DEV Community: Krishna Paul

Introducing Gati — The Zero-Ops Backend Framework for the AI Era

Krishna Paul — Sat, 22 Nov 2025 23:33:47 +0000

🚀 Introducing Gati — The Zero-Ops Backend Framework for the AI Era

Build faster. Break nothing. Deploy everywhere.

Modern backend development shouldn’t feel like wrestling infrastructure, gluing libraries, debugging traffic flows, or worrying whether deploying a new API will break production for your customers.

Yet — it still does.

For startups, solo developers, agencies, and even mid-sized teams, backend engineering is increasingly fragmented:

Too many moving parts
Too much DevOps overhead
Too many “gotchas” with deployment
Too much risk when shipping updates
Too much manual work for scaling, versioning & observability
Too much pressure to integrate AI, queues, modules, caching, security… manually

Gati was born to change that.

Gati (गति) means speed, motion, progress — and the framework embodies exactly that:
A backend that evolves, scales, and adapts automatically, letting developers focus on what they actually love: writing logic and building great products.

Welcome to a new era of backend development.

🌟 What is Gati?

Gati is a TypeScript-first, fully modular, self-managed backend runtime designed for an AI-accelerated world.

It combines:

a flexible runtime
an auto-versioning deployment engine
a unified module & plugin ecosystem
a powerful real-time playground
and several developer experience innovations…

…into a single, elegant platform.

You write simple TypeScript handlers.
Gati handles everything else.

No YAML.
No pipelines.
No infra chaos.
No downtime.
No backward-incompatible deployments.

Just code → deploy → evolve.

🧠 Why Gati?

1. Zero-Ops Backend

Forget DevOps ceremonies.
Gati takes raw source code and automatically:

watches your code
analyzes changes
generates schemas, manifests & types
spins up versions
manages rolling updates
drains old API versions
deploys with zero downtime
updates your cloud infrastructure
syncs everything with your Gati Cloud account

A single gati deploy is all you need.

2. Timescape — API Versioning Solved Forever

Classic versioning is painful:

Breaking changes break clients
You must maintain v1, v2, v3… manually
Deprecation is slow or impossible
Rollouts risk production downtime

Timescape changes the rules.

Timescape automatically:

detects breaking changes
creates versioned handler copies
handles traffic per-version
drains old versions safely
generates transformers for backward compatibility
decommissions versions when no clients use them
logs evolution visually in the playground

Your API evolves smoothly, safely, endlessly — without breaking existing clients.

This is backend evolution done right.

3. Local & Global Context — Clean, Functional DX

Gati provides a beautifully simple handler signature:

export async function handler(req, res, lctx, gctx) {
  // your logic goes here
}

lctx = per-request state & lifecycle hooks
gctx = global modules, caches, DBs, queues & plugin APIs

No decorators.
No magic.
No framework-heavy abstractions.

Just functional, readable, TypeScript-native code.

4. Modular Architecture — Polyglot by Design

Everything in Gati is a module:

database clients
queue drivers
AI models
caching layers
external API connectors
WASM functions
Node modules
Docker images
even binary executables

Modules are isolated, polyglot, typed, and hot-swappable.

You can share modules through the upcoming Gati Registry — and monetize them.

5. Plugin Ecosystem — Extend the Runtime

Plugins can:

add new types, validators & transformers
define new module clients
inject before/after hooks
integrate with AI tools
enhance observability
add new cloud providers
add authentication frameworks
add gateways, queues, caches, databases

And the best part:
Anyone can publish plugins — making Gati a community-driven ecosystem like npm, but purpose-built for backend development.

6. Gati Playground — See Your Backend

Backend development has always been dark and opaque.
Gati brings first-class visual observability:

✔ API Studio

Test APIs
Run load/stress tests
Generate TS/JS SDKs
Manage mock datasets
Explore versioned APIs
See schema diffs
Replay request flows

✔ Network Mode (2D Visualization)

See real-time traffic flowing through:

ingress
version routers
handlers
modules
plugins
queues

With latency, health & throughput highlighted visually.

✔ Lifecycle Mode (3D Tracing)

Walk through a single request in 3D:

every handler
every hook
every module call
every internal event
snapshots & state transitions
debug gates to pause mid-flight

It’s like Chrome DevTools…
but for distributed backend systems.

7. Gati Registry — The Backend App Store

Gati Registry (coming soon) will host:

Modules
Plugins
AI models
Agents
Starters & templates
Versioned manifests
Pricing tiers
Marketplace & revenue-sharing

Imagine:

“npm, Docker Hub, HuggingFace, and Terraform registry — combined, but designed specifically for backend apps.”

