Hiatus - pressing the pause button

 

Some career things have come up which mean that I will need to put the main themes of this blog on pause for a while.  I need to focus on studying for industry certs, and there won't be a lot of time to keep the regular blog cadence and project themed post going.  

Given that I am largely talking to myself here, this is unlikely to cause a global panic, but a future data archaeologist might care.

So, in the interests of setting the record wrong:  I recently bought some terrible Cat 6 cables from a guy called Ean Asir on ebay. They were so bad that I cut one open to have a look at the wiring. The copper quality was atrocious! The wires were corroded and the insulation was just falling off.  They were very rude when I tried to return them, so I left a 1 star review. Don't buy anything made of copper from this guy! 

Article SAAS - back-end integration

The front-end functionality of my world simplest SAAS project is now complete enough that I want to start adding some real back-end services. This is so that I can firstly add functional authentication and persistence, and eventually add web hook integration to a payment provider.

I am going to use Supabase for the back-end for this project.  It is a great, well-documented set of services that has a fully functional free usage tier.  It is a one-stop shop for auth, persistence, web hooks and many other features. It is based on open source products, it supports both client-only and multi-tier architectures and it supports a local development model where you can build your solution on a local instance of the Supabase stack. What is not to like?

Initial Setup

To get started, I have created a free tier account and a Supabase project for the article site.

I then followed this guide  to setting up a local version of the Supabase stack and linking it to my project.

With the Getting Started steps complete, I have a local installed version of the Supabase environment that I can start using:

Database Schema

Another really great feature of Supabase is that the locally stack still includes the full Studio UI for managing the project.  This means that I can quickly set up my initial database schema:

Supabase is designed primarily for client-only applications where the browser hosted application is interacting directly with the persistence layer. To enable this to occur securely, Supabase supports row-level access policies for its database tables.  These policies define which operations and which rows uses can perform on each table.   These policies often require tuning as you develop and test the solution, but it is a good idea to set up some initial policies when you define your tables.  

With the initial database schema defined, we can create a migration that exports the postgres-sql that can be used to recreate or publish this schema later

>npx supabase migration new create_initial_schema

will create a new  migration file: 

>npm supabase db diff --schema public

will give a dump of the SQL required to migrate our database is its current status.

using a text editor to copy this sql to a migration file will preserve this state change and enable us to scrip the rebuild of the database in the future.

User Accounts

Creating user accounts is a little trickier. The Supabase authentication service uses its own database schema to manage user authentication. This table stores the 'master record' for each user identity, but is purely concerned with authentication.

We also want to store own own details for our user in the user_accounts table, and we want to make sure that  a user_accounts  record is created whenever a new user signs up.  

Also, by default Supabase doesn't give you a user interface for setting or resetting a user's password. This is probably to reduce security risks. 

Eventually we will manage the account creation through the user sign-up process on our site, but in the mean time we can inject some test users via SQL.

This Gist (not mine - I found it with a google search ) shows how to inject users into the Supabase auth schema.

Once we have done that, we can run a simple SQL statement to populate our user_accounts table based on the currently defined users

Once those scripts are executed, we have some test account to play with

To make this a repeatable process, we can add this SQL to the database seeding script supabase/seed.sql

This will ensure that these accounts are created whenever we reset the database, and gives us a repeatable way of setting our test database to a known state.

Conclusion

With the above steps complete, I now have a scaffolded back end that I can start integrating into the site. The next step will be to wire up our services layer to Supabase, then create the user interface for signing up and logging in  users.

2025 New Year Cont - Project State Of Play

Continuing the 'new year reflection'  theme,  I thought that I would use this post to list all of the projects that I currently have in-flight.  This is intended to hi-light my shameful habit of serially starting projects, and hopefully prompt me to do better this year. 

Here are the things I am currently working on

Software

• Article Site simple SAAS
• Text Adventure Engine (and text adventure)
• C# port of FreeRDP
• 'Big Idea' SAAS

Hardware

• Hexbot Robot (and control software)
• Cable driven robot arm

(These are the projects that I have at least 'touched' in the last 12 months. There is a litany of other abandoned ones that have been left by the wayside over the years.)

Of these, the Article Site simple SAAS project is the one that I have discussed most on this blog.  The other projects probably need a little more introduction. I'll expand on them below.

