If it's subscription based service, no problem, say it up front. If it's free with various premium options, fine, say it up front. If it's all open source, great, say it up front. You didn't have half the dark pattern/bait-and-switch/datamining revenue models that are commonly seen these days (and there are enough companies that have left users high and dry at the end of their "incredible journey" that app/business longevity is also a valid concern).Īnd so now, in 2016 I'm more cynical and one of the first things I want to know when I come across a potentially interesting app/product is how they plan to make money off me. If I land on the marketing site for an app I'm going to assume it's a business and look for pricing first. If I land on some project's Github page I'm not going to be looking for pricing. The world, the Internet, and in particular revenue models for software and services have changed significantly since the 90's. > This is something I was used to explain in the 90's, I didn't expect to have to explain it again in 2016. My point is that the presence of a Pricing page (which I admit is one of the first things I look for when I visit any app or service page) could mislead people into thinking it is a strictly paid-for app, when in fact it is not. If it is as good as others say, then I do sincerely hope that the author finds some way to monetise it via some sort of Pro subscription etc. Later, when I saw that it was an always free piece of software, it immediately went back on my radar as something I should check out as a possible replacement for Postman. I immediately assumed it was a paid licence product, which meant that it immediately fell outside any compelling reason for me to even trial it. In Insomnia's case, I was ready to dismiss it because I read about the simplicity of the interface, and I saw a 'Pricing' link on the web page. But for me, I didn't see any solid reason to switch to Paw from Postman unless I came across an absolutely killer feature that I could not live without. It sounds a great product and is well worth the money. However, if the other product is a 'paid for' product, then it has to be VERY compelling indeed to make me switch from the free one I am already using.įor instance, I (and many others) think that Paw is worth the licence fee. It is just that in this circumstance, I am already a happy user of the (free) Postman API testing app, and whenever I see anyone talk about a new API testing tool, I am keen to check it out. Just to clarify my position - I run for profit web apps too, and have absolutely no objection to any developer putting a price on their products or services. We're quite biased here: many users want this feature, but we don't want to encourage bad practices (as it may be interpreted by some as "ok let's not write proper tests, there's Paw for that").Īnyway, that was to share my point of view as a Paw guy :) A robust API should have unit tests written with mocks and be part of the server code, not a few assertions made in a 3rd party app. And while we will do something somewhat related in the near future, it's a slippery slope. And we're writing enough code elsewhere to not want to write code in an app.Īs of scripting used for "unit" testing, we have thought about it many time for Paw. We don't want to add another level of complexity due to the tools we use. I know from experience as an iOS developer (then Python backend guy) that when working on a given project, our mind is already full of business logic. Because of that, we try to keep actions intuitive and keep scripting as a last resort (JS scripts & extensions are available in Paw too, btw). I guess it's a matter of choice, but we see Paw as a visual tool that makes it easy to setup a request (or a set of requests) to iterate quickly when developing an API or discovering a new one.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |