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Ask HN: Are there any CLI only tools that are monetised

17 points by ludovicianul 2y ago

I'm curious if anyone is aware of pure CLI tools that that are monetised, either by premium support or by offering a free and paid version. Majority I've seen are extensions of some sort of SaaS or desktop product (IDEs, testing, etc.)

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
troymc 2y ago
[flagged]
- uaas 2y ago
  Reads like an LLM-generated, low effort reply.
- waonderer 2y ago
  This is such an AI response.
dcminter 2y ago
Not much. I've encountered a handful of esoteric file conversion tools, though I couldn't say whether any of those are still for sale/available now that you can hide the secret sauce behind a web front end. It doesn't seem impossible in principle, but anything viable has to be better than any open source tools that might be out there but also able to command an audience with enough money and inclination to pay for it despite whatever level of license infringement takes place. It sounds like quite a narrow scope!
pirates 2y ago
I would have said k9s (free) and k9s alpha (pay for additional features), but it looks like the k9s alpha site is not up/working at the moment. k9s itself still gets regular updates, but I’m not sure what the status of k9s alpha is anymore. I had assumed it was still available, but I never tracked it too closely. https://github.com/derailed/k9s https://github.com/derailed/k9s https://k9scli.io/ https://k9scli.io/
mike_hearn 2y ago
Sure. My company sells Conveyor, a CLI build tool for deploying desktop apps. https://hydraulic.dev/ https://hydraulic.dev/ (yes the domain name is silly, rebranding is on the todo list but customers come first). It has plenty of customers paying a $45/month subscription, some of which are big name companies that unfortunately don't like to have their logo put on the web page. But it's a CLI tool, and it's monetized. What do you want to know?
- AznHisoka 2y ago
  What’s wrong with that domain name? I personally view it as OK and even a bit memorable
  - mike_hearn 2y ago
    The problem is that the company is named Hydraulic, but it only has one product, so it's confused branding. I think a lot of startups make this mistake so I don't beat myself up about it too much. The product has a different name to the company, but it's the product name people know, and so then they have to realign the branding around that - something I've never done. For better or worse there are enough users and customers (it's free for open source devs), that fixing problems and addressing feature requests/support tickets tends to suck up the available time. I still live in hope that one day I will drain the high priority queue enough to be able to reorganize the docs and redo the web presence.
    - satvikpendem 2y ago
      Basecamp the company changed their names after their main product, Basecamp, became successful. They only changed it back when they had more than one successful product. I wouldn't worry about your company name to be honest.
    - ericb 2y ago
      I like it too. Memorable is good! Why not just put Hydraulic in front of the name of each other product? Hydraulic Deploy. Hydraulic Build. Etc. Seems scalable.
dyingkneepad 2y ago
There's probably a compiler somewhere for some language that is monetized.
- someguy101010 2y ago
  graalvm
Jeremy1026 2y ago
terminal.shop sells coffee only through SSH.
- dagelf 2y ago
  You could really mess with them by putting up a web frontend that takes payment plus commission.
nhatcher 2y ago
I'm not sure if this falls under your category but I think the folks at charm have some form of revenue: https://charm.sh/#enterprise https://charm.sh/#enterprise
evanelias 2y ago
Yes, this is a possible business model for developer tools. My declarative schema management product Skeema is primarily a CLI tool, available in both FOSS [1] and paid editions, with the latter adding extra functionality and optional premium support [2]. In my space, some larger competitors are more focused on SaaS/cloud offerings. But that can be a mixed bag for security-sensitive customers who prefer to self-host, as well as for folks who want to integrate a tool into an automation/CI/CD pipeline. CLI tools are more compelling in those situations. [1] https://github.com/skeema/skeema/ https://github.com/skeema/skeema/ [2] https://www.skeema.io/download/ https://www.skeema.io/download/
- ludovicianul 2y ago
  Looks great. Similar model to what I was having in mind: open source + premium model with additional features. Is the revenue enough to work on it full time?
  - evanelias 2y ago
    Thanks! My situation is pretty similar to the comment from mike_hearn – I started it as a retirement/burnout project, and self-funded the business for years until the product was mature. If I was to start something like this today, personally I wouldn't use a permissive license for the free version next time. That's been really problematic as a bootstrapped business.
- ddgflorida 2y ago
  I occasionally sell CLI tools for file conversion at convertcsv.com. This is driven by customer concerns about security and privacy.
UnserMannInK 2y ago
https://imapsync.lamiral.info https://imapsync.lamiral.info Bought it to transfer mail from SMTP to Office365. Worth every penny.
- dddw 2y ago
  Oh yeah this an awesome tool, I used it at a company I worked for prior which had its own mailserver. Used it to migrate customers out of it.
_kix 2y ago
PHPStan, a static analysis tool for PHP, has a Pro version: https://phpstan.org/blog/introducing-phpstan-pro https://phpstan.org/blog/introducing-phpstan-pro Fun part is that the CLI handles all the browser redirecting for the payment and saving the license (I guess). Just pass it a `--pro` arg and there you go.
wenc 2y ago
Purely CLI tools are harder to monetize. But I’ve seen REPL instances (which are command line in a way but interactive) monetized. The AMPL optimization language is monetized. The very expensive KDb+ language and database is monetized. Back in the day lots of DOS shareware tools like pkzip, etc were monetized as shareware.

