26 ms·

I keep turning my Google Sheets into phone-friendly webapps

708 points by cpeterso 2y ago

FredPret 2y ago
I've recently been toying with the idea of turning my overly complicated weightlifting Excel into an overly complicated me-only webapp / testflight app. It can't be worse than Excel for iOS!
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- abound 2y ago
  Self-plug: I wrote a not-too-overly complicated app for tracking my strength training (a 5/3/1 derivative) https://github.com/bcspragu/stronk https://github.com/bcspragu/stronk
  - hammock 2y ago
    Nice. If you havent seen it, I use 531 calculator religiously and it has a ton of programs on it, and very customizable https://blackironbeast.com/5/3/1/calculator https://blackironbeast.com/5/3/1/calculator? Might inspire you as you continue to develop your app
  - worthless-trash 2y ago
    I use stronk (531 BBB) ! Its a damn small world! I exported most of my data from "Strong" into Stronk, was easy. Thanks ! The interface showed lbs, but my values were all kg, still works.
- dcreater 2y ago
  This is exactly what I've wanted to do for a long time. All the apps in the app store are money sucking or ad ridden and unnecessarily cluttered. I want a simple front end that lets me log lifts to a sheet/database
  - httpsterio 2y ago
    you could do an ios shortcut that fills a numbers sheet for you
    - dcreater 2y ago
      hmm tell me more
  - hackernewds 2y ago
    get Claude to make an app and publish it as a PBA
    - dcreater 2y ago
      PBA?
      - fragmede 2y ago
        mispelling of PWA, presumably
  - tmpz22 2y ago
    I’ve been jotting them down in a standardized format in apple notes and using a regex to parse them into structured json for later analysis. For all the apps that are supposed to make this easier none of them do it right.
    - fudged71 2y ago
      I’m verrrry interested in your regex!! Can you share? I’m interested in building a fitness ontology/terminology linked to a tokenizer and parser.
      - tmpz22 2y ago
        My format is MM/DD/YYYY (i.e. 1/1/2025) $sets x $reps $weight $name (i.e. 3x10 135 Bench Press) I uploaded the log file to ChatGPT and had it spit out a Python script to parse into JSON: ``` for line in file: date_match = re.match(r'^(\d{1,2}/\d{1,2}).\*?$', line.strip()) if date_match: # construct a new workout entry # continue exercise_match = re.match(r'^(\d+)x(\d+)\s+(\d+)\s+(.+)$', line.strip()) if exercise_match: # insert new exercise into current workout # continue ```
- tcandens 2y ago
  This seems like a common predicament. I made this one mostly for myself and to try out VLCN sqlite sync. https://www.dumblift.com https://www.dumblift.com
- m-zuber 2y ago
  I've been very impressed with hevy[0] so far [0] https://www.hevyapp.com/ https://www.hevyapp.com/
- adlotsof 2y ago
  I use https://www.liftosaur.com/ https://www.liftosaur.com/ which allows for overly complicated stuff with its liftoscript DSL
xnx 2y ago
Is Glide better than AppSheets?
- lurn_mor 2y ago
  Easier, but more expensive in the long run.
- dvdsgl 2y ago
  Our customers who’ve switched from AppSheet tell us emphatically “yes” because of Glide’s ease of use, power, and the design of the apps it produces.
whatever1 2y ago
Let go of your complex solutions. Spreadsheets were the right answer all along.
- Mistletoe 2y ago
  I organize my life with spreadsheets and it works great. Running Spreadsheet, Health Spreadsheet, Investing Spreadsheet, Gardening Spreadsheet, on and on. :) It's just the best way to examine the data that is your life and have any hope of remembering the past and improve the future.
  - genghisjahn 2y ago
    I’ve kept my finances on a google sheet for well over a decade. And it was old excel before that.
- crabmusket 2y ago
  I think the mobile form factor has something to say about that. I somewhat agree (reluctantly) for desktop usage, but spreadsheets are too complex to be ergonomic with small touch screens.
- larodi 2y ago
  Yes, so was IBM/360 in text mode but someone wanted to draw nice buttons.
- bentcorner 2y ago
  My wife had surgery last summer and had about 10 medications she needed to take immediately afterwards - each of them had their own period so I needed to know what we took, and what was "overdue" at any point in time. I whipped up a spreadsheet in google sheets and added a google form that allowed me to quickly pick a medication that was just taken - it'd enter it into the sheet and an "overview" page would show me what was pending, with color coding if something was "overdue". I felt like I was abusing what a spreadsheet was meant for but it worked quite well. If I knew about Glide I probably could have made it look even nicer.
Neywiny 2y ago
Tbh sheets has gotten a lot better over the years. It's not hard to autofill and other things that used to be impossible or too obscure to figure out. I'll stick with the free platform for things just for me
tekknolagi 2y ago
See also: retool
- dvdsgl 2y ago
  Retool is great, although they explicitly build for developers and building on retool requires writing glue code in their JavaScript template language, and writing SQL queries. In Glide, we avoid code and syntax as much as possible. Our table-driven programming model also creates a nice MVC-like separation of concerns where you don’t end up with your program chaotically interspersed with controls on a canvas, so your program is easier to manage as it scales (in exchange for being less direct to create).
gunalx 2y ago
Why lock down to a nocode tool instead of just hacking together a simple html5 page? Ai assistants have speed up the prototype workflow for doing less code/design.
- FlamingMoe 2y ago
  True that Claude can generate a simple working prototype in a single prompt. But there's still the friction of deploying the app, making it accessible across devices, and easily managing updates. Which something like Glide streamlines for non-technical users.
  - hackernewds 2y ago
    publish it as a website and download it as a PWA
    - franga2000 2y ago
      Even just "make it a PWA" can take an experienced frontend developer a day or more. The manifest needs to be just right, the server might need to be reconfigured to serve the right MIME type, you need to generate a few mandatory icon sizes, you need a service worker even if you're not using it... If you're using a big framework like Vite, this is somewhat easier, but then it's not a "simple html file" anymore and you spend just as much time fiddling with framework stuff.
  - reustle 2y ago
    For those curious, you can also do some pretty fast prototyping (including deploy) with https://bolt.new https://bolt.new and https://v0.dev https://v0.dev (vercel). Sometimes even a single prompt.
- hipadev23 2y ago
  Presumably so they can hook into an external datasource
  - 2y ago
rdiddly 2y ago
The hack quotient on this is high, so that's good, though ironically it's hacking around all the BS we put up with (languages, frameworks) to get a programming project up and running!
e12e 2y ago
Opening Glide on my phone, I'm greeted with: > Open Glide on a large screen to build apps. I get it - but a little ironic that one can't get started with an existing sheet...
- dvdsgl 2y ago
  Yes, we agree. We have a mobile experience in the works! https://glideapps.com/create https://glideapps.com/create
est 2y ago
I keep changing the last part of Google spreadsheets URL from /edit to /preview Much better loading time.
deweywsu 2y ago
Glide appears pretty cool, except that the next level up plan over the free one is $69 per month, more than a little steep for most personal users. I myself am wondering if there are any good projects out there that do similar things but that use either local databases or even browser storage?
- harikb 2y ago
