; I wonder how do you solve that? Or do you have a "hybrid" model with some parts on the client and others on the server?
  - bwship 5y ago
    So everything is done between the client app and AWS. Under the hood it is using the AWS SDK. We don't store any keys or any of your data on our servers. So, the user has to have access keys, and they can also have their session token. We also have it setup that it can read from your .aws/credentials file, so if you have a process that automatically updates that file, the session token is also automatically updated in the app.
phnofive 5y ago
You've got some references to 'Digger' in your docs - perhaps an old name for the product? - and at least one 404 from there as well.
- igorzij 5y ago
  Yes, thanks and sorry for that - Digger is the old name and we haven't updated the docs. Will fix!
pachico 5y ago
I really don't know what must happen before I give AWS CRUD credentials to a third party. However, that something didn't happen by reading this website and its value proposition. I'm saying this as, hopefully, source for inspiration. The amount of trust a third party must inspire before anyone (like me at least?) dares to delegate operation must be overwhelming.
- igorzij 5y ago
  Thanks! This is super helpful What'd be your thoughts on the following options: - IAM role account-to-account (no credentials sharing) - Self-hosted webapp that runs in your account - Mac app so that creds never ever leave your laptop
  - redhale 5y ago
    Make that a Wndows-compatible app and I'm sold.
  - pachico 5y ago
    > - Self-hosted webapp that runs in your account this is probably as close as I'd get to use it, yes, with a little console that displays all the communications as a prove of good faith, welcoming anyone to spoof network and find out there are no home-calls/telemetry involved.
- rirze 5y ago
  Agreed, I'm not a fan of AWS's online console and its UI/UX, but my distaste isn't enough to login to AWS through another site. I'd rather navigate by CLI/API before I do that. Furthermore, I'm not really a fan of these closed-source available-for-pricing, enhancement products. They last for a few months in pre-release form, gauge that they don't have the customer numbers to justify their revenue, and then cease development.
  - doyoung 5y ago
    Totally agreed. Still kudos to the Lemon team in trying to improve the overall AWS experience.
aphrax 5y ago
Looks good, enjoyed the demo. Fwiw the name Lemon might get a few raised eyebrows here in the UK. Its slang for a dud/ broken thing..
- igorzij 5y ago
  Oh wow thanks!! totally did not realize that - despite myself living in London) lots to learn
  - blntechie 5y ago
    There is this whole thing called ‘Lemon Law’ to cover what is a lemon and what protection consumers get for their goods if they turn out to be lemons.
wizwit999 5y ago
This isn't a good idea.
- igorzij 5y ago
  why?
  - wizwit999 5y ago
    So a few things. First, I, like many here read your title and took a cursory look at your website, and thought you were literally making an alternative AWS console, which would be a bad idea for many reasons. But I just looked at your site again, and you're completely misrepresenting yourself by calling yourself an alternative UI for AWS. Youre more like a Kubernetes PaaS on AWS. There are many similar products, so I don't see a clear differentiation and your product doesn't very clean, but you could maybe possibly have something there. But your main problem is you're completely mis-selling yourself (or perhaps you're not completely sure what you're building).
    - igorzij 5y ago
      Thanks! This is helpful
loraxclient 5y ago
This looks cool! I spend half the day in terraform and AWS and I’m looking forward to trying this out later today. Regardless of how that goes, it’s really nice to see a project that addresses this specific area. Way to go! The AWS console is (at least for the popular services and API endpoints) super effective. That said, when you’re deploying a project that has components that span almost a dozen services in AWS that can quickly become a dozen tabs just to assess the state of the project. Not very fun - looking forward to seeing how this handles that.
- igorzij 5y ago
  thank you!! let us know how it goes for you! There's a chat icon at the bottom right or drop me a line at igor@uselemon.io

40 points by igorzij 5y ago

Hi all, Igor & Mo here from Lemon. We believe that developers deserve better than what AWS UI is today. It's incomprehensible, like an airplane cockpit. Whereas Lemon is built to feel more like your phone - no manual needed. Lemon is easy to use, like Vercel or Heroku. You can deploy containers, webapps, functions, databases, etc. Networking and permissions are automatically configured, CI / CD just works, instrumentation connected. But it's not a PaaS - it manages your AWS account, and you retain full control. Lemon has first-class support of Terraform, so you can customise every bit. It supports multiple environments and can export Terraform to a dedicated "infrastructure repository" if you connect one. And it will pick up your custom TF from that repo too, so it's a two-way sync. By default Lemon uses ECS Fargate to deploy your containers. Kubernetes is supported too, as well as Lambda. Static webapps go to S3 and served via CloudFront. Every environment gets independent configuration so you can have high-load production and many short-lived cost-efficient dev environments, even one per branch if you'd like. We've also just launched on ProductHunt: https://www.producthunt.com/posts/lemon-4 https://www.producthunt.com/posts/lemon-4

QuinnyPig 5y ago

This really needs an “about us” page. Trust (particularly with access to something as sensitive as an AWS account) is important here.

igorzij 5y ago
Thanks!! Super helpful, we haven't considered this

austinshea 5y ago

Can this be launched internally, such that I am not leaking internal details out to a 3rd party? I can't imagine adopting this in the companies I've worked for, without that avenue.