17 points by ludovicianul 2y ago

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

troymc 2y ago

[flagged]

uaas 2y ago
Reads like an LLM-generated, low effort reply.
waonderer 2y ago
This is such an AI response.

dcminter 2y ago

Not much. I've encountered a handful of esoteric file conversion tools, though I couldn't say whether any of those are still for sale/available now that you can hide the secret sauce behind a web front end. It doesn't seem impossible in principle, but anything viable has to be better than any open source tools that might be out there but also able to command an audience with enough money and inclination to pay for it despite whatever level of license infringement takes place. It sounds like quite a narrow scope!

pirates 2y ago

I would have said k9s (free) and k9s alpha (pay for additional features), but it looks like the k9s alpha site is not up/working at the moment. k9s itself still gets regular updates, but I’m not sure what the status of k9s alpha is anymore. I had assumed it was still available, but I never tracked it too closely. https://github.com/derailed/k9s https://github.com/derailed/k9s https://k9scli.io/ https://k9scli.io/

mike_hearn 2y ago

Sure. My company sells Conveyor, a CLI build tool for deploying desktop apps. https://hydraulic.dev/ https://hydraulic.dev/ (yes the domain name is silly, rebranding is on the todo list but customers come first). It has plenty of customers paying a $45/month subscription, some of which are big name companies that unfortunately don't like to have their logo put on the web page. But it's a CLI tool, and it's monetized. What do you want to know?

AznHisoka 2y ago
What’s wrong with that domain name? I personally view it as OK and even a bit memorable
- mike_hearn 2y ago
  The problem is that the company is named Hydraulic, but it only has one product, so it's confused branding. I think a lot of startups make this mistake so I don't beat myself up about it too much. The product has a different name to the company, but it's the product name people know, and so then they have to realign the branding around that - something I've never done. For better or worse there are enough users and customers (it's free for open source devs), that fixing problems and addressing feature requests/support tickets tends to suck up the available time. I still live in hope that one day I will drain the high priority queue enough to be able to reorganize the docs and redo the web presence.
  - satvikpendem 2y ago
    Basecamp the company changed their names after their main product, Basecamp, became successful. They only changed it back when they had more than one successful product. I wouldn't worry about your company name to be honest.
  - ericb 2y ago
    I like it too. Memorable is good! Why not just put Hydraulic in front of the name of each other product? Hydraulic Deploy. Hydraulic Build. Etc. Seems scalable.

dyingkneepad 2y ago

There's probably a compiler somewhere for some language that is monetized.

someguy101010 2y ago
graalvm

Jeremy1026 2y ago

terminal.shop sells coffee only through SSH.

dagelf 2y ago
You could really mess with them by putting up a web frontend that takes payment plus commission.

nhatcher 2y ago

I'm not sure if this falls under your category but I think the folks at charm have some form of revenue: https://charm.sh/#enterprise https://charm.sh/#enterprise

evanelias 2y ago

Yes, this is a possible business model for developer tools. My declarative schema management product Skeema is primarily a CLI tool, available in both FOSS [1] and paid editions, with the latter adding extra functionality and optional premium support [2]. In my space, some larger competitors are more focused on SaaS/cloud offerings. But that can be a mixed bag for security-sensitive customers who prefer to self-host, as well as for folks who want to integrate a tool into an automation/CI/CD pipeline. CLI tools are more compelling in those situations. [1] https://github.com/skeema/skeema/ https://github.com/skeema/skeema/ [2] https://www.skeema.io/download/ https://www.skeema.io/download/

ludovicianul 2y ago
Looks great. Similar model to what I was having in mind: open source + premium model with additional features. Is the revenue enough to work on it full time?
- evanelias 2y ago
  Thanks! My situation is pretty similar to the comment from mike_hearn – I started it as a retirement/burnout project, and self-funded the business for years until the product was mature. If I was to start something like this today, personally I wouldn't use a permissive license for the free version next time. That's been really problematic as a bootstrapped business.
ddgflorida 2y ago
I occasionally sell CLI tools for file conversion at convertcsv.com. This is driven by customer concerns about security and privacy.

UnserMannInK 2y ago

https://imapsync.lamiral.info https://imapsync.lamiral.info Bought it to transfer mail from SMTP to Office365. Worth every penny.

dddw 2y ago
Oh yeah this an awesome tool, I used it at a company I worked for prior which had its own mailserver. Used it to migrate customers out of it.

_kix 2y ago

PHPStan, a static analysis tool for PHP, has a Pro version: https://phpstan.org/blog/introducing-phpstan-pro https://phpstan.org/blog/introducing-phpstan-pro Fun part is that the CLI handles all the browser redirecting for the payment and saving the license (I guess). Just pass it a `--pro` arg and there you go.

wenc 2y ago

Purely CLI tools are harder to monetize. But I’ve seen REPL instances (which are command line in a way but interactive) monetized. The AMPL optimization language is monetized. The very expensive KDb+ language and database is monetized. Back in the day lots of DOS shareware tools like pkzip, etc were monetized as shareware.