DevUtils.app

Dev tools

developer utilities

SHOW HN2020

241points
105comments
#201of 3,028 in 2020
Top 7%of 2020 by points

How HN took it

MixedNo clear lean

17 positive, 25 neutral or asking, 2 mixed, 9 critical, out of 53 comments about the project. Thread score +0.13.

Idea: 9 for, 3 againstPricing: 3 for, 1 againstDesign: 3 for, 0 againstExecution: 1 for, 1 againstPrivacy: 1 for, 1 against

The thread, comment by comment

Each row is a top-level comment and its replies, in HN's order. Select a cell to open that comment on HN.

positive neutral or mixed critical about another commenter or something else the maker

What HN said

What people liked

  • Offline, native macOS app with convenient hotkey and context menu workflow

    From 3 comments
    • CyberChef is awesome for sure! I built DevUtils because I wanted more "integrated workflow". For example when I have an unformatted JSON string in my clipboard, I just need to…
      trungdq88 on HN
    • It looks like it has a separate input and output which is nice, and it also lists the possible options so you don't have to type and guess :)
      ladberg on HN
    • Oh that seems really interesting. Smart detect is a nice addition, I'd say. I'll try it out.
      arthtyagi on HN
  • Good alternative to web tools like CyberChef

    From 2 comments
    • This reminds me a lot of CyberChef[0], which has a lot of similar features. That said, it's a web application(though it's easy to run locally). This looks like a nice native-UI…
      charlesdaniels on HN
    • DevUtils reminds me of CyberChef [1][2]. The latter supports ~300 operations, is also open source and works entirely offline, but lacks the 'smart detect' feature of DevUtils…
      arthurfm on HN

Objections

  • Available only on macOS; want other platforms

    From 2 comments
    • Most of these tools are not mac only, it would be amazing if you could make this available to users of other operating systems, too. On a tooling note, how much work would it be…
      TheRealPomax on HN
    • Does anyone have an alternative for Windows?
      Farbklex on HN
  • Prefer App Store distribution for purchase and updates

    From 3 comments
    • The JSON formatter/validator alone would make this worth the money to me. A YAML formatter/validator could also be very useful. But they do have to be rock-solid and able to…
      bradknowles on HN
    • I agree with the App Store statement. If this was on the App Store, I would pay and try it out. Instead I downloaded the source code and building myself right now.
      sercand on HN
    • I would definitely buy it if it was on the App Store. Much less hassle to buy and keep updated than to have to track the github repo and build my own CI/CD workflow around…
      bradknowles on HN
  • Browser dev tools or scripts can already do much of this

    From 2 comments
    • Can't i just pop open my browser's console and: - Unix time converter: (unixtime) => new Date(unixtime) - Unix time converter reverse: (date) => ~~(date.getTime() / 1000) - JSON…
      iptq on HN
    • Not to sound negative but I always wonder, who is this for? Seems like a lot of these can be replaced by a line of python (or javascript or gnu util). - backslash escapes:…
      wraptile on HN

Requests

  • Regex support

    From 3 comments
    • Any plans to include regex support? I used to use a small offline tool (regexhibit?) but that remained unsupported, now moved to regex101.com. Yet something offline would be so…
      technimad on HN
    • Another comment in favor of regex support. If it worked similar to regex101.com I'd instabuy
      chowndown on HN
    • Nice, now absorb https://regex101.com/ too!
      ianlevesque on HN
  • YAML formatter and validator

    From 2 comments
    • The JSON formatter/validator alone would make this worth the money to me. A YAML formatter/validator could also be very useful. But they do have to be rock-solid and able to…
      bradknowles on HN
    • Nice app! Some suggestions: - a YAML formatter and validator would be nice. I lost counts of how many hairs I pulled trying to debug my YAML configuration files only to find out…
      neurostimulant on HN
  • JSON diff and text diff tools

    From 2 comments
    • Couple additional things would be interesting: 1. UUID generator (v1/v4, etc...) 2. Text diff checker (two sets of text, show the differences). 3. JSON diff. Show differences…
      mrcarruthers on HN
    • JSON diff would be extremely useful!
      bradknowles on HN
  • Handling very large JSON files

    From 2 comments
    • The JSON formatter/validator alone would make this worth the money to me. A YAML formatter/validator could also be very useful. But they do have to be rock-solid and able to…
      bradknowles on HN
    • Not OP in question. I threw a 20k student campus of json class registration data ... Hundreds of Megs at CyberChef to pretty print and it choked. I sometimes use jq/ya ... The…
      tenken on HN
  • Custom scripts for user-defined tools

    From 2 comments
    • Thanks! These are all good suggestions. I also have plan to add custom scripts so people can add their own tools from their specific workflows.
      trungdq88 on HN
    • Yeah... This is what I was always doing. Everytime I open my Chrome Dev Tool for this, I wish there is an app that do it for me with just a single click / hotkey. So I wrote the…
      trungdq88 on HN

Questions

  • How does it differ from Boop?

    From 1 comment
    • Just to be clear, what's the primary difference between the featured app and Boop (https://apps.apple.com/us/app/boop/id1518425043?mt=12)?
      tr1ll10nb1ll on HN
  • Is there tab support for multiple inputs?

    From 1 comment
    • Very cool! Is there support for tabs? For example, on the JSON Formatters I usually have a few Chrome tabs open where I work with different data structures.
      throw03172019 on HN

Alternatives named

  • CyberChef

    From 2 comments
    • DevUtils reminds me of CyberChef [1][2]. The latter supports ~300 operations, is also open source and works entirely offline, but lacks the 'smart detect' feature of DevUtils…
      arthurfm on HN
    • This reminds me a lot of CyberChef[0], which has a lot of similar features. That said, it's a web application(though it's easy to run locally). This looks like a nice native-UI…
      charlesdaniels on HN
  • Boop

    From 1 comment
    • Just to be clear, what's the primary difference between the featured app and Boop (https://apps.apple.com/us/app/boop/id1518425043?mt=12)?
      tr1ll10nb1ll on HN
  • jq and yq

    From 2 comments
    • Interesting! Could you share more on why would you use this app for large JSON/YAML files but not other specific tools like jq/yq? I'm interesting to know because I built this…
      trungdq88 on HN
    • Not OP in question. I threw a 20k student campus of json class registration data ... Hundreds of Megs at CyberChef to pretty print and it choked. I sometimes use jq/ya ... The…
      tenken on HN
  • json.pizza

    From 1 comment
    • I use json.pizza [1] on the web but have not hit it at scale. Likely it would choke. Still a great little tool. [1] https://json.pizza/
      kripy on HN
  • regex101.com

    From 1 comment

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