Introduction

Coming into demo day with a solo-built Chrome extension and a minimal React web app, I discovered how critical real-time, community-driven tech discovery is for developers and researchers. Under hackathon pressure, I wired together React, Supabase, and Deno edge functions-then deployed the site at openexplorer.tech to prove the concept in under 48 hours.

Analytics Dashboard

After demo day, I found myself staring at mountains of raw scan data and realizing there was a narrative buried in every entry. That moment sparked my vision for a Supabase-backed dashboard: not just charts, but a living chronicle of the web’s evolution, powered by every extension install. When you fire up Open Tech Explorer, you’re not just inspecting a site-you’re casting a vote in real time, and together we’ll watch the story unfold across thousands of domains.

Open & Free API

From day one, I committed to keeping our API, Web App and extensions 100% open and unrestricted. No paywalls. No tiers. Every request you make fuels our shared dataset and fuels innovation for everyone. Your scans, your data-everyone wins. I want developers, researchers, and curious minds everywhere to tap in, explore, and build on top of what we’ve created without ever hitting a “lite” or “pro” wall.

Community & Collaboration

I built Open Tech Explorer alone, but I’ve designed it so every install automatically enriches our dataset-no manual pull requests required. Although the project is newly open source and no external contributions have landed yet, I’m eager to welcome collaborators: star the repo, file an issue, or send a PR. Together, we’ll co-author the future of web-tech discovery-one scan at a time.

Reflecting on the Journey

There were late nights poring over code, tweaking detection heuristics until they clicked-and waking up the next morning to discover even smoother solutions waiting in my mind. Those moments proved that building in public is more than a mantra; it’s a partnership. Every star, issue, and pull request reflects a shared enthusiasm that fuels my drive to keep improving.

The Power of Small Wins

It’s easy to celebrate a launch and move on, but I’ve learned to savor the little victories: the first time a user left 5-star review on extensions web store, watching our install count increase, or the excitement of watching our scanned-sites counter climb with each new scan. Those milestones aren’t just numbers-they’re proof that a solo spark can ignite a community fire.

Looking Ahead

Over the next few months, I’m focused on polishing core features that matter most: enhancing the mobile PWA for offline scanning, adding customizable filters in the dashboard so you can track only the frameworks you care about, and building CSV export so teams can plug our data into their own reports. I’m also kicking off a series of monthly “insights” posts-deep dives into trends we’re seeing in the wild. Open Tech Explorer taught me that every new scan tells a story, and I can’t wait to share those stories with you.

Conclusion

This hackathon taught me that launching and iterating rapidly is far more rewarding than competing. Open Tech Explorer is live at openexplorer.tech with Chrome & Firefox support. Install it, star the repo at

turazashvili / openexplorer.tech