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Show HN: Jig – a tool to define, compute and monitor metrics

74 points by d--b 5y ago

Hi HN, 8 months ago, I posted “Ask HN: I built it nobody came, what now?” and got a ton of (not very optimistic) feedback [1]. I took away 3 things: 1. The message wasn’t properly targeted 2. The onboarding experience was terrible. 3. Someone posted some advice to find leads which actually worked, yeah! So here we are. 8 months later. I unfortunately didn’t have a lot of time to put in the tool itself. But I improved the website, improved the onboarding, and got a paying customer who seems to really like the software. So here it is in its current form. Let me know what you think would make the tool/website better! [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26734079 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26734079

voz_ 5y ago
I was the overall TL of FB's Metric Platform for some time. I would be interesting in learning how it works. The site only kind of tells me what its not, not what it is? How does it work?
- d--b 5y ago
  This tool falls in the “very tactical” category, and is mostly aimed at startups who want more than Excel and not invest in lock-in platforms. It basically is an electron app running the observable runtime. It’s got some differences in the layout, but that’s mostly what it is. But yeah a video will do well. Thanks for the feedback.
  - voz_ 5y ago
    What feedback? I was asking, and you gave me some weird non answer. I still have no idea what this is. Perhaps you replied to the wrong comment?
    - d--b 5y ago
      The feedback that you didn’t understand what it was… sorry apparently I failed again… This tool is a live programming environment. The code that you write is organized in cells, and the observable runtime links cells together in a computing graph (similar to how cells in excel form a computation graph). Conceptually it is very similar to data science notebooks (and that is in fact what observable is) The language is JavaScript. Some will say that JavaScript is not suited to do data manipulation, and in many regards it is true. But in many use cases, javascript in the browser is good enough, and it has the added benefit to allow you to use all kinds of data visualization libraries and it doesn’t require you to hire Python guys, which in my experience can bring its own set of problems. What I meant by it being very tactical is that you are limited to calculations that fit in a browser window. So it doesn’t really scale to the size of FB… that said it would allow someone at Facebook to fiddle with the results of some large scale data analysis. Hopefully that explains a little more. But yeah really a demo will be a lot clearer
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
mritchie712 5y ago
Do you have a demo video? It's especially helpful to have this when you're asking someone to download an app and connect to a data source. You're asking a lot, you should at least give them an idea of what they're getting into.
- rmetzler 5y ago
  Yes please. I would like to see it in action and understand how it works.
- d--b 5y ago
  I will make a video shortly indeed… It’s javascript, the tool runs the Observable runtime. https://www.observablehq.com https://www.observablehq.com The main differences are: - it’s an electron app: so no finicky browser problem. - it runs locally: so no problem with CORS, private database, or local files. - it saves files as text on your computer, not in a cloud you don’t own - the layout is a 2d canvas with tabs instead of a notebook (cause I find notebooks don’t scale well) - it’s got some templates nodes and simpler functions overall to create charts and tables.
  - d--b 5y ago
    Geez I replied to the wrong comment, sorry. I will still make a screencast
solidsnack9000 5y ago
It would be helpful to link to some docs and language examples. "Jig is not no-code!" -- so what is the code? JS? JigLang?
- gajus 5y ago
  Based on screenshots – JavaScript
- d--b 5y ago
  It’s javascript. It runs the Observable runtime (https://www.observablehq.com https://www.observablehq.com) I’ll make it clearer (in a demo video)
a-dub 5y ago
after reading the webpage, i love the philosophy behind this tool! i wish the documentation were online so i could see exactly what i could do with it. (i was tempted to download and install the deb to try and find the docs, but that's an activation threshold i'm not willing to overcome for idle exploration of new technology)
- d--b 5y ago
  Thanks for the kind feedback. This tool runs the Observable runtime. So check out https://www.observablehq.com https://www.observablehq.com to see what it does.
mhitza 5y ago
I would suggest for Linux to either provide an AppImage or a flatpak (whichever it's easier for you), that way it's usable cross distros without finnicking with the deb file.
- d--b 5y ago
  Noted thanks
exdsq 5y ago
Why no monthly fee for Pro? So much more likely to try a 30-day trial and then $10 a month than an $89 up-front fee. Maybe this is subjective but the way SaaS has gone I assume people have A/B'd this and it's the proven model too.
- d--b 5y ago
  Noted, thanks
austinjp 5y ago
Good to see you iterating :) Brief feedback: pinch-zoom on mobile seems to be disabled. This makes the images difficult to see on my crappy-res phone, so I can't really understand much about the product.
- d--b 5y ago
  Geez, I totally procrastinated myself into making that stupid parallax effect (instead of making a demo video). Didn’t think it would cause problems. Anyhow the image is mostly a teaser. It’ll be clearer once I make a demo video…
zestyping 5y ago
I'm curious but I can't see what this is. No demo, no documentation, not even any screenshots. How am I supposed to decide if I should install it? How do I figure out if it is appropriate for my use case? A walkthrough document with some screenshots, or a working online demo, would be ideal. If not those, then at least a screencast of you showing how it works would be good.
- d--b 5y ago
  Yes, I knew I was going to have to make a video. I even bought a mic for it! I just suck so much at making videos this is mostly an attempt to not do one… But of course you’re right. Going to have to sharpen those skills too I guess… See you in a few weeks…
  - mkdirp 5y ago
    You should get someone to do it instead. Somewhere like fiverr or should have some people relatively cheap.
clement_b 5y ago
They're nailing it with this point. > Jig is not no-code! > Here at Jig, we don’t want to mislead our customers. No-code platforms do not magically remove the need for code, they just bury it in a maze of UI and DSL that only experts can make sense of No-code is a valid intention but unsustainable and counter productive at some point, especially for a small team. Translating everything into UI often leads to a product that is hard to document, maintain, learn due to too many abstractions, dense UI, missing documentation, too much testing involved. Etc.
- d--b 5y ago
  Thanks for your comment. I am glad to see I am not the only one to think that!

