DEV Community: Chakshu Software Creation

I found a completely free, no-ads task exchange platform and I'm genuinely confused how it exists

Chakshu Software Creation — Sun, 07 Jun 2026 13:32:52 +0000

Okay this is going to sound like an ad. It's not. I'm just genuinely surprised this thing exists and nobody's talking about it.

The rant that started this

A few weeks ago I needed a really simple favor — someone to test a form I built and give me honest feedback. Not a dev. Just a normal person who could click through it and tell me if it was confusing.

I posted on Reddit. Got 2 replies. One person said "looks fine" without actually testing it (I had analytics, I could tell). The other ghosted.

I tried those "do a task for me" apps. Most of them are either:

Full of spam/scam tasks
Want you to pay upfront
Take a 20-30% cut
Have a $50 minimum withdrawal

All I wanted was: I help you with something, you help me with something. No money involved. Just people exchanging small favors.

What I stumbled on

So I found this thing called Friendly Help. No idea how I found it honestly — think someone linked it in a Discord server I lurk in.

It's a task exchange platform. The concept is dead simple:

You post a task you need help with
Someone applies to help
You approve them
They do it, submit proof
You verify, they get coins
Now they can post their own tasks and someone else will help using those coins

No real money. No payments. No ads. No premium tier. Completely free.

I sat there for a good 5 minutes waiting for the catch. There isn't one. It's just... a community project someone built and maintains for free.

How it actually works

So I signed up (email/Google auth — took 30 seconds) and posted my first task: "Test my web form and give feedback — 5 minutes max."

Within a few hours, someone applied. I could see their profile, their tier (Bronze/Silver/Gold based on how much they've helped), and their history. I approved them.

They tested my form and submitted a screenshot as proof showing they went through the whole thing. They also left a note with actual useful feedback — "the submit button on mobile is cut off" — which I hadn't noticed.

The whole thing took maybe 24 hours from posting to completion.

Here's what surprised me about the system:

The coin economy

Everything runs on virtual coins. Not crypto. Not real money. Just an internal point system.

You start with some coins when you join
Posting a task costs coins (you set the amount)
Completing a task earns you coins
Coins go into escrow when someone starts your task — so they're guaranteed to get paid

It's basically: help others → earn coins → use coins to get help → cycle continues.

Nobody's making real money here. That's the whole point. It removes the awkward "how much should I pay for this" problem.

The trust system

This was the part that impressed me. For a free platform, they've thought about this:

Proof submission — the helper has to upload proof (screenshots, photos) that they actually did the task
48-hour auto-approve — if the task poster doesn't verify within 48 hours, it auto-approves. So helpers don't get screwed by ghosters.
Dispute system — if someone submits garbage proof, you can open a dispute. An admin reviews it.
User tiers — Bronze/Silver/Gold based on completed tasks. Higher tier = more trust.
Ban system — people who consistently cheat get banned.

It's not perfect. I'm sure people game it. But for a free community platform, it's surprisingly well thought out.

Works on both web and phone

They have a web app at friendlyhelp.app and an Android app (Flutter-based). Both connect to the same backend, so your account, tasks, and coins sync across both.

I used the web version on desktop and the app on my phone to check notifications. Worked fine both ways.

What kind of tasks are on there?

From what I've seen browsing around:

"Test my app and give feedback" (this is basically why I found it)
"Fill out my survey (5 min)"
"Proofread my portfolio website"
"Watch my YouTube video and give honest critique"
"Help me pick a logo — vote on 3 options"
"Review my resume"
"Try my Chrome extension and find bugs"
"Help me practice an English conversation (15 min voice call)"
"Give me feedback on my landing page copy"

It's mostly small, quick tasks. Nothing crazy. The kind of stuff you'd ask a friend for — except you don't want to keep bugging your friends.

What I like about it

It's genuinely free. I keep saying this because I keep waiting for the popup that says "upgrade to Pro for $9/month." It hasn't come. No ads either. No tracking dark patterns. No "invite 5 friends to unlock" nonsense.

The coin system removes money awkwardness. I don't have to figure out if a 5-minute task is worth $2 or $5 or $10. It's just coins. Help and be helped.

The auto-approve after 48 hours is genius. On other platforms, I've done freelance tasks where the poster just disappears and never confirms. Here, if they ghost, you still get your coins after 48 hours.

It's fast for small tasks. I've used it 4 times now. Average turnaround is about 12-24 hours for simple stuff.

What could be better

Being honest here:

The user base is still small. Some tasks sit for a day or two before someone picks them up. If you need something done in 30 minutes, this isn't it.
No iOS app yet. Just web + Android for now.
The UI is functional but not beautiful. It's clearly a passion project, not something with a design team behind it. Purple and gold color scheme — it works but it's not going to win design awards.
The free tier of Render means the server sometimes cold-starts slow. First load can take a few seconds. After that it's fine.

None of these are dealbreakers for me. It's free. It works. It solves my problem.

TL;DR

Friendly Help is a free task exchange platform (web + Android)
Virtual coin economy — no real money, no ads, no premium tiers
Post tasks, help others, earn coins, use coins to get help
Built-in proof submission, escrow, disputes, user tiers
Completely community-driven, maintained by an indie dev for free
Small user base but growing
Actually useful for getting quick feedback, testing, surveys, proofreading, etc.

Do you know of any other platforms like this? The whole "help exchange" concept seems obvious but I can't find many good ones. Drop suggestions in the comments — I'm curious what else is out there.

I wasted 6 weeks on Google Play's closed testing. Here's what finally worked.

Chakshu Software Creation — Sun, 07 Jun 2026 13:21:27 +0000

I need to vent. And maybe save someone else from the same nightmare.

