ChartDB · B2B · database diagram tool for developers
Launch your free open-source developer tool as a Show HN on Hacker News
Hit the front page; thousands of engineers tried it the same day
Workedpr-launchcommunity
What they did
After 3 weeks of development they prepared a launch, picked a day and posted ChartDB as a Show HN. His take on why it worked: developers appreciate open source they can test with no signup, and a unique wedge they had never seen before earns upvotes, which lift the post to the front page that many developers check every day.
What happened
Reached the Hacker News front page; thousands of engineers landed on the product the same day; the start of ChartDB's growth
- Stage
- Launch (Launch, ~October 2024)
- Effort
- One Show HN post after 3 weeks of building
“the growth for ChartDB started with a launch on Hacker News that got us like for the front page.”
“This Show HN got working and blow up to get to the front page, what gave us a thousands of engineers on the same day landing on our product.”
“if you have a a wedge that like it's very unique to what you're trying to solve, they will provide appreciation with their upvote.”
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More from this episode
- ChartDB: Let developers try it with no signup, no database login and nothing to installDevelopers adopted it after an earlier version needing credentials stalled
- ChartDB: Give the tool away free, then charge for the team features users ask for~$9K MRR from the paid cloud version after 16 months
- ChartDB: Show up on GitHub, Hacker News and r/selfhosted instead of inventing new channels21K+ GitHub stars and ~250K developers a year; no per-channel numbers
- ChartDB: Focus only on making database diagrams obvious and ignore everything elseFounder says everything started working once they focused; no numbers