Text Adventure Engine

I have briefly mentioned this project in a previous post. This project is my attempt to make a text adventure engine in pure typescript that can be used to create a sophisticated text adventure with a simple JSON payload (e.g configuration only - no scripting required).   The goal for this project is to support the creation of multiple Infocom style text adventure games in the near future.

My vague idea is to use the medium of text adventures to have a fun project to work on as a relief from the more serious projects, while also improving my narrative skills.

C# port of FreeRDP

This project is an attempt to create a pure c# RDP Client, based on the FreeRDP open source C code base. The motivation here is that there doesn't seem to be a good RDP client that can be used with Unity (which uses C# as its base development language).

However, what I found while attempting is that the RDP protocol is very complicated, with multiple protocol layers, endian specific buffer programming and lots of crypto/security programming. 

I made progress despite that, but the project quickly became a drain - this is the sort of project that is large enough to require full time attention for while, and I have a lot of other things I want to look at instead.  The major downside here is that the end results of the project won't have enough return on investment compared with other things I wont to work on - the actual payoff for me will be quite low compared with the effort required.  This is more of a 'bragging rights' project than something I really need.

Even so, I haven't completely given up on this one and I do intend to pick it up again at some stage. It might get a post or two in the future.

Big Idea SAAS

This project will likely be the next SAAS project I tackle after completing the Article Site one.  I have a 'concept of a plan' for a SAAS site that has some potential to make actual money for paying customers, but I am still sketching things out and I don't want to make the idea public before making more progress. In particular, I  need to do some market testing to see if the idea has any traction.

For now, I am just going to say that this project is related to enabling code free implementation of Augmented Reality heads up displays for Industrial use.

Hexbot Robot

A while ago I bought one of these Hi-Wonder robot kits. The kit was pretty good, but I was disappointed by the ancient version of JetPack and ROS it shipped with.  I also found that the back current protection on the custom Hi-Wonder adaptor board for the Jetson wasn't great, as I managed to completely fry the Jetson nano while trying to charge the battery.

So, when life gives you lemons... make your own robot. I decided to modify the base hexbot to my own Frankenstein design and I've been plugging away at this project (on and off) for about a year now.

I'll make a more detailed post about the robot soon, but for now the main changes I have made are

1. Replace the tiny supplied LiPO battery pack with an adaptor than can use power tool 18v pluggable battery packs (mission life of 45Wh)
2. Replace the Jetson Nano with a Raspberry Pi 3 running Ubuntu (cheaper + less power drain)
3. Rewrite the robot control software from scratch in python/ROS2 

This is a nice little project for boosting my robotics skills (which are more or less 'intermediate')

The hardware side has required a lot of 3D printing, customization and learning about serial servo control.

The software side has required a lot of python, base robotics knowledge and an improved understanding of legged robot control.

At the moment the robot can be powered on,  supports SSH control, can adopt various leg poses and has relative accurate inverse kinematic control (you can move each leg tip by a specific vector)

I am currently working on re-integrating the lidar module and depth camera, and creating a gait controller that will enable the robot to walk specific distances. The steps after than will be accurate turning and dead-reckoning navigation.

Cable-Driven Small Robot Arm

This project is an attempt to design and 3D print a 6DOF cable actuated robot arm that will be light weight enough to add onto a future upscaled hexbot.  The design uses rolling joints + a pulley system to ensure linear motion of all joints while minimizing the weight of the arm structure. So far I have a  prototype builds for the 3DOF wrist and for the elbow and shoulder joints, but they all still need to be integrated into a common structure.  (I don't have any mechanical engineering training, so most of this work is iterative try-it-and-see stuff ).  I'll try and make some more progress with this project in the near future.

Summary

So that's the current project list.  I am going to try hard to get to a decent milestone with at least one of these before starting anything else!

One thing I've noticed with the above project list is that it doesn't include any VR or 3D development (which is my day job), but that is probably for the best. I want to keep my home projects very much separated from my work.  If I work on anything in Unity or VR it will probably be commercially sensitive and I won't be able to talk about it here.

Anyway, that is probably enough for this post. Time to do some actual work.

2025. New Year Thoughts

 So its a New Year, and as its been a few months of writing this blog I thought I'd do a pulse check.  

