5 ms·

I scaled to millions of users as a solo founder and still run the whole show myself. AMA if you like. Here is what works for me: CI: From the terminal, I run

by TekMol 5y ago

I scaled to millions of users as a solo founder and still run the whole show myself. AMA if you like. Here is what works for me: CI: From the terminal, I run my tests and commit to git. Deployments: rsync Rollbacks: Never did one. If something breaks, I fix it and rsync the fix to production. DB: MariaDB k8s: I don't use it. Computers are very fast these days. A cheap single VPS will get you a long way. Nightmare: Not really. I spend about 30 minutes per week on DevOps.

CodinM 5y ago
What is the domain of your venture? (assuming it's not something you want to advertise specifically)
- TekMol 5y ago
  I like to keep it off my HN profile. I feel I am more open to share details this way.
  - lambdaba 5y ago
    Do you mind putting in some contact details (even temporarily) on your profile? I'd like to have a chat with you some time, I was looking through this whole thread for a comment like yours and I resonated a lot with you. (my details are in my profile) Not immediately, but in the following weeks. Thanks again for sharing.
aristofun 5y ago
Best comment so far. Thank you for being specific and to the point.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
launchiterate 5y ago
What are the most important things you learned and what would be your core advice for someone who wants to run a solo operation? How do you schedule your time to work on your project and how has it changed over time? Thanks in advance!
- TekMol 5y ago
  I would say the most important thing is a combination of two things: 1: Work on something that you yourself or your users want to exist. Don't think about what others might want. Make something that you consider pretty cool shit. Or something your users are asking for. Something where you or your users say "OMG when this is ready I will fricking love using it! I can't wait!". 2: Most founders, me included, often get stifled. They stop putting time into their project because they think it is just a dream. Remember that all amazing things have been built by people just like you. And to keep putting time into building something that you yourself or your users want.
  - launchiterate 5y ago
    Thank you so much !!! And congratulations on all you have accomplished!
nkzd 5y ago
How do you host your DB? Do you use managed DB service?
- TekMol 5y ago
  I run it on my VPS along with the rest of my project. If I want to set it up on a new server, I start a fresh Debian machine, do "apt install mariadb-server" and I am good to go. I don't like managed services (like Heroku) because: 1: I cannot easily replicate the setup locally. 2: It creates vendor lock-in which will cause me trouble when the vendors service changes in a way I don't like. 3: I would not be able to put the whole setup of my project in one setup script. It is so nice to just have a single script that contains all the steps that need to be done (Like the "apt install mariadb-server") to run the project on a fresh machine.
- strzibny 5y ago
  If someone wants to know how to host a database for the first time, I have a full chapter on PostgreSQL (and one on Redis) in my new book https://deploymentfromscratch.com/ https://deploymentfromscratch.com/. There is also a demo that sets up an independent database server (which you can treat as your own managed db). It's easier than you think if you stick to your distributions' packages. Just need to know how to 1, do auth right 2, enable SSL 3, run with SELinux 4, set a different location (for attached storage) 5, managed backups.
  - whitepoplar 5y ago
    Any chance you have an HN discount code? :-)
    - strzibny 5y ago
      I want to do Show HN, but probably have to prepare a bigger preview for that. Grab the "ruby30" code from the Reddit announcement: https://www.reddit.com/r/ruby/comments/pg3c9c/i_posted_on_this_subreddit_3_years_ago_about_my/ https://www.reddit.com/r/ruby/comments/pg3c9c/i_posted_on_th...
juanse 5y ago
Which tech stack are you using? PD: I follow a similar approach. I am glad you said it.
tommiegannert 5y ago
Agreed on rollbacks. I think rollbacks are a thing when you don't know the code, or you're too busy to be able to debug. Like when being on-call for a large codebase. If you're solo, you probably know enough that fix-forward is the way to go. (This assumes the system isn't critical enough that it needs fixing even if you're asleep, but then you would probably not be solo anyway.)
- orky56 5y ago
  Not sure if it's a philosophical question but as a solopreneur I have always rolled back since it keeps my commit chain cleaner rather than have previous versions that were buggy. I want to minimize downtime and a rollback is always faster than a fix-forward even when you know, or think you know, the fix.
hnick 5y ago
How about backups? I struggle with it a bit for our home office.
jitendrac 5y ago
Would you like to share the vps configuration and traffic you handle per month without diving deep into your venture?
XCSme 5y ago
I do the same, I feel like a simple VPS is a lot easier to manage and less prone to failures than a "cloud" provider. Normally the push-back is "what if it fails, what if you need to scale, etc.", but so far no VPS failed on me (even if it did, you can just use backups and restore with a bit of downtime) and the scaling part can be solved through a good horizontal-scaling server architecture, instead of relying on the cloud to automatically do that for you (which anyway still requires your architecture to support horizontal scaling).