  I think the key value of Google sheets link is that you can do rest of your aggregation/data fixes on Google sheets. And data is in your control I made an app for a meetup/reunion, but 10 user limit meant everyone had to given a shared password Like you, I would happily pay for many many services about 10/month - right where streaming subscriptions are. But none of these companies seem to understand that part…
pspeter3 2y ago
I wish Google Sheets supported a REST API for their new tables feature so you could interact with them more like a database and less like a 2D array
- altbdoor 2y ago
  You could more or less achieve this, by using a Google Apps Script that exposes the sheet. I found spreadapi to be good enough for basic use. https://github.com/ziolko/spreadapi https://github.com/ziolko/spreadapi
  - pspeter3 2y ago
    This is great, thanks!
dcre 2y ago
I use Notion databases for this. They're essentially spreadsheets with customizable table, list, kanban views, and each row gets its own wiki-style page in addition to the structured data. So it's nice for lists of books or movies or games, where you have some metadata but you also might want to take notes on it when you read/watch/play. It works pretty well for this purpose, but I also could probably make Obsidian or Logseq work and it would have a better privacy story, give me more control over the shape of the data, and not cost $48 a year (though I don't really mind paying). https://www.notion.com/help/intro-to-databases https://www.notion.com/help/intro-to-databases I have been looking for a way to switch from Notion since they rolled out AI features without an opt-out (besides emailing them). I don't even dislike LLMs, I just want to know what I'm sending them and when.
- pjot 2y ago
  A little know Google product is called Tables[0]. Very similar to what you’re describing. Another is AppSheet[1] for a more drag and drop application builder. [0]: https://tables.area120.google.com/ https://tables.area120.google.com/ [1]: https://about.appsheet.com/home/ https://about.appsheet.com/home/
  - edoceo 2y ago
    From the Tables page: Important update: The Beta program is now closed Tables is no longer accepting new users for its Beta program
    - do_not_redeem 2y ago
      Also, > Table’s features and capabilities are now integrated into AppSheet, our no-code platform that blah blah blah Seems like a usual Google product in that if you use it, you'll be forced to migrate all your data/workflows to some shiny new thing every few years.
      - lupire 2y ago
        Tables was never a supported Google product. It was an Area 120 experimental prototype. By design, Area 120 prototypes either get shut down or get merged into real products. AppMaker was Google's AppSheet competitor that was shut down after a few years.
jerryandtom 2y ago
[dead]
larodi 2y ago
Basically: Guy reinvents MS Access on Google sheets 40 years later. Disclaim: this is not to say Access is to be despised of or anything. People found its utility for many years and the fact it is not what Boyce/Codd suggested they do with their tables, does not make it irrelevant. There was an article about how it just refuses to die and why. Worth reading for everyone interested in computer and computing history.
anyfactor 2y ago
I've built quite a few dashboards while working on proof-of-concept feature/product engineering. Even though people often think I'm joking, almost always the backend database was a Google Sheet. Google Sheets has great API support, easy to write functionality, convenient read and file dumps, works well with Pandas/SQL, and has a universally appreciated UX. Data validation can be annoying if the "admin" directly enters data, but for building a proof of concept, nothing beats Google Sheets. The data from Google Sheets would be passed through an API to a web UI/dashboard. The dashboard I built for end users was a simple Bootstrap (Vue-Bootstrap) table from the API, with enough easy-to-use filters and views to work out of the box. If the data was too large, I would use a templated snippet to convert the JSON into a card view. Ignoring long-term maintainability, this was one of the most foolproof ways to build dashboards. After that, I'd slap Firebase Auth on top, and that was it. I haven't worked on these types of projects for nearly two years now. Folks I know use Retool or Softr with an API connectivity platform like Portable, Pipedream, or Zapier. If you're staring at a spreadsheet on a daily basis, the next step should be looking into an app builder combined with an API connection platform.
- mettamage 2y ago
  Love it. I think my prototyping capabilities just extended by this comment
- vishnugupta 2y ago
  Currently I manage my startup’s accounting in Google sheet, and your comment gave me an idea to enhance it with Google Forms!
  - ezst 2y ago
    That... Sounds scary.
    - ska 2y ago
      Clunky, but should be ok assuming a) a pretty simple structure and cashflow b) properly implemented double-entry, and c) backups.
fijiaarone 2y ago
Nice ad
zie 2y ago
I tried going all on on Google Sheets earlier this year. I used the Python API and like almost nothing worked consistently. I got 1 sheet to work well with like 1k rows and thought woohoo this is great! So I went all-in, put 25k rows in and Google pooped the bed. It gave errors all the time, rows and columns were funky. API issues galore. SQLite however handled 25k rows without any errors, always rock solid. I gave up. Overall a terrible experience once I got past 1k rows. I'm glad it's worked well for you. I only had like 10 columns, so it wasn't like massive amounts of data. I was linking to a file out in Google Drive and that was where most of my issues were. Google drive's API was 99.99% completely useless. My takeaway from the experience was, Google proclaims they have an API, but it seems more like nobody tests it or cares about it. Perhaps it's malicious compliance, they have it because they have to have an API, but not because they expect anyone to actually use it. Perhaps I'm just not cool enough for Google.
- anyfactor 2y ago
  The projects I worked on always had a mechanism to dump data into a proper database. For example, I built a daily scraper to collect some of the inventory. I didn’t keep all the data in a single sheet. Instead, all the data was stored in a cloud-based managed SQLite or PostgreSQL database, or sometimes a local SQLite database. Only the day's data was stored in Google Sheets because the client wanted to see the spreadsheet themselves and have the UI be accessible for their users.
  - matharmin 2y ago
    It feels a little misleading to say you're using Google Sheets as the backend database, when you need an actual database in conjunction with it.
    - mattigames 2y ago
      Extremely misleading, in this case Google Sheets it's working more like a frontend
- worthless-trash 2y ago
bewal416 2y ago
We built an entire app for our golf league- all using Glide and Google Sheets. It was honestly a great experience- all the players had a great mobile experience with obvious forms and leaderboards, while the storage and compute was hidden inside the Google Sheet. The pricing was pretty reasonable- considering we could split the bill among us all, and we only needed it for about 4 months. There’s still hope for good, quality SaaS! However, I hope Glide (or another) can figure out the pricing for the hobbyist tier.
- deleted 2y ago
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ijidak 2y ago
I'm looking for a no code platform that I can use for my customers and charge a subscription for access. Most of these no-code solutions target internal company Intranets. But, I want to use them for apps I can sell to customers. Does anyone have recommendations?
- BOOSTERHIDROGEN 2y ago
  I am also interested in this.
- mrbluecoat 2y ago
  As mentioned by another poster, check out "Partner portals" section on https://retool.com/ https://retool.com/