In general I am happy with the progress.  I have managed to keep a reasonable cadence with posting, completely finish one simple project, make significant progress on a couple of others and along the way I have significantly improved/refreshed my web development skills.  

Of course, I haven't made any actual money yet - but then Rome wasn't built in a day.  I feel that I have started building some momentum though, If I can keep it up then eventually I might get somewhere.

However, I also want to change the mix a little and have a little more fun with this blog. Up until now it has been focused purely on side-hustle web development, but I also have a few other interests that I would like to occasionally cover.  Moving forwards, I am going to broaden the scope a little. The main focus will still be to somehow build a side hustle SAAS business, but I am going to be less rigidly focused on that one topic

My other interests include a whole bunch of areas. These include robotics, game development, science fiction, retro computing and even cabinet making. From now on, I'm going to reserve the right to post about anything that motivates me enough to write an article.

With that out of the way, what else do I want to achieve in 2025?  There are a few things:

1. Keep a reasonable posting cadence with this blog
2. Finish more projects.
3. Get fit.
4. Have more fun 

Points 3 and 4 are actually the most important.  2024 wasn't really a great year for me, and I'm not too upset to see the back of it. One of the motivations for starting this blog was as one way to start pulling myself out of a mental hole.  I think this (and other things)  might be working, but I want to go further.

Physical and mental fitness are linked, and my physical fitness has become terrible. Part of this is generic middle-age, but mostly it is just self-neglect.  I need to change that. 

Another thing I need to do is to give myself permission to spend time on things that I enjoy. The hustle/grind approach is just going to lead to more burn out. That is one of the reasons I am going to be less hustle focused with this blog.

So with all that being said, I have been working on another project for the last couple of weeks, but one that is more for my own amusement than for building a business.  I've been developing a text adventure engine in Typescript, as a precursor to writing one (or more) web based text adventure games.

Why? For a few of reasons.  One,  I have a nostalgic love for these sorts of games and I think the world could use more of them. Two, it gives me a way to continue to improve my Typescript/webdev skills but have some fun in the process. Three, it will hopefully enable me to also improve my writing skills. 

I don't think I have the chops to write anything long form at the moment, but I think that I should be able to manage a text adventure.

Anyway, this thing is now officially another Project, which means that not only do I have to finish it, I will also be posting about it in this blog.

One of the key requirements I am trying to meet is that the engine should enable an entire text adventure to be implemented as a JSON payload (e.g. with no additional coding). The engine should also be good enough to develop games as good as the classic games of the genre, such as The Hobbit, The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy etc.

So far it is coming along nicely, and I'll probably dive into more depth in future posts, but for now here are a couple of  teaser screen shots to end with

 

 

Project 2 - Simple SAAS - Business Model

 

In the previous Project 2 post, I mentioned that one of the key outstanding design items was to come up with a business model for the site. I now have an idea of what I want to do, and this post I'll try and explain it.

The model is actually pretty simple:

The site will be based on a freemium model where all members will be able to post up to 5 articles for free. However, free articles will be (subtly) watermarked when then are viewed.  Something like this:

Subscribed users will be able to permanently post more articles ( 20?), and their published articles will not be watermarked as long as their subscription is active.

This model is simple, but it does hillight a couple of consideration points for a freemium business model

1. What features do paid subscribers get that free users don't
2. What happens when a subscription is cancelled. How do you gracefully remove the paid features when a subscription expires? 

In this case, I've chosen to watermark the pages for 'free plan' users, and to regress subscribed users to this model if they allow their subscription to expire. This should enable a few things

• The site will be useable for free users, giving people an incentive to use the site as a free service
• There will be tangible benefits for subscribing and maintaining a subscription, which should lead to people signing up for a subscription service assuming that is is appropriately priced.
• The penalty for letting a subscription lapse will be minor - all paid published articles will be permanently available, but will simply incur a watermark if the subscription lapses.

I'm reasonable happy with this concept.  It still needs some work (how much will the paid plan be per year? how many articles will this allow? How exactly will the free articles be watermarked), but this is enough to move forwards with.

With this concept sketched out, I am ready to start integrating the site into some real world services. I'll cover that process in future posts.

