Here’s a screenshot to show what I mean: https://imgur.com/a/d0SjEVt
Reader view exposes the content fine, so that’s a valid workaround for now.
The constraints are listed in our docs - https://docs.pipedream.com/pricing/
No thanks, I've been there before. You'd be better off just charging from the get-go. Otherwise, this should be 100% open source.
I ask because I see a lot of these dismissive comments on HN which end with "open source it" - and that doesn't seem like a super constructive piece of advice to a new startup team.
FWIW, at my current company, an analytics company, about five years ago, we made it clear that no matter what data we collected, if you leave the service or we shut down, we will get you all that data to take with you in a very reasonable format.
It's always risky to invest in a new service, but sometimes risks bring great rewards, and I think it's helpful if you're giving input, to try to make it constructive.
If the model turns out to be inaccurate: A) Change the architecture to reduce costs to the point where it becomes profitable at an attractive price point for customers, or B) Move on to the next idea.
It's not that complex, and more startups should be more realistic about profitability.
That said, I get your point that if you can create a model that gives you a good sense of future profitability, you are in a better position not to die as a company.
This provides a signaling of value, creates a real business relationship, and directly contributes to the lifespan of the vendor.
A free model doesn't really tell their business if there's actually demand and if people actually value it when supply is "infinite" when in reality it isn't.
Guess a high price with some research for similar things and lower it iteratively. Def. see what sticks.
Also they could combine this with discounts, such as if someone preallocates capacity for X month, they get f(X) % discount.
They should build a core customer base. Solicit feedback about what niche feature they would happily pay for.
For example here's a GitLab issue that I think people would (might?) use: https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab/issues/15536 (provide a "lock service" or a queue with max concurrency gate and launch pipelines / jobs)
The risk here seems small.
The value seems to be free hosting for the polling and scheduling.
This isn't too different than IFTTT abstraction-wise, and is easily reproducible in AWS using data pipelines and lambdas.
Why take an external dependency if what they are doing is rather simple?
I'd argue you are right about the complexity. The hook of the service seems to be easy integration and lack of infrastructure requirements.
At scale, a freemium model won't work. But it would provide initial traction for small use cases. This can be funded for a while without major rounds.
The advice to monetize now versus building community and getting users / crowd sourcing plugins is solid if the aim isn't to open source it.
With all workflow type services I’ve encountered I find that the actual underlying workflow can’t be managed under source control as one would do with (hopefully) most if not all application & infrastructure code.
Can I “deploy” workflows from source control?
Deploying workflows from source via CLI or your CI/CD pipeline is in the works! We want you to host workflows on Github / Gitlab and be able to deploy them using your standard process.
Feel free to reach out to me directly if you'd like more information and I can let you know when we're testing this.
dylan [at] pipedream [dot] com
BTW, love the name Pipedream!
I completely empathize with the time involved learning new tools. I'm happy to create a tutorial specific to your use case. We've built a few workflows to process Github events and I'd love to show you how this works end-to-end.
Is there anything specific you'd like to do with the commit / merge events, just so I make sure the tutorial targets your use case?
Feel free to reach out directly if you'd like to talk more at dylan [at] pipedream [dot] com.
The specific use-case I have in mind is that when a commit made I'd want to run various checks on configuration files in the repo to make sure specific conventions are followed and that certain file references exist. Upon a merge I'd like run a build process and send the build files to Heroku, Digital Ocean, or AWS.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ZGNP1-1vyg&feature=youtu.be
You can load the workflow I created for the video here:
https://pipedream.com/@dylburger/template-workflow-to-proces...
and press the Fork button in the top right to create a copy of it in your own account. You can modify that copy and run it for free.
The video isn't perfectly polished and I made a few mistakes, but we've built Pipedream to make it easy to debug your workflows, too, so I hope the mistakes help you understand part of its power!
A couple of notes on your specific use case:
* There's no webhook event for new commits. A PR (like I show in the video) or a push might be the best event to listen for. You can then run Node code to list commits associated with that push. See the API docs for commits here: https://developer.github.com/v3/repos/commits/ . * I wasn't sure specifically what build process you wanted to run, so I end the video reviewing how to add new steps to the workflow and walk through a few options: you can run any Node.js code or any of our pre-built actions. You have access to the /tmp dir on Pipedream and can use a package like child_process [1] to spawn some commands if you need to run anything on the shell. Unfortunately you don't have access to a full shell but let me know if what we provide works or doesn't — we'd love the feedback.
Let me know if that helps or if you have any questions!
[1] https://www.freecodecamp.org/news/node-js-child-processes-ev...
Great work! This is incredibly useful stuff and can't wait to start trying it out
Out of curiosity, are you hiring? I’d be interested in hearing what your longer-term plans are and am looking for something new. This seems right up my alley.
ETA: I see from the article that Python is indeed coming. I’d love to be a part of that!
We're planning to share more about our stack in future engineering blogs, so keep an eye out for those!
(Yes, Python is coming.)
+1
I'm a Pythonista at heart and we're working on Python support as we speak! We'll let y'all know when we ship that.
Pipedream is an integration platform built for developers. Develop any workflow, based on any trigger with authentication management built-in and no server or cloud resources to manage.
Workflows are code, which you can run for free.
The beta version includes the ability to:
- Run any Node code, or use pre-built actions
- Trigger workflows via HTTP, Cron, integrated apps or email
- Create, share, and fork workflows from the community and
- Send data to S3, Snowflake, email, SSE, and more.
Coming soon — Develop locally and deploy workflows via CLI, SDK, and more.
We think there’s a lot we can improve and are eager for feedback so please send us your ideas and opinions. Also, if you want a specific app or API fully integrated, let us know.