# Indie Software and Building in Public

URL: https://www.mattsenter.com/blog/topics/indie-software

Small products built by one person, and the decisions that come with them: pricing, naming, scope, and knowing when a thing is finished rather than abandoned.

## What does building in public look like for a solo founder?

I build alone, and I write about it as I go, including the embarrassing parts. When a customer hit a 404 at Premail’s checkout that my tests, alerts, and infrastructure alarms all missed, I wrote it up in [One Failure, One Success](https://www.mattsenter.com/blog/one-failure-one-success), along with the fixes and the feature that surfaced their feedback. I use what I ship: [Stop Checking Your Email](https://www.mattsenter.com/blog/stop-checking-your-email) is about replacing my inbox habit with three Premail briefings a day, and I listen to [StockCar](https://www.mattsenter.com/blog/why-i-built-stockcar) on the way to the gym most mornings. Being my own first user shapes more of the product than any roadmap.

## Why do I keep building small, local software?

Most of what I ship does one job, runs on your own machine, and asks for no account. Cheap code generation pulls toward more features, but the real cost lives after generation, so small scope is how I keep deciding what not to build; [small, local, single-purpose software](https://www.mattsenter.com/blog/small-local-software) lays out the tests I apply. [Burly](https://www.mattsenter.com/blog/why-i-built-burly) started as a daily annoyance, links opening in the wrong browser profile, and no URL ever leaves the Mac. [Weatherling](https://www.mattsenter.com/blog/introducing-weatherling) puts rain behind your windows without recording your screen. Even my AI plans are [local-first, not local-only](https://www.mattsenter.com/blog/talking-myself-out-of-buying-a-mac-studio).

## How do I decide what to charge?

Free is a distribution decision, not generosity. [StockCar, Comoji, and Burly are free](https://www.mattsenter.com/blog/why-most-of-my-apps-are-free) because they are self-contained utilities that cost very little to serve to one more person, and a price would only be a wall in front of the first thirty seconds. Premail charges because it works on every message, every day, and should be able to fund its own future, though it keeps a free tier. The consulting side of Senternet funds that patience. Free does not mean less effort: a free app has to be good enough to keep with no billing relationship holding it in place.

## How do I name what I ship?

A name follows a product everywhere, so I run candidates through practical tests before I commit: can a stranger spell it back after hearing it once, does a search lead to me, does it agree with what the product does, and will I still want to say it out loud in a year? [How I name what I ship](https://www.mattsenter.com/blog/naming-what-you-ship) covers the two families of names I use and why clever names usually backfire. I do not lock a name until I can say what the product does in one sentence. If I cannot name the thing, I usually have not decided what it is yet.

- [November 3, 2026 · Weatherling 1.7: AI, UX, and Accessibility · How AI coding tools freed up time for UX and accessibility in Weatherling 1.7, from shareable templates and custom colors to VoiceOver and optional Game Center. · Read→](https://www.mattsenter.com/blog/building-weatherling-1-7)
- [October 23, 2026 · Introducing Despacer: Copy. Paste. In One Piece. · Despacer is my free, open source Mac app that repairs wrapped commands copied from Claude Code and Codex. Copy normally. Paste in one piece. · Read→](https://www.mattsenter.com/blog/introducing-despacer)
- [October 21, 2026 · Introducing CommandH: Hide That Last App · On a Mac, Cmd+H hides the app in front but keeps it running. CommandH, my free, open source app, makes Cmd+H work on the last visible app too. · Read→](https://www.mattsenter.com/blog/introducing-commandh)
- [October 18, 2026 · App Store 4.3 Rejections: Does Being First Give Apps an Edge? · Can App Store spam rules give early apps an advantage? Dumpling’s 4.3 rejection raises questions about differentiation, appeals, and indie distribution. · Read→](https://www.mattsenter.com/blog/app-store-4-3-spam-rejections)
- [October 16, 2026 · Weatherling Reached #8 in Mac App Store Utilities. It Started with Rain. · Four days after launch, Weatherling reached #8 in US Mac App Store Utilities through word of mouth. The story behind my desktop weather effects app. · Read→](https://www.mattsenter.com/blog/weatherling-number-8-mac-app-store)
- [September 26, 2026 · Why Your Mac Spam Filter Misses Cold Outreach · Apple Mail and Gmail catch junk, not recruiter pitches, sales follow-ups, or newsletters you never asked for. Why I think the fix belongs on your own Mac. · Read→](https://www.mattsenter.com/blog/email-spam-filter-mac)
- [September 26, 2026 · The Mac Emoji Keyboard, and Why I Built Comoji · Open emoji on Mac with Control-Command-Space or Fn-E. I compare Apple’s picker with Comoji’s colon shortcuts and explain why I built it. · Read→](https://www.mattsenter.com/blog/mac-emoji-keyboard-why-i-built-comoji)
- [September 26, 2026 · Introducing Weatherling: Make It Rain on Your Desktop · Weatherling is a macOS app that makes rain fall behind your windows, without recording your screen or getting in your way. Snow and sunlight come next. · Read→](https://www.mattsenter.com/blog/introducing-weatherling)
- [September 21, 2026 · Stop Checking Your Email · Email overload is partly a checking habit. I swapped inbox scans for three scheduled Premail briefings a day: a summary and a to-do list, not a pile. · Read→](https://www.mattsenter.com/blog/stop-checking-your-email)
- [September 18, 2026 · One Failure, One Success · A broken Premail checkout slipped past my tests and alerts. A customer reported it, and my new morning briefing surfaced the feedback I had overlooked. · Read→](https://www.mattsenter.com/blog/one-failure-one-success)
- [July 29, 2026 · How I Name the Things I Ship · A product name is the first promise you make. How I name indie apps like Premail, Comoji, and Burly, and the clever names I have learned to avoid. · Read→](https://www.mattsenter.com/blog/naming-what-you-ship)
- [July 22, 2026 · Why Most of My Apps Are Free, and One Is Not · StockCar, Comoji, and Burly are free. Premail is not. How I decide when an indie product should have a price and when it should not. · Read→](https://www.mattsenter.com/blog/why-most-of-my-apps-are-free)
- [July 20, 2026 · Why I Built Burly · Why I built Burly, a macOS link router that sends each link to the right browser profile, and how it compares to Browserosaurus, Choosy, Velja, and Bumpr. · Read→](https://www.mattsenter.com/blog/why-i-built-burly)
- [July 11, 2026 · Why I Build Small, Local Software That Does One Thing · AI makes it cheap to build sprawling apps fast. I keep shipping tiny, single-purpose tools that run locally with no account, on purpose. Here is why. · Read→](https://www.mattsenter.com/blog/small-local-software)
- [May 26, 2026 · Why I Built StockCar · I wanted a podcast about my portfolio, not the market, not someone else's picks. Nothing existed, so I built it. · Read→](https://www.mattsenter.com/blog/why-i-built-stockcar)
- [August 26, 2026 · I’m Trying to Talk Myself Out of Buying a Mac Studio. Apple Isn’t Helping. · I want a Mac Studio for local AI work, but its price and Apple upgrades make the case hard to justify. Here is why I am still talking myself out of one. · Read→](https://www.mattsenter.com/blog/talking-myself-out-of-buying-a-mac-studio)

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