 

Interlude - Sickness and distractions

 Ugh. I've been sick. A nasty flu and a bonus round of bronchitis because I am just that lucky. 

As such, I haven't really been focused on moving forwards with Project 2.  Instead I've allowed myself to get distracted and started a couple of other things on the side. Did I mention that one of my biggest flaws is that I am great at starting things and terrible at finishing them? I think I might have.

However, it turns out that one of the projects was something simple that I was able to finish in a couple of days. As well as being terrible at finishing projects that I have started, I am also terrible at making decisions regarding what to work one.  I  dither so much over the 'what shall I work on today' question that I often just give up on being productive and choose brain rot instead. 

To fix that, I made a simple tool to help make decisions.  https://thedecisionator.com/ lets you create a list of choices to make, and then will randomly pick a choice from that list for you.  The lists of choices are stored to local browser storage, so they will persist between browser sessions on the same device

The site is another Vue/Vuetify/Typescript site that I've deployed via Cloud Flare pages.  It is intentionally bare bones, but it gets the job done.  The next time that I need to choose what to work on, I'll be covered!

Since one of the themes of this blog is side hustles and money making, it is interesting to consider if or how this site could be turned into a side hustle.  On the face of it, there don't seem to be too many options

• The site is too simple for advertisers to consider, it is unlikely to pass a provider review
• There is no realistic opportunity to 'upsell' to a  paid model.
• There isn't anything to subscribe t

About the only avenue I can think of is adding a donation link. I might look at this later.. but this would need some serious traffic numbers to be viable. This leads to marketing/traffic/seo considerations that I need to get across but which probably aren't worth it for a simple tool.

For not I am just happy to have something that I can use to help me be more decisive.  I might come back to making this a more profitable exercise later if I think of a good idea.

 

Project 2 - UI Scaffolding progress

 Over the last couple of weeks I have been working on scaffolding the key features of my simple article publishing project, while trying to actively avoid getting distracted by constant fiddling with the fine details of UX.  As a reminder, I am trying to create a very simple, but feature complete SAAS website so that I can build a better understanding of how to integrate the back-end services like Auth, Database, Payments, Helpdesk for a real SAAS site.

In my previous post I detailed how I am using a services pattern and in-memory repositories to separate the front-end UI from these back-end concerns, to avoid having to solve too many problems at once.  This also allows me to focus on making sure that the key features of the site - which in general are the features that will attract paying customers - are valid, working and stable. This prevents losing time implementing back-end integrations for features that are in flux, or which are poorly thought out.

As a case in point,  one of the key features for an article editing an publishing site is actually being able to create and edit an article.  My initial idea here was to use a markdown style approach - users would enter wiki-style markdown which would get transformed into a page when the article was previewed or published.

By implementing the UI first, it quickly became apparent that this approach was clumsy, overly technical and would turn off a lot of prospective customers. Instead I opted to implement a rich text editor based on VueQuill, and this greatly streamlined the user experience for creating articles - which is one of the core features of the site. Focusing on the core UI enabled me to make this switch with minimal impact - as no backend changes needed to be made.

Rule of thumb for future SAAS work: scaffold the core features first. Focus on getting the stuff that users are gong to pay for working before worrying about pesky details like security, db schema, payments etc.

Anyway, here is the list of features that are more or less working:

(remember, the UX here is a work-in-progress!)

The site is a responsive layout, with a fixed width for user interaction and fluid gutters. This may change in future, but it seems to make sense for now.  

It has a dedicated members/dashboard area that supports navigation, managing articles, managing the user's account and getting help/support

Each member page is an 'invisible scroller', enabling the user to scroll content vertically without requiring browser scroll bars. Each page also has built-in feedback features, providing common notification and dialog services for page actions:

The article management features are implemented using a master/detail list pattern, where the user can create, edit, delete, publish, unpublish and view their articles

Article creation or editing uses VueQuill as a WYSIWYG rich text editor:

There is a scaffolded Account management page:

and a scaffolded support page, using a hosted support form from FreshDesk (more about this in future posts)

Published articles are available for viewing by the public:

Obviously the site is by no means complete, but the core UI features are mostly there. 

The main outstanding feature is implementing the business model for the site - adding (or restricting!) features based on user payments.  This will be my next focus, and I'll try and report progress in the next post.