ShaggyHotDog 2y ago
Google sheet on mobile is pain. Good idea on how this becomes usable. Will try it.
santa_boy 2y ago
Glide is cool ... I wish there were FOSS versions of Glide to spin up nice, neat and simple mobile apps. There are now quite a few reliable FOSS version of no-code tools (but the mobile space seems to be missing alternatives). Few nice no-code FOSS that I love using are listed at https://blog.n0c0de.com/articles/1635ef6f-f616-8023-b336-ff3f4b416a6e https://blog.n0c0de.com/articles/1635ef6f-f616-8023-b336-ff3...
- dvdsgl 2y ago
  Thank you!
- mrbluecoat 2y ago
  This is great, thanks for sharing!
zuhayeer 2y ago
Love this, big fan of Glide. We've used Google Sheets for a long time to power Levels.fyi and allowed us to move fast without too much of a formal backend. Check out our post here: https://www.levels.fyi/blog/scaling-to-millions-with-google-sheets.html https://www.levels.fyi/blog/scaling-to-millions-with-google-...
ryanmarsh 2y ago
I really like the part where the article was phone friendly. Seriously how does anyone make money with a website where the actual content is so obscured by ads that users don’t bother coming back?
shahzaibmushtaq 2y ago
I haven't used online spreadsheets as databases and I guess they are good for prototyping, rapid application development and in-house testing.
epolanski 2y ago
OT but I convinced several of my clients to use Excel and SharePoint they already had in their bundle over writing a full blown app multiple times, added some automation and it was both cheaper and made them happier.
JimmyWilliams1 2y ago
[dead]
rashidae 2y ago
During COVID, I built a quick no-code solution to help ‘all-inclusive resorts’ in Cancun and Punta Cana. It started with guests scanning a QR code, filling out a short form, and scheduling their Antigen/PCR tests. Over time, it evolved to help nurses manage operations, streamline test results, and send certificates via email. What began as a DIY project during lockdown scaled quickly to Mexico City, the Dominican Republic, and Barcelona, processing over 30,000 tests the day after New Year’s Eve. Using Airtable, an Airtable extension called miniextensions.com, and tools like Docusign, Make, Sendgrid, and Twilio, the solution ended up supporting over 1 million tests. I handled all technical aspects, support, and training myself. Since the solution was meant to be temporary, I prioritized speed and reliability. Airtable’s relational database capabilities were crucial, especially compared to spreadsheets, for managing multiple linked tables and automations. Airtable also offers a REST API and a pretty amazing self- actualizing database schema that can be copied into tools like GPT or Claude for added context. You can build powerful tools with its scripts, interfaces, and automations. That said, Airtable is best for use cases with fewer than 250,000 records per month. Above 100,000 records, the web platform’s performance can suffer, though there are workarounds. It’s perfect for small to medium-sized businesses needing custom API integrations for CRMs or internal tools. If you’re interested, I wrote a brief case study about the project here: https://rashidazarang.com/covid-testing https://rashidazarang.com/covid-testing. On a related note, today I built a cool Airtable automation using ChatGPT and custom scripts. By filling out a corporate email in a form, the system scrapes the web for details like company name, address, phone, fax, and more, which then populates the CRM automatically. I’m still experimenting and plan to make a YouTube video about it soon. Here’s the loom video I sent to a friend about it: https://www.loom.com/share/b9ddbefbdce5434da378667fc2079d00?user_id_of_reactor=1139180d90ab45dabbef202c1931c09e https://www.loom.com/share/b9ddbefbdce5434da378667fc2079d00?...
- panosfilianos 2y ago
  woah! didn't even know you can embed videos on HN!
  - starquake 2y ago
    I think your browser is doing some embedding cause I don't see an embedded video...
ozim 2y ago
app-based delivery services like DoorDash and Uber Eats were not the best way to support local businesses Unfortunately I got pissed off badly because I found out that ordering directly I was treated like a second class customer - where I expected the opposite. If I order directly they know I will not leave negative reviews. I really wanted to pay directly for the same service. I wasn’t expecting to get better service and definitely I wasn’t expecting being treated like dirt. So sorry but I will keep using app ordering services because I simply get better quality of food and better delivery times.
dools 2y ago
I used google sheets but wouldn’t go past big query or firebase these days. You can have connected sheets that read straight from big query and probably firebase too, and they’re so much better and faster and have fewer quirks than sheets
d--b 2y ago
Is that an ad? It definitely sounds like one.
- switch007 2y ago
  Definitely an ad.
- Too 2y ago
  Either that, or the author has a really odd fixation that warrants spending $69/month, just to share a list of nearby restaurants with his wife?
  - switch007 2y ago
    That's definitely it !
- dvdsgl 2y ago
  Founder of Glide (YC W19) here. This article surprised us and is not paid.
tym83 2y ago
Tried to use Glide a few years ago and couldn't understand why it is needed anyway in real life? It seems like toy for startup-guys, not for real MVP's or something valuable. I like Google Sheets and Google Docs but this app is so strange. Maybe it's ok for small "homemade" projects for neighbourhoods or local businesses like flower salon or fitness club. But why it is needed for these type of business if we have social media, messengers, WPA and adaptive layouts on websites.
- dvdsgl 2y ago
  We’ve made a lot of progress in a few years! Check again?
lwhi 2y ago
This is giving me flashbacks to the days when MS Access (and later on Visual Basic) ruled this segment of the market. It's interesting to think there's still a market for this type of small scale enthusiast application. One scenarios I've been thinking about recently is the death of the generic app. If LLMs end up being able to create software easily, why wouldn't we choose to have software that's totally aligned our specific needs?
- deleted 2y ago
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- deleted 2y ago
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- ajcp 2y ago
  Not just totally aligned, but also "just-in-time" and ephemeral: an LLM goes and does/builds it on request, and then destroys all artifacts when the request has been fulfilled? If the persistence of something incurs a cost in storage and security, and the traditional penalties of efficiency and learning-curves are removed, why not recreate it every time its needed?
  - lwhi 2y ago
    I like this idea. As an analogue to this; would each iteration adapt and evolve in the same way an organism might?
    - ajcp 2y ago
      Maybe not "evolve" but certainly would be different every time, right? If it already knows every conivable way to generate something, it stands to reason it will be different every time, as every request will be a little different, even if it's just the temperature of the room. As a thought exercise: if I could automatically generate, at no cost in money or time, a "disposable" vehicle for every single trip I took, wouldn't it make sense that it would be different every time, even though the basic requirement (transportation) is the same? Why bother generating a car with A/C if it's cold out? Why have a passenger seat if I'm just going to the corner store for milk?
Raed667 2y ago
I wanted to use Google Sheets for an internal corporate app, but authentication/authorization is a pain, I got it to work but it would have probably been faster to just have some CRUD SQLITE somewhere.
- dvdsgl 2y ago