The backstory

I'm a solo Android dev. I've been working on my app for about 4 months — evenings, weekends, the usual indie grind. I finally got to the point where I was ready to publish on the Play Store.

Then I hit the closed testing wall.

If you haven't dealt with this yet — Google now requires you to run a 14-day closed test with at least 20 testers who are actually engaged. Not just opted in. Not just installed once. Google tracks whether your testers are genuinely using your app over those 14 days.

Sounds reasonable, right? It is. Until you try to find 20 people who will reliably open your app every day for two weeks.

Round 1: Friends & family

I asked everyone I know. Got about 12 people to opt in. Most of them installed the app on Day 1. A few opened it again on Day 2. By Day 5, maybe 3 people were still using it.

The rest? Life happened. They forgot. They got busy. One person told me "yeah I opened it" — their phone had auto-uninstalled it because of storage.

Day 14. I submitted for production access. Rejected.

"Your testers did not show sufficient engagement..."

Cool. Two weeks wasted.

Round 2: Reddit & Discord

I went to r/AndroidDev, various Discord servers, those "I'll test yours if you test mine" threads. Got 25 people to sign up this time.

The problem? Most of them did exactly what I feared — installed once to bump their own numbers, then removed the app. I was in an illusion that people were testing. They weren't.

Day 15. Submitted again. Rejected again.

Same message. Testers not engaged.

Another two weeks gone. At this point I've spent over a month just trying to get past closed testing. Haven't written a single line of new code.

The actual problem

Here's the thing that drove me crazy — I had zero visibility. I couldn't tell:

Who actually opened the app today?
Who installed it once and forgot?
Is anyone even using it on Day 7, 8, 9?
How long are sessions lasting? 2 seconds or 2 minutes?

I was flying blind. You submit testers, pray for 14 days, and find out the result. That's it. No dashboard, no analytics, no feedback loop.

I could've replaced inactive testers on Day 3 if I'd known they weren't opening the app. Instead I waited until Day 15 to find out I failed.

What I ended up using

While doom-scrolling GitHub one night (as you do), I stumbled on this thing called TestPulse. It's basically a small SDK you drop into your app during the testing phase that tracks tester engagement — sessions, screen visits, duration, which testers are active, which ones ghosted.

It has a web dashboard where you can see all of this in real time.

I was skeptical. But at this point I was desperate. Adding it was stupidly simple:

When testers open the app for the first time, a little dialog asks for their name so you can identify them. After that, the SDK silently tracks sessions, screens, and duration. Data gets batched locally and synced to the backend every 60 seconds.

Round 3: The one that worked

I built a new APK with TestPulse included, uploaded it to closed testing, and recruited testers again — this time from a mix of friends and online communities.

The difference? I could actually see what was happening.

Day 1: 22 testers installed. 20 opened it. Good start.
Day 2: 18 testers active. The dashboard showed 2 people hadn't opened it since Day 1.
Day 3: Those 2 still inactive. I messaged them on WhatsApp — one had phone issues, one had just forgotten. Both opened it that day.
Day 5: 3 testers had dropped to < 30 second sessions. I could see they were just opening and closing the app. I reached out and asked them to actually try the features.
Day 7: I could see the engagement graph trending in the right direction. The dashboard gave me an "engagement score" which was at 78/100 — labeled "Good."
Day 10: One tester went inactive. I recruited a replacement immediately instead of waiting until Day 15 to find out.

Day 14. Submitted for production access.

Approved. ✅

I literally teared up. Not because the app was approved, but because this nightmare was finally over.

What I wish I'd known earlier

The real issue was never about finding 20 testers. It was about knowing which testers are actually engaged so you can take action.

A few things I learned:

Most people won't test your app for 14 straight days. It's not malicious — they just forget. Life happens.
You need visibility, not more testers. 15 engaged testers beat 30 ghost testers every time.
Google checks DAU (Daily Active Users), session length, and screen navigation. A tester who opens your app for 2 seconds and closes it doesn't count as "engaged."
Replace inactive testers EARLY. If someone hasn't opened the app by Day 3, they're not coming back. You need to know this on Day 3, not Day 15.
The tester exchange communities (Reddit, Discord) are hit or miss. Some people genuinely help. Many just install once to get you to reciprocate, then uninstall. Without tracking, you can't tell the difference.

For Flutter devs

If you're wondering — yes, it works with Flutter too. Flutter apps are regular Android apps under the hood. You add the dependency in android/app/build.gradle.kts (NOT settings.gradle.kts — that doesn't work for Flutter) and the API key in the Android manifest. The SDK auto-tracks sessions. For per-screen tracking you'd need to call logScreen() manually since Flutter uses a single Activity, but honestly session tracking alone was enough for me to pass.

The removal

After I got production access, I just removed the gradle dependency and the manifest meta-data tag. Two lines deleted, build the release APK, done. No leftover code, no cleanup needed.

You could also use debugImplementation instead of implementation so it's automatically excluded from release builds. I wish I'd done that from the start.

Would I recommend it?

I'm not going to tell you this is the only way or the best way. I'm just telling you what worked for me after failing twice and wasting 6 weeks.

If you're about to start closed testing — or worse, if you've already been rejected — just having visibility into who's actually testing changes everything. I went from blind hope to informed action, and that made the difference.

The repo is here if you want to check it out. The dashboard is free to use.

Good luck with your closed testing. You're going to need it. But hopefully not as much luck as I needed. 😅

Has anyone else dealt with this Google Play closed testing rejection loop? How did you handle it? Would love to hear other approaches in the comments.