by TekMol 5y ago

CodinM 5y ago

What is the domain of your venture? (assuming it's not something you want to advertise specifically)

TekMol 5y ago
I like to keep it off my HN profile. I feel I am more open to share details this way.
- lambdaba 5y ago
  Do you mind putting in some contact details (even temporarily) on your profile? I'd like to have a chat with you some time, I was looking through this whole thread for a comment like yours and I resonated a lot with you. (my details are in my profile) Not immediately, but in the following weeks. Thanks again for sharing.

aristofun 5y ago

Best comment so far. Thank you for being specific and to the point.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

launchiterate 5y ago

What are the most important things you learned and what would be your core advice for someone who wants to run a solo operation? How do you schedule your time to work on your project and how has it changed over time? Thanks in advance!

TekMol 5y ago
I would say the most important thing is a combination of two things: 1: Work on something that you yourself or your users want to exist. Don't think about what others might want. Make something that you consider pretty cool shit. Or something your users are asking for. Something where you or your users say "OMG when this is ready I will fricking love using it! I can't wait!". 2: Most founders, me included, often get stifled. They stop putting time into their project because they think it is just a dream. Remember that all amazing things have been built by people just like you. And to keep putting time into building something that you yourself or your users want.
- launchiterate 5y ago
  Thank you so much !!! And congratulations on all you have accomplished!

nkzd 5y ago

How do you host your DB? Do you use managed DB service?

TekMol 5y ago
I run it on my VPS along with the rest of my project. If I want to set it up on a new server, I start a fresh Debian machine, do "apt install mariadb-server" and I am good to go. I don't like managed services (like Heroku) because: 1: I cannot easily replicate the setup locally. 2: It creates vendor lock-in which will cause me trouble when the vendors service changes in a way I don't like. 3: I would not be able to put the whole setup of my project in one setup script. It is so nice to just have a single script that contains all the steps that need to be done (Like the "apt install mariadb-server") to run the project on a fresh machine.
strzibny 5y ago
If someone wants to know how to host a database for the first time, I have a full chapter on PostgreSQL (and one on Redis) in my new book https://deploymentfromscratch.com/ https://deploymentfromscratch.com/. There is also a demo that sets up an independent database server (which you can treat as your own managed db). It's easier than you think if you stick to your distributions' packages. Just need to know how to 1, do auth right 2, enable SSL 3, run with SELinux 4, set a different location (for attached storage) 5, managed backups.
- whitepoplar 5y ago
  Any chance you have an HN discount code? :-)
  - strzibny 5y ago
    I want to do Show HN, but probably have to prepare a bigger preview for that. Grab the "ruby30" code from the Reddit announcement: https://www.reddit.com/r/ruby/comments/pg3c9c/i_posted_on_this_subreddit_3_years_ago_about_my/ https://www.reddit.com/r/ruby/comments/pg3c9c/i_posted_on_th...

juanse 5y ago

Which tech stack are you using? PD: I follow a similar approach. I am glad you said it.

tommiegannert 5y ago

Agreed on rollbacks. I think rollbacks are a thing when you don't know the code, or you're too busy to be able to debug. Like when being on-call for a large codebase. If you're solo, you probably know enough that fix-forward is the way to go. (This assumes the system isn't critical enough that it needs fixing even if you're asleep, but then you would probably not be solo anyway.)

orky56 5y ago
Not sure if it's a philosophical question but as a solopreneur I have always rolled back since it keeps my commit chain cleaner rather than have previous versions that were buggy. I want to minimize downtime and a rollback is always faster than a fix-forward even when you know, or think you know, the fix.

hnick 5y ago

How about backups? I struggle with it a bit for our home office.

jitendrac 5y ago

Would you like to share the vps configuration and traffic you handle per month without diving deep into your venture?

XCSme 5y ago

I do the same, I feel like a simple VPS is a lot easier to manage and less prone to failures than a "cloud" provider. Normally the push-back is "what if it fails, what if you need to scale, etc.", but so far no VPS failed on me (even if it did, you can just use backups and restore with a bit of downtime) and the scaling part can be solved through a good horizontal-scaling server architecture, instead of relying on the cloud to automatically do that for you (which anyway still requires your architecture to support horizontal scaling).