  Glide (from the article) adds simple pin-based auth and access control on top of the spreadsheet data. There’s also user and role-based data protection.
anoncow 2y ago
Looks like a wonderful New Years Eve project
animal531 2y ago
I used to work on some really complicated old code for a long term incentive management company where each client had a ton of their own rules, but once those were set up they would be running fine for 3 or 5 year cycles without any issues. The difficult part was to fit their requirements and rules into our code. At some point I started working on a new version that would just run with a spreadsheet as the frontend where the business analyst could add whatever rules and calculation fields they wanted, which would then link to some input of users, share values, periods etc. It was going quite well and seemed extremely viable but unfortunately the business died due to some other issues along with Covid before the software saw the light of day.
bru3s 2y ago
[flagged]
dvdsgl 2y ago
Founder of Glide (YC W19) mentioned in the article — thanks for the recognition. This was not an ad from us, we were surprised by the coverage. Glide’s customers are businesses building software for internal use. During YC we called these “dark apps” but since then we call them “apps for work.” We wanted something usable by IT and operations staff (not developers) that emphasized design and UX. Glide started as a simple spreadsheet-to-PWA trick but is now a complete programming model and runtime platform for data-driven business apps, including APIs, databases, responsive layouts, a managed AI system, and workflow automations. One of our Crown Jewels is our data editor, where you program your app with our reactive computed columns. Our data grid has become a popular open source component: https://grid.glideapps.com/ https://grid.glideapps.com/ You can also try our new AI-native builder experience, where we’re trying to simplify building even further. It’s very early but just shows our continued effort to make building software simpler: https://glideapps.com/create https://glideapps.com/create Thanks again!
- flanbiscuit 2y ago
  I remember when you launched your product on HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19163081 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19163081 I favorited it back then. Glad to see it's doing well, it looks like a cool product. I haven't found a reason to use it yet but that's also because I have slowed down on coding personal projects after work in general.
  - ilrwbwrkhv 2y ago
    Glide was cool when it launched but they never made that product work. Right now they have moved to an agency model and that is their product.
    - dvdsgl 2y ago
      This is not true. We don’t build apps for customers, although there are Glide agencies that we match customers with. We’ve learned that some businesses prefer to pay for someone else to build for them no matter the platform, so we’re happy to facilitate that given our agency ecosystem.
donohoe 2y ago
Its been real easy to build small and large web apps for news organization on Google Sheets. Most recently we built an "AI Election Tracker" for 2024 elections across the globe https://restofworld.org/2024/elections-ai-tracker/ https://restofworld.org/2024/elections-ai-tracker/ GS is not the best editorial interface but its not bad either, especially when it allows you to get things done quickly. Likewise, this was another fun project (since retired) that sits on Google Sheets: https://restofworld.org/stat-of-the-day/ https://restofworld.org/stat-of-the-day/ We skip Google's API which I really dislike. The sheets are set to publish to the web and you can use that to pull down the data and parse it into JSON files. It take less than a minute to set the basics up now.
- yx827ha 2y ago
  Why does the site hijack the back button!? It wouldn't let me get back to hn.
sylware 2y ago
Since now google mail is blocking email addresses with ipv4 and ipv6 literals, I moved to a self hosted messaging site to interact with google mail prisoners.
smileybarry 2y ago
This looks great, but I got a bit of sticker shock when I saw Glide's plan to do this is $69 per month cost (billed yearly). There's a free tier, but with a 1-app limit and only Big Tables (no Google Sheets). I'd be fine with paying for personal apps, but $69/month feels a bit... steep.
- graeme 2y ago
  It's a tool targeted at businesses. The article writer just found a use case that works for them personally.
  - smileybarry 2y ago
    I know, but usually a lot of these have hobbyist plans. I wouldn't mind being throttled and QoS'd behind businesses for a lower price.
caseyy 2y ago
The idea is neat but holy SaaS, the price for what it offers is ridiculous. It’s not even about having the money, it’s just that $828 p.a. price of entry to build a spreadsheet front-end is objectively a bad buy/business decision. Most people would just learn to code at a boot camp for $828 so they don’t need codeless.
- drewbeck 2y ago
  You and I have a very different idea of “most people”
- blizkreeg 2y ago
  This comment reminds me of the infamous Dropbox comment :)
  - caseyy 2y ago
    Touché, but let’s see…
pluto_modadic 2y ago
ah, native advertising
dhruvarora013 2y ago
For my workplace, I built an internal orgchart and the backend is entirely Google Sheets. It's been completely hassle free and I've spent almost no time on the code since building it three years ago. As employees join and leave, HR adds/deletes a row in the sheet and only they have access to the "database" besides myself. In case of accidental deletion, there's the handy restore ability built into sheets so a database "rollback" is also trivial and can be done by HR without my input. Sheets as a database for light web apps is absolutely joyful to build with.
dr_kretyn 2y ago
From a similar need I built the HomeHero app (https://homehero.pro https://homehero.pro) which helps maintain house inventory and now turning general (projects) inventory.
j45 2y ago
A great example where customers don’t care as much what you code in especially for B2C. Is it a solution that works or is helpful is more of a bar.
jayd16 2y ago
You can easily add some user input with Forms and with some setup you can get SSO and require Google auth to the Forms and Sheets. You can also throw up some async jobs in Google Cloud Run functions. I automated some IT processes this way. These were tasks that were already a bit manual (like on/off boarding hires) and needed flexible workflows but would be helped with automation. When the scale is small it can be a nice little toolbox.
jimmcslim 2y ago
The article conveys much the same sentiment as “An app can be a home-cooked meal” https://www.robinsloan.com/notes/home-cooked-app/ https://www.robinsloan.com/notes/home-cooked-app/
deepspace 2y ago
My experience with no-code or low-code products (like Glide, but I have not tried Glide yet), is that they are fine and dandy when you have a single table or sheet. But as soon as you have to source data from multiple tables 9or sheets), they all fall down, or become exponentially more difficult to use. I do not know what it is about splitting your data (even if everything is indexed against a common id), that makes the complexity go up so much. If someone can make an easy-to-use app to deal with this situation, I would potentially throw a lot of money at it.
dartharva 2y ago
I once used AppSheets to make a Sales enablement app for salespeople in my team. It worked well and gave great results, but.. damn does it get painful once the data starts going beyond a nontrivial threshold.
johnisgood 2y ago
> the shopping list is plagued by blank items/rows Hmm, interesting that he goes as far as to add a map based on an address provided (which is actually quite nice) but can't (or rather, didn't) get rid of blank items/rows.

