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Fernando
Fernando

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Do you pay for any indie software?

My everyday devices are mostly Apple products and just recently realized that I barely use any software built by independent devs (or small companies). Most of what I consistently use falls in one of the following categories:

  • Shipped with the OS (XCode, Notes, Reminders, etc)
  • Open source (Atom editor, Docker, OSS frameworks, etc)
  • Big tech (Chrome, Slack, Zoom, G suite, etc)

Note: There will be some overlap in the above

In my case I'm a happy customer of Better Touch Tool which "allows you to customize various input devices on your Mac".

So, do you pay for any indie software?

(I'm referring to any product like licensed tools, SaaS, mobile apps or anything in between for that matter)

Top comments (21)

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geekynerdgirl profile image
Ashley

I do, if I find it useful. I'm an indie developer, too, and I want to support my fellow developers.

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moopet profile image
Ben Sinclair • Edited

I pay for indie games. Also for a couple of services.

I convinced my company that TablePlus was a worthwhile purchase because of the problems with Sequel Pro and MySQL Workbench, so though technically I don't pay for it, we do.

Honestly, for my cases, there's not much software that doesn't already have a free equivalent that's better than the proprietary ones.

Oh, the last thing I paid for was by using the "buy me a coffee thing" for someone who made a dark skin for Google Play Music.

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getaclue profile image
Alex Kluew

i hope your coworkers appreciate TablePlus! Such wonderful software.

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moopet profile image
Ben Sinclair

It's pretty good. What my boss appreciates most is being able to "lock" connections so you can't commit changes to databases on other people's servers without unlocking them first.
We end up being given accounts on legacy live systems that have most permissions, so that could be a Bad Thing unless we were to set up local replica databases and use them instead. This means we can quickly log into someone else's host and do a bit of forensics.

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Cody Pearce

Iā€™ve paid for Magnet, Gifox, Dark Noise, Carrot Weather, Be Focused Pro, and probably a dozen more. Im quite willing to pay for a quality app, as a developer I know how much time and effort it takes to make good software so I want to support those efforts when I can.

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Mike

I pay for Alfred on my Mac - saves me a bunch of time here and there with tasks I do all the time.

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djeikyb profile image
jacob • Edited

gifox: It's so easy to record a few seconds of screen and plop it into slack or wherever and it just works and loops and is as small as a gif can get. I had a hacky pipeline for this, but nowhere near as seamless, and I was pretty happy to buy a polished version.

tripmode: A bandwidth meter! When there isn't a pandemic going on, I work on a lot of different networks, including tethered to my phone. Sometimes I want to be sure I'm not accidentally downloading gigs of docker images or system updates or whatever. You can monitor and set limits, even per app!

better touch tool: There's a lot here, and it can be kinda overwhelming. I use it for three distinct purposes.

  • Bought this originally to remote control my macos laptop from my iphone. I'd hdmi the laptop to the tv, and then use my phone as a remote control.
  • Now my work laptop has a touchbar, and I use btt to customize it pretty heavily. Not, personally, that's a lot of work; I use the GoldenChaos-BTT presets.
  • Other people have mentioned magnet, and btt has these features built in! For a while I actually didn't know it was a btt feature. I was pairing with a coworker on their machine, and was very confused when I tried to grid and resize windows by dragging them around.

krisp: I remember the day I bought it. It was supposed to be a no-meeting heads down coding day. I biked to a coffee shop with a huge windy patio and a coloured slat art installation that rattles with the wind. And I forgot my headphones. And then an urgent call came up. I downloaded the trial. I kept the volume low and talked kinda quiet. There was hardly anyone else nearby, but still, trying to minimize my breach of etiquette. The call was fine. I experimented at the end turning it off and back on and everyone was shocked at the difference.

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getaclue profile image
Alex Kluew

If I have money, yes;
If I have no money, no.

^^

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ishan0445 profile image
Ishan Rayeen

Paid for 2 apps, Paste and Magnet, to make my life easier.

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fdocr profile image
Fernando

Magnet really caught my attention, thanks for sharing Ishan!

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ishan0445 profile image
Ishan Rayeen

Recently I bought Alfred, It just changed the way I work on mac, you can do pretty much anything with few keyboard buttons.

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Richard Guay

I pay for indie software and I give donations to free software quite often. I believe paying for things I use and that help me make money.

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Fernando

That's pretty interesting! And you're right, donations are a great way to give back to plenty of projects out there too.

I remember having some bitcoin fractions at some point and donating with them at least 4 or 5 years ago... I hope they cashed them in at a good price :)

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Patrick Schadler

I do. Like for Little Snitch 4, 1Password, iA Writer, Fantastical, Magnet. LanguageTool and probably many more.

I just want to support developers. I know their struggle because I am one of them :).