74 points by d--b 5y ago

voz_ 5y ago

I was the overall TL of FB's Metric Platform for some time. I would be interesting in learning how it works. The site only kind of tells me what its not, not what it is? How does it work?

d--b 5y ago
This tool falls in the “very tactical” category, and is mostly aimed at startups who want more than Excel and not invest in lock-in platforms. It basically is an electron app running the observable runtime. It’s got some differences in the layout, but that’s mostly what it is. But yeah a video will do well. Thanks for the feedback.
- voz_ 5y ago
  What feedback? I was asking, and you gave me some weird non answer. I still have no idea what this is. Perhaps you replied to the wrong comment?
  - d--b 5y ago
    The feedback that you didn’t understand what it was… sorry apparently I failed again… This tool is a live programming environment. The code that you write is organized in cells, and the observable runtime links cells together in a computing graph (similar to how cells in excel form a computation graph). Conceptually it is very similar to data science notebooks (and that is in fact what observable is) The language is JavaScript. Some will say that JavaScript is not suited to do data manipulation, and in many regards it is true. But in many use cases, javascript in the browser is good enough, and it has the added benefit to allow you to use all kinds of data visualization libraries and it doesn’t require you to hire Python guys, which in my experience can bring its own set of problems. What I meant by it being very tactical is that you are limited to calculations that fit in a browser window. So it doesn’t really scale to the size of FB… that said it would allow someone at Facebook to fiddle with the results of some large scale data analysis. Hopefully that explains a little more. But yeah really a demo will be a lot clearer

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

mritchie712 5y ago

Do you have a demo video? It's especially helpful to have this when you're asking someone to download an app and connect to a data source. You're asking a lot, you should at least give them an idea of what they're getting into.

rmetzler 5y ago
Yes please. I would like to see it in action and understand how it works.
d--b 5y ago
I will make a video shortly indeed… It’s javascript, the tool runs the Observable runtime. https://www.observablehq.com https://www.observablehq.com The main differences are: - it’s an electron app: so no finicky browser problem. - it runs locally: so no problem with CORS, private database, or local files. - it saves files as text on your computer, not in a cloud you don’t own - the layout is a 2d canvas with tabs instead of a notebook (cause I find notebooks don’t scale well) - it’s got some templates nodes and simpler functions overall to create charts and tables.
- d--b 5y ago
  Geez I replied to the wrong comment, sorry. I will still make a screencast

solidsnack9000 5y ago

It would be helpful to link to some docs and language examples. "Jig is not no-code!" -- so what is the code? JS? JigLang?

gajus 5y ago
Based on screenshots – JavaScript
d--b 5y ago
It’s javascript. It runs the Observable runtime (https://www.observablehq.com https://www.observablehq.com) I’ll make it clearer (in a demo video)

a-dub 5y ago

after reading the webpage, i love the philosophy behind this tool! i wish the documentation were online so i could see exactly what i could do with it. (i was tempted to download and install the deb to try and find the docs, but that's an activation threshold i'm not willing to overcome for idle exploration of new technology)

d--b 5y ago
Thanks for the kind feedback. This tool runs the Observable runtime. So check out https://www.observablehq.com https://www.observablehq.com to see what it does.

mhitza 5y ago

I would suggest for Linux to either provide an AppImage or a flatpak (whichever it's easier for you), that way it's usable cross distros without finnicking with the deb file.

d--b 5y ago
Noted thanks

exdsq 5y ago

Why no monthly fee for Pro? So much more likely to try a 30-day trial and then $10 a month than an $89 up-front fee. Maybe this is subjective but the way SaaS has gone I assume people have A/B'd this and it's the proven model too.

d--b 5y ago
Noted, thanks

austinjp 5y ago

Good to see you iterating :) Brief feedback: pinch-zoom on mobile seems to be disabled. This makes the images difficult to see on my crappy-res phone, so I can't really understand much about the product.

d--b 5y ago
Geez, I totally procrastinated myself into making that stupid parallax effect (instead of making a demo video). Didn’t think it would cause problems. Anyhow the image is mostly a teaser. It’ll be clearer once I make a demo video…

zestyping 5y ago

I'm curious but I can't see what this is. No demo, no documentation, not even any screenshots. How am I supposed to decide if I should install it? How do I figure out if it is appropriate for my use case? A walkthrough document with some screenshots, or a working online demo, would be ideal. If not those, then at least a screencast of you showing how it works would be good.

d--b 5y ago
Yes, I knew I was going to have to make a video. I even bought a mic for it! I just suck so much at making videos this is mostly an attempt to not do one… But of course you’re right. Going to have to sharpen those skills too I guess… See you in a few weeks…
- mkdirp 5y ago
  You should get someone to do it instead. Somewhere like fiverr or should have some people relatively cheap.

clement_b 5y ago

They're nailing it with this point. > Jig is not no-code! > Here at Jig, we don’t want to mislead our customers. No-code platforms do not magically remove the need for code, they just bury it in a maze of UI and DSL that only experts can make sense of No-code is a valid intention but unsustainable and counter productive at some point, especially for a small team. Translating everything into UI often leads to a product that is hard to document, maintain, learn due to too many abstractions, dense UI, missing documentation, too much testing involved. Etc.

d--b 5y ago
Thanks for your comment. I am glad to see I am not the only one to think that!