708 points by cpeterso 2y ago

I've recently been toying with the idea of turning my overly complicated weightlifting Excel into an overly complicated me-only webapp / testflight app. It can't be worse than Excel for iOS!

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
abound 2y ago
Self-plug: I wrote a not-too-overly complicated app for tracking my strength training (a 5/3/1 derivative) https://github.com/bcspragu/stronk https://github.com/bcspragu/stronk
- hammock 2y ago
  Nice. If you havent seen it, I use 531 calculator religiously and it has a ton of programs on it, and very customizable https://blackironbeast.com/5/3/1/calculator https://blackironbeast.com/5/3/1/calculator? Might inspire you as you continue to develop your app
- worthless-trash 2y ago
  I use stronk (531 BBB) ! Its a damn small world! I exported most of my data from "Strong" into Stronk, was easy. Thanks ! The interface showed lbs, but my values were all kg, still works.
dcreater 2y ago
This is exactly what I've wanted to do for a long time. All the apps in the app store are money sucking or ad ridden and unnecessarily cluttered. I want a simple front end that lets me log lifts to a sheet/database
- httpsterio 2y ago
  you could do an ios shortcut that fills a numbers sheet for you
  - dcreater 2y ago
    hmm tell me more
- hackernewds 2y ago
  get Claude to make an app and publish it as a PBA
  - dcreater 2y ago
    PBA?
    - fragmede 2y ago
      mispelling of PWA, presumably
- tmpz22 2y ago
  I’ve been jotting them down in a standardized format in apple notes and using a regex to parse them into structured json for later analysis. For all the apps that are supposed to make this easier none of them do it right.
  - fudged71 2y ago
    I’m verrrry interested in your regex!! Can you share? I’m interested in building a fitness ontology/terminology linked to a tokenizer and parser.
    - tmpz22 2y ago
      My format is MM/DD/YYYY (i.e. 1/1/2025) $sets x $reps $weight $name (i.e. 3x10 135 Bench Press) I uploaded the log file to ChatGPT and had it spit out a Python script to parse into JSON: ``` for line in file: date_match = re.match(r'^(\d{1,2}/\d{1,2}).\*?$', line.strip()) if date_match: # construct a new workout entry # continue exercise_match = re.match(r'^(\d+)x(\d+)\s+(\d+)\s+(.+)$', line.strip()) if exercise_match: # insert new exercise into current workout # continue ```
tcandens 2y ago
This seems like a common predicament. I made this one mostly for myself and to try out VLCN sqlite sync. https://www.dumblift.com https://www.dumblift.com
m-zuber 2y ago
I've been very impressed with hevy[0] so far [0] https://www.hevyapp.com/ https://www.hevyapp.com/
adlotsof 2y ago
I use https://www.liftosaur.com/ https://www.liftosaur.com/ which allows for overly complicated stuff with its liftoscript DSL

xnx 2y ago

Is Glide better than AppSheets?

lurn_mor 2y ago
Easier, but more expensive in the long run.
dvdsgl 2y ago
Our customers who’ve switched from AppSheet tell us emphatically “yes” because of Glide’s ease of use, power, and the design of the apps it produces.

whatever1 2y ago

Let go of your complex solutions. Spreadsheets were the right answer all along.

Mistletoe 2y ago
I organize my life with spreadsheets and it works great. Running Spreadsheet, Health Spreadsheet, Investing Spreadsheet, Gardening Spreadsheet, on and on. :) It's just the best way to examine the data that is your life and have any hope of remembering the past and improve the future.
- genghisjahn 2y ago
  I’ve kept my finances on a google sheet for well over a decade. And it was old excel before that.
crabmusket 2y ago
I think the mobile form factor has something to say about that. I somewhat agree (reluctantly) for desktop usage, but spreadsheets are too complex to be ergonomic with small touch screens.
larodi 2y ago
Yes, so was IBM/360 in text mode but someone wanted to draw nice buttons.
bentcorner 2y ago
My wife had surgery last summer and had about 10 medications she needed to take immediately afterwards - each of them had their own period so I needed to know what we took, and what was "overdue" at any point in time. I whipped up a spreadsheet in google sheets and added a google form that allowed me to quickly pick a medication that was just taken - it'd enter it into the sheet and an "overview" page would show me what was pending, with color coding if something was "overdue". I felt like I was abusing what a spreadsheet was meant for but it worked quite well. If I knew about Glide I probably could have made it look even nicer.

Neywiny 2y ago

Tbh sheets has gotten a lot better over the years. It's not hard to autofill and other things that used to be impossible or too obscure to figure out. I'll stick with the free platform for things just for me

tekknolagi 2y ago

See also: retool

dvdsgl 2y ago
Retool is great, although they explicitly build for developers and building on retool requires writing glue code in their JavaScript template language, and writing SQL queries. In Glide, we avoid code and syntax as much as possible. Our table-driven programming model also creates a nice MVC-like separation of concerns where you don’t end up with your program chaotically interspersed with controls on a canvas, so your program is easier to manage as it scales (in exchange for being less direct to create).

gunalx 2y ago

Why lock down to a nocode tool instead of just hacking together a simple html5 page? Ai assistants have speed up the prototype workflow for doing less code/design.

FlamingMoe 2y ago
True that Claude can generate a simple working prototype in a single prompt. But there's still the friction of deploying the app, making it accessible across devices, and easily managing updates. Which something like Glide streamlines for non-technical users.
- hackernewds 2y ago
  publish it as a website and download it as a PWA
  - franga2000 2y ago
    Even just "make it a PWA" can take an experienced frontend developer a day or more. The manifest needs to be just right, the server might need to be reconfigured to serve the right MIME type, you need to generate a few mandatory icon sizes, you need a service worker even if you're not using it... If you're using a big framework like Vite, this is somewhat easier, but then it's not a "simple html file" anymore and you spend just as much time fiddling with framework stuff.
- reustle 2y ago
  For those curious, you can also do some pretty fast prototyping (including deploy) with https://bolt.new https://bolt.new and https://v0.dev https://v0.dev (vercel). Sometimes even a single prompt.
hipadev23 2y ago
Presumably so they can hook into an external datasource
- 2y ago

rdiddly 2y ago

The hack quotient on this is high, so that's good, though ironically it's hacking around all the BS we put up with (languages, frameworks) to get a programming project up and running!

e12e 2y ago

Opening Glide on my phone, I'm greeted with: > Open Glide on a large screen to build apps. I get it - but a little ironic that one can't get started with an existing sheet...