swayson 5y ago
+1
- igorzij 5y ago
  What'd you think of an "intermediate" solution like Mongo Atlas for example - hosted dedicated instance in your region, but managed by us?
igorzij 5y ago
We are working on a self-hosted version, as well as a standalone mac app Both on the roadmap for Q4

itisit 5y ago

Great. More abstraction.

dang 5y ago
"Don't be snarky." "Please don't post shallow dismissals, especially of other people's work. A good critical comment teaches us something." https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html "Be respectful. Anyone sharing work is making a contribution, however modest." "When something isn't good, you needn't pretend that it is, but don't be gratuitously negative." https://news.ycombinator.com/showhn.html https://news.ycombinator.com/showhn.html
- igorzij 5y ago
  Thanks!! One of our fundamental challenges was and to some extent still is to strike the right balance. On the one hand, some high-level concepts are clearly needed because it's got so complex in the last decade. But on the other hand it can't be opague, low-level access and control are still needed because no stack is the same. We believe we got this somewhat right by combining click-ops and Terraform into one seamless experience.

bwship 5y ago

We are tackling this same issue, but in a different way. A unified UI for AWS and LocalStack. https://getcommandeer.com https://getcommandeer.com

igorzij 5y ago
Very cool! We're also considering building a mac app, that elegantly solves all the access control / compliance concerns The downside is that in client-only arrangement state is no longer centrally managed; I wonder how do you solve that? Or do you have a "hybrid" model with some parts on the client and others on the server?
- bwship 5y ago
  So everything is done between the client app and AWS. Under the hood it is using the AWS SDK. We don't store any keys or any of your data on our servers. So, the user has to have access keys, and they can also have their session token. We also have it setup that it can read from your .aws/credentials file, so if you have a process that automatically updates that file, the session token is also automatically updated in the app.

phnofive 5y ago

You've got some references to 'Digger' in your docs - perhaps an old name for the product? - and at least one 404 from there as well.

igorzij 5y ago
Yes, thanks and sorry for that - Digger is the old name and we haven't updated the docs. Will fix!

pachico 5y ago

I really don't know what must happen before I give AWS CRUD credentials to a third party. However, that something didn't happen by reading this website and its value proposition. I'm saying this as, hopefully, source for inspiration. The amount of trust a third party must inspire before anyone (like me at least?) dares to delegate operation must be overwhelming.

igorzij 5y ago
Thanks! This is super helpful What'd be your thoughts on the following options: - IAM role account-to-account (no credentials sharing) - Self-hosted webapp that runs in your account - Mac app so that creds never ever leave your laptop
- redhale 5y ago
  Make that a Wndows-compatible app and I'm sold.
- pachico 5y ago
  > - Self-hosted webapp that runs in your account this is probably as close as I'd get to use it, yes, with a little console that displays all the communications as a prove of good faith, welcoming anyone to spoof network and find out there are no home-calls/telemetry involved.
rirze 5y ago
Agreed, I'm not a fan of AWS's online console and its UI/UX, but my distaste isn't enough to login to AWS through another site. I'd rather navigate by CLI/API before I do that. Furthermore, I'm not really a fan of these closed-source available-for-pricing, enhancement products. They last for a few months in pre-release form, gauge that they don't have the customer numbers to justify their revenue, and then cease development.
- doyoung 5y ago
  Totally agreed. Still kudos to the Lemon team in trying to improve the overall AWS experience.

aphrax 5y ago

Looks good, enjoyed the demo. Fwiw the name Lemon might get a few raised eyebrows here in the UK. Its slang for a dud/ broken thing..

igorzij 5y ago
Oh wow thanks!! totally did not realize that - despite myself living in London) lots to learn
- blntechie 5y ago
  There is this whole thing called ‘Lemon Law’ to cover what is a lemon and what protection consumers get for their goods if they turn out to be lemons.

wizwit999 5y ago

This isn't a good idea.

igorzij 5y ago
why?
- wizwit999 5y ago
  So a few things. First, I, like many here read your title and took a cursory look at your website, and thought you were literally making an alternative AWS console, which would be a bad idea for many reasons. But I just looked at your site again, and you're completely misrepresenting yourself by calling yourself an alternative UI for AWS. Youre more like a Kubernetes PaaS on AWS. There are many similar products, so I don't see a clear differentiation and your product doesn't very clean, but you could maybe possibly have something there. But your main problem is you're completely mis-selling yourself (or perhaps you're not completely sure what you're building).
  - igorzij 5y ago
    Thanks! This is helpful

loraxclient 5y ago

This looks cool! I spend half the day in terraform and AWS and I’m looking forward to trying this out later today. Regardless of how that goes, it’s really nice to see a project that addresses this specific area. Way to go! The AWS console is (at least for the popular services and API endpoints) super effective. That said, when you’re deploying a project that has components that span almost a dozen services in AWS that can quickly become a dozen tabs just to assess the state of the project. Not very fun - looking forward to seeing how this handles that.

igorzij 5y ago
thank you!! let us know how it goes for you! There's a chat icon at the bottom right or drop me a line at igor@uselemon.io