dvdsgl 2y ago
Yes, we agree. We have a mobile experience in the works! https://glideapps.com/create https://glideapps.com/create

est 2y ago

I keep changing the last part of Google spreadsheets URL from /edit to /preview Much better loading time.

deweywsu 2y ago

Glide appears pretty cool, except that the next level up plan over the free one is $69 per month, more than a little steep for most personal users. I myself am wondering if there are any good projects out there that do similar things but that use either local databases or even browser storage?

harikb 2y ago
I think the key value of Google sheets link is that you can do rest of your aggregation/data fixes on Google sheets. And data is in your control I made an app for a meetup/reunion, but 10 user limit meant everyone had to given a shared password Like you, I would happily pay for many many services about 10/month - right where streaming subscriptions are. But none of these companies seem to understand that part…

pspeter3 2y ago

I wish Google Sheets supported a REST API for their new tables feature so you could interact with them more like a database and less like a 2D array

altbdoor 2y ago
You could more or less achieve this, by using a Google Apps Script that exposes the sheet. I found spreadapi to be good enough for basic use. https://github.com/ziolko/spreadapi https://github.com/ziolko/spreadapi
- pspeter3 2y ago
  This is great, thanks!

dcre 2y ago

I use Notion databases for this. They're essentially spreadsheets with customizable table, list, kanban views, and each row gets its own wiki-style page in addition to the structured data. So it's nice for lists of books or movies or games, where you have some metadata but you also might want to take notes on it when you read/watch/play. It works pretty well for this purpose, but I also could probably make Obsidian or Logseq work and it would have a better privacy story, give me more control over the shape of the data, and not cost $48 a year (though I don't really mind paying). https://www.notion.com/help/intro-to-databases https://www.notion.com/help/intro-to-databases I have been looking for a way to switch from Notion since they rolled out AI features without an opt-out (besides emailing them). I don't even dislike LLMs, I just want to know what I'm sending them and when.

pjot 2y ago
A little know Google product is called Tables[0]. Very similar to what you’re describing. Another is AppSheet[1] for a more drag and drop application builder. [0]: https://tables.area120.google.com/ https://tables.area120.google.com/ [1]: https://about.appsheet.com/home/ https://about.appsheet.com/home/
- edoceo 2y ago
  From the Tables page: Important update: The Beta program is now closed Tables is no longer accepting new users for its Beta program
  - do_not_redeem 2y ago
    Also, > Table’s features and capabilities are now integrated into AppSheet, our no-code platform that blah blah blah Seems like a usual Google product in that if you use it, you'll be forced to migrate all your data/workflows to some shiny new thing every few years.
    - lupire 2y ago
      Tables was never a supported Google product. It was an Area 120 experimental prototype. By design, Area 120 prototypes either get shut down or get merged into real products. AppMaker was Google's AppSheet competitor that was shut down after a few years.

jerryandtom 2y ago

[dead]

larodi 2y ago

Basically: Guy reinvents MS Access on Google sheets 40 years later. Disclaim: this is not to say Access is to be despised of or anything. People found its utility for many years and the fact it is not what Boyce/Codd suggested they do with their tables, does not make it irrelevant. There was an article about how it just refuses to die and why. Worth reading for everyone interested in computer and computing history.

anyfactor 2y ago

I've built quite a few dashboards while working on proof-of-concept feature/product engineering. Even though people often think I'm joking, almost always the backend database was a Google Sheet. Google Sheets has great API support, easy to write functionality, convenient read and file dumps, works well with Pandas/SQL, and has a universally appreciated UX. Data validation can be annoying if the "admin" directly enters data, but for building a proof of concept, nothing beats Google Sheets. The data from Google Sheets would be passed through an API to a web UI/dashboard. The dashboard I built for end users was a simple Bootstrap (Vue-Bootstrap) table from the API, with enough easy-to-use filters and views to work out of the box. If the data was too large, I would use a templated snippet to convert the JSON into a card view. Ignoring long-term maintainability, this was one of the most foolproof ways to build dashboards. After that, I'd slap Firebase Auth on top, and that was it. I haven't worked on these types of projects for nearly two years now. Folks I know use Retool or Softr with an API connectivity platform like Portable, Pipedream, or Zapier. If you're staring at a spreadsheet on a daily basis, the next step should be looking into an app builder combined with an API connection platform.

mettamage 2y ago
Love it. I think my prototyping capabilities just extended by this comment
vishnugupta 2y ago
Currently I manage my startup’s accounting in Google sheet, and your comment gave me an idea to enhance it with Google Forms!
- ezst 2y ago
  That... Sounds scary.
  - ska 2y ago
    Clunky, but should be ok assuming a) a pretty simple structure and cashflow b) properly implemented double-entry, and c) backups.

fijiaarone 2y ago

Nice ad

zie 2y ago

I tried going all on on Google Sheets earlier this year. I used the Python API and like almost nothing worked consistently. I got 1 sheet to work well with like 1k rows and thought woohoo this is great! So I went all-in, put 25k rows in and Google pooped the bed. It gave errors all the time, rows and columns were funky. API issues galore. SQLite however handled 25k rows without any errors, always rock solid. I gave up. Overall a terrible experience once I got past 1k rows. I'm glad it's worked well for you. I only had like 10 columns, so it wasn't like massive amounts of data. I was linking to a file out in Google Drive and that was where most of my issues were. Google drive's API was 99.99% completely useless. My takeaway from the experience was, Google proclaims they have an API, but it seems more like nobody tests it or cares about it. Perhaps it's malicious compliance, they have it because they have to have an API, but not because they expect anyone to actually use it. Perhaps I'm just not cool enough for Google.

anyfactor 2y ago
The projects I worked on always had a mechanism to dump data into a proper database. For example, I built a daily scraper to collect some of the inventory. I didn’t keep all the data in a single sheet. Instead, all the data was stored in a cloud-based managed SQLite or PostgreSQL database, or sometimes a local SQLite database. Only the day's data was stored in Google Sheets because the client wanted to see the spreadsheet themselves and have the UI be accessible for their users.
- matharmin 2y ago
  It feels a little misleading to say you're using Google Sheets as the backend database, when you need an actual database in conjunction with it.
  - mattigames 2y ago
    Extremely misleading, in this case Google Sheets it's working more like a frontend
worthless-trash 2y ago

bewal416 2y ago

We built an entire app for our golf league- all using Glide and Google Sheets. It was honestly a great experience- all the players had a great mobile experience with obvious forms and leaderboards, while the storage and compute was hidden inside the Google Sheet. The pricing was pretty reasonable- considering we could split the bill among us all, and we only needed it for about 4 months. There’s still hope for good, quality SaaS! However, I hope Glide (or another) can figure out the pricing for the hobbyist tier.

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]

ijidak 2y ago

I'm looking for a no code platform that I can use for my customers and charge a subscription for access. Most of these no-code solutions target internal company Intranets. But, I want to use them for apps I can sell to customers. Does anyone have recommendations?

BOOSTERHIDROGEN 2y ago
I am also interested in this.
mrbluecoat 2y ago
As mentioned by another poster, check out "Partner portals" section on https://retool.com/ https://retool.com/

ShaggyHotDog 2y ago

Google sheet on mobile is pain. Good idea on how this becomes usable. Will try it.

santa_boy 2y ago

Glide is cool ... I wish there were FOSS versions of Glide to spin up nice, neat and simple mobile apps. There are now quite a few reliable FOSS version of no-code tools (but the mobile space seems to be missing alternatives). Few nice no-code FOSS that I love using are listed at https://blog.n0c0de.com/articles/1635ef6f-f616-8023-b336-ff3f4b416a6e https://blog.n0c0de.com/articles/1635ef6f-f616-8023-b336-ff3...

dvdsgl 2y ago
Thank you!
mrbluecoat 2y ago
This is great, thanks for sharing!

zuhayeer 2y ago

Love this, big fan of Glide. We've used Google Sheets for a long time to power Levels.fyi and allowed us to move fast without too much of a formal backend. Check out our post here: https://www.levels.fyi/blog/scaling-to-millions-with-google-sheets.html https://www.levels.fyi/blog/scaling-to-millions-with-google-...

ryanmarsh 2y ago

I really like the part where the article was phone friendly. Seriously how does anyone make money with a website where the actual content is so obscured by ads that users don’t bother coming back?

shahzaibmushtaq 2y ago

I haven't used online spreadsheets as databases and I guess they are good for prototyping, rapid application development and in-house testing.

epolanski 2y ago

OT but I convinced several of my clients to use Excel and SharePoint they already had in their bundle over writing a full blown app multiple times, added some automation and it was both cheaper and made them happier.

JimmyWilliams1 2y ago

[dead]

rashidae 2y ago

During COVID, I built a quick no-code solution to help ‘all-inclusive resorts’ in Cancun and Punta Cana. It started with guests scanning a QR code, filling out a short form, and scheduling their Antigen/PCR tests. Over time, it evolved to help nurses manage operations, streamline test results, and send certificates via email. What began as a DIY project during lockdown scaled quickly to Mexico City, the Dominican Republic, and Barcelona, processing over 30,000 tests the day after New Year’s Eve. Using Airtable, an Airtable extension called miniextensions.com, and tools like Docusign, Make, Sendgrid, and Twilio, the solution ended up supporting over 1 million tests. I handled all technical aspects, support, and training myself. Since the solution was meant to be temporary, I prioritized speed and reliability. Airtable’s relational database capabilities were crucial, especially compared to spreadsheets, for managing multiple linked tables and automations. Airtable also offers a REST API and a pretty amazing self- actualizing database schema that can be copied into tools like GPT or Claude for added context. You can build powerful tools with its scripts, interfaces, and automations. That said, Airtable is best for use cases with fewer than 250,000 records per month. Above 100,000 records, the web platform’s performance can suffer, though there are workarounds. It’s perfect for small to medium-sized businesses needing custom API integrations for CRMs or internal tools. If you’re interested, I wrote a brief case study about the project here: https://rashidazarang.com/covid-testing https://rashidazarang.com/covid-testing. On a related note, today I built a cool Airtable automation using ChatGPT and custom scripts. By filling out a corporate email in a form, the system scrapes the web for details like company name, address, phone, fax, and more, which then populates the CRM automatically. I’m still experimenting and plan to make a YouTube video about it soon. Here’s the loom video I sent to a friend about it: https://www.loom.com/share/b9ddbefbdce5434da378667fc2079d00?user_id_of_reactor=1139180d90ab45dabbef202c1931c09e https://www.loom.com/share/b9ddbefbdce5434da378667fc2079d00?...

panosfilianos 2y ago
woah! didn't even know you can embed videos on HN!
- starquake 2y ago
  I think your browser is doing some embedding cause I don't see an embedded video...

ozim 2y ago

app-based delivery services like DoorDash and Uber Eats were not the best way to support local businesses Unfortunately I got pissed off badly because I found out that ordering directly I was treated like a second class customer - where I expected the opposite. If I order directly they know I will not leave negative reviews. I really wanted to pay directly for the same service. I wasn’t expecting to get better service and definitely I wasn’t expecting being treated like dirt. So sorry but I will keep using app ordering services because I simply get better quality of food and better delivery times.

dools 2y ago

I used google sheets but wouldn’t go past big query or firebase these days. You can have connected sheets that read straight from big query and probably firebase too, and they’re so much better and faster and have fewer quirks than sheets

d--b 2y ago

Is that an ad? It definitely sounds like one.

switch007 2y ago
Definitely an ad.
Too 2y ago
Either that, or the author has a really odd fixation that warrants spending $69/month, just to share a list of nearby restaurants with his wife?
- switch007 2y ago
  That's definitely it !
dvdsgl 2y ago
Founder of Glide (YC W19) here. This article surprised us and is not paid.

tym83 2y ago

Tried to use Glide a few years ago and couldn't understand why it is needed anyway in real life? It seems like toy for startup-guys, not for real MVP's or something valuable. I like Google Sheets and Google Docs but this app is so strange. Maybe it's ok for small "homemade" projects for neighbourhoods or local businesses like flower salon or fitness club. But why it is needed for these type of business if we have social media, messengers, WPA and adaptive layouts on websites.

dvdsgl 2y ago
We’ve made a lot of progress in a few years! Check again?

lwhi 2y ago

This is giving me flashbacks to the days when MS Access (and later on Visual Basic) ruled this segment of the market. It's interesting to think there's still a market for this type of small scale enthusiast application. One scenarios I've been thinking about recently is the death of the generic app. If LLMs end up being able to create software easily, why wouldn't we choose to have software that's totally aligned our specific needs?

deleted 2y ago
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deleted 2y ago
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ajcp 2y ago
Not just totally aligned, but also "just-in-time" and ephemeral: an LLM goes and does/builds it on request, and then destroys all artifacts when the request has been fulfilled? If the persistence of something incurs a cost in storage and security, and the traditional penalties of efficiency and learning-curves are removed, why not recreate it every time its needed?
- lwhi 2y ago
  I like this idea. As an analogue to this; would each iteration adapt and evolve in the same way an organism might?
  - ajcp 2y ago
    Maybe not "evolve" but certainly would be different every time, right? If it already knows every conivable way to generate something, it stands to reason it will be different every time, as every request will be a little different, even if it's just the temperature of the room. As a thought exercise: if I could automatically generate, at no cost in money or time, a "disposable" vehicle for every single trip I took, wouldn't it make sense that it would be different every time, even though the basic requirement (transportation) is the same? Why bother generating a car with A/C if it's cold out? Why have a passenger seat if I'm just going to the corner store for milk?

Raed667 2y ago

I wanted to use Google Sheets for an internal corporate app, but authentication/authorization is a pain, I got it to work but it would have probably been faster to just have some CRUD SQLITE somewhere.

dvdsgl 2y ago
Glide (from the article) adds simple pin-based auth and access control on top of the spreadsheet data. There’s also user and role-based data protection.

anoncow 2y ago

Looks like a wonderful New Years Eve project

animal531 2y ago

I used to work on some really complicated old code for a long term incentive management company where each client had a ton of their own rules, but once those were set up they would be running fine for 3 or 5 year cycles without any issues. The difficult part was to fit their requirements and rules into our code. At some point I started working on a new version that would just run with a spreadsheet as the frontend where the business analyst could add whatever rules and calculation fields they wanted, which would then link to some input of users, share values, periods etc. It was going quite well and seemed extremely viable but unfortunately the business died due to some other issues along with Covid before the software saw the light of day.

bru3s 2y ago

[flagged]

dvdsgl 2y ago

Founder of Glide (YC W19) mentioned in the article — thanks for the recognition. This was not an ad from us, we were surprised by the coverage. Glide’s customers are businesses building software for internal use. During YC we called these “dark apps” but since then we call them “apps for work.” We wanted something usable by IT and operations staff (not developers) that emphasized design and UX. Glide started as a simple spreadsheet-to-PWA trick but is now a complete programming model and runtime platform for data-driven business apps, including APIs, databases, responsive layouts, a managed AI system, and workflow automations. One of our Crown Jewels is our data editor, where you program your app with our reactive computed columns. Our data grid has become a popular open source component: https://grid.glideapps.com/ https://grid.glideapps.com/ You can also try our new AI-native builder experience, where we’re trying to simplify building even further. It’s very early but just shows our continued effort to make building software simpler: https://glideapps.com/create https://glideapps.com/create Thanks again!

flanbiscuit 2y ago
I remember when you launched your product on HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19163081 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19163081 I favorited it back then. Glad to see it's doing well, it looks like a cool product. I haven't found a reason to use it yet but that's also because I have slowed down on coding personal projects after work in general.
- ilrwbwrkhv 2y ago
  Glide was cool when it launched but they never made that product work. Right now they have moved to an agency model and that is their product.
  - dvdsgl 2y ago
    This is not true. We don’t build apps for customers, although there are Glide agencies that we match customers with. We’ve learned that some businesses prefer to pay for someone else to build for them no matter the platform, so we’re happy to facilitate that given our agency ecosystem.

donohoe 2y ago

Its been real easy to build small and large web apps for news organization on Google Sheets. Most recently we built an "AI Election Tracker" for 2024 elections across the globe https://restofworld.org/2024/elections-ai-tracker/ https://restofworld.org/2024/elections-ai-tracker/ GS is not the best editorial interface but its not bad either, especially when it allows you to get things done quickly. Likewise, this was another fun project (since retired) that sits on Google Sheets: https://restofworld.org/stat-of-the-day/ https://restofworld.org/stat-of-the-day/ We skip Google's API which I really dislike. The sheets are set to publish to the web and you can use that to pull down the data and parse it into JSON files. It take less than a minute to set the basics up now.

yx827ha 2y ago
Why does the site hijack the back button!? It wouldn't let me get back to hn.

sylware 2y ago

Since now google mail is blocking email addresses with ipv4 and ipv6 literals, I moved to a self hosted messaging site to interact with google mail prisoners.

smileybarry 2y ago

This looks great, but I got a bit of sticker shock when I saw Glide's plan to do this is $69 per month cost (billed yearly). There's a free tier, but with a 1-app limit and only Big Tables (no Google Sheets). I'd be fine with paying for personal apps, but $69/month feels a bit... steep.

graeme 2y ago
It's a tool targeted at businesses. The article writer just found a use case that works for them personally.
- smileybarry 2y ago
  I know, but usually a lot of these have hobbyist plans. I wouldn't mind being throttled and QoS'd behind businesses for a lower price.

caseyy 2y ago

The idea is neat but holy SaaS, the price for what it offers is ridiculous. It’s not even about having the money, it’s just that $828 p.a. price of entry to build a spreadsheet front-end is objectively a bad buy/business decision. Most people would just learn to code at a boot camp for $828 so they don’t need codeless.

drewbeck 2y ago
You and I have a very different idea of “most people”
blizkreeg 2y ago
This comment reminds me of the infamous Dropbox comment :)
- caseyy 2y ago
  Touché, but let’s see…

pluto_modadic 2y ago

ah, native advertising

dhruvarora013 2y ago

For my workplace, I built an internal orgchart and the backend is entirely Google Sheets. It's been completely hassle free and I've spent almost no time on the code since building it three years ago. As employees join and leave, HR adds/deletes a row in the sheet and only they have access to the "database" besides myself. In case of accidental deletion, there's the handy restore ability built into sheets so a database "rollback" is also trivial and can be done by HR without my input. Sheets as a database for light web apps is absolutely joyful to build with.

dr_kretyn 2y ago

From a similar need I built the HomeHero app (https://homehero.pro https://homehero.pro) which helps maintain house inventory and now turning general (projects) inventory.

j45 2y ago

A great example where customers don’t care as much what you code in especially for B2C. Is it a solution that works or is helpful is more of a bar.

jayd16 2y ago

You can easily add some user input with Forms and with some setup you can get SSO and require Google auth to the Forms and Sheets. You can also throw up some async jobs in Google Cloud Run functions. I automated some IT processes this way. These were tasks that were already a bit manual (like on/off boarding hires) and needed flexible workflows but would be helped with automation. When the scale is small it can be a nice little toolbox.

jimmcslim 2y ago

The article conveys much the same sentiment as “An app can be a home-cooked meal” https://www.robinsloan.com/notes/home-cooked-app/ https://www.robinsloan.com/notes/home-cooked-app/

deepspace 2y ago

My experience with no-code or low-code products (like Glide, but I have not tried Glide yet), is that they are fine and dandy when you have a single table or sheet. But as soon as you have to source data from multiple tables 9or sheets), they all fall down, or become exponentially more difficult to use. I do not know what it is about splitting your data (even if everything is indexed against a common id), that makes the complexity go up so much. If someone can make an easy-to-use app to deal with this situation, I would potentially throw a lot of money at it.

dartharva 2y ago

I once used AppSheets to make a Sales enablement app for salespeople in my team. It worked well and gave great results, but.. damn does it get painful once the data starts going beyond a nontrivial threshold.

johnisgood 2y ago

> the shopping list is plagued by blank items/rows Hmm, interesting that he goes as far as to add a map based on an address provided (which is actually quite nice) but can't (or rather, didn't) get rid of blank items/rows.