That’s the Gati Registry.

8. AI-Enabled Backend Development

Gati is built for the AI era:

AI agents can be plugged into runtime
Agents can observe requests and act
Models can run inside modules via WASM or containers
Auto-migration tools can assist Express.js/NestJS projects
Playground integrates tracing + LLM explanations
Auto-generated transformers for backward compatibility

Gati is not just AI-friendly —
it is AI-native.

💡 Who is Gati for?

🧑‍💻 Solo Developers

Ship production backends with zero DevOps.
Focus entirely on product & users.

🚀 Startups

Move fast without breaking production.
Iterate APIs without fear.

🧩 Agencies / Service Companies

Build and deploy dozens of backends reliably and consistently.

⛏️ Enterprise Teams

Gain visibility, reliability, stronger contracts, and multi-cloud portability.

🧬 AI Developers

Deploy AI inference modules, agents, and models without infrastructure overhead.

🗃️ Open Source Contributors

Help build core modules, plugins, models — or earn on the marketplace.

🔥 What makes Gati different?

Most frameworks solve "backend functionality."
Gati solves backend evolution, observability, and zero-ops deployment.

Feature	Gati	Express	NestJS	FastAPI	Firebase	Supabase	AWS CDK
Zero-Ops Deployment	✔	❌	❌	❌	✔	✔	❌
Automatic API Versioning	✔	❌	❌	❌	❌	❌	❌
Auto Schema Diff / Transformers	✔	❌	❌	❌	❌	❌	❌
Polyglot Modules	✔	❌	⚠️	❌	❌	❌	✔
Visual Network Playground	✔	❌	❌	❌	❌	❌	❌
Unified Request Lifecycle	✔	❌	❌	❌	❌	❌	❌
Plugin Ecosystem	✔	⚠️	✔	⚠️	❌	❌	❌
AI-Native Integrations	✔	❌	⚠️	⚠️	❌	❌	❌

Gati is not just another backend framework.
It is a backend development platform.

🌍 The Future of Gati

Here’s what’s coming next:

🏗️ Gati Dev Cloud

Deploy anywhere — Gati Cloud, AWS, GCP, Azure, DigitalOcean — using a single login experience.

🧱 Gati Registry

Modules, plugins, AI models, agents, templates — free and commercial.

🛠️ Gati Studio

Official desktop IDE plugins
VSCode integration
Schema autocomplete
Playground built-in
Real-time debugging

🧬 AI-assisted migration tools

Auto-migrate Express, NestJS, Django, FastAPI into Gati handlers.

🔗 Multi-runtime backend

Core runtime available in:

Node.js
Rust
Go

Thanks to language-neutral contracts.

🏁 Conclusion — A Backend That Evolves With You

Gati is designed to make backend development:

Fast
Safe
Fun
Observable
Modular
AI-powered
Zero-Ops

It lets you ship without fear, iterate faster than ever, and build production-grade systems without an army of DevOps engineers.

Gati’s philosophy:

“Developers should write logic, not infrastructure.”

If that resonates with you —
welcome to the next generation of backend development.

More is coming soon.
Stay tuned — and stay fast. ⚡

Introducing Gati: The Backend That Builds, Scales, and Evolves Itself

Krishna Paul — Sat, 22 Nov 2025 17:17:38 +0000

Introducing Gati: The Backend That Builds, Scales, and Evolves Itself

TL;DR: Gati is a next-generation TypeScript framework that eliminates infrastructure complexity. Write handlers, deploy to Kubernetes, and let the framework handle routing, scaling, versioning, and cloud infrastructure automatically. M1 and M2 are complete, and we're now live on npm! 🎉

The Problem We're Solving

Modern backend development is powerful, but painful. Developers spend more time:

🔧 Fighting infrastructure and deployment pipelines
📝 Writing boilerplate for routing, middleware, and validation
🐛 Debugging version conflicts and breaking changes
☁️ Wrestling with DevOps, Docker, and Kubernetes
🔄 Maintaining backward compatibility manually

...than actually building features that matter.

What if your backend could handle all of this automatically?

Meet Gati

Gati (Sanskrit: गति, meaning "motion" or "progress") is a TypeScript framework that takes the chaotic world of distributed systems, deployment pipelines, API versioning, and scaling—and transforms it into something automated, intelligent, and developer-first.

The Core Philosophy

// That's it—just write your handler
export const handler: Handler = async (req, res, gctx, lctx) => {
  const user = await gctx.modules['db'].users.findById(req.params.id);
  res.json({ user });
};

// ✅ Automatically available at /api/users/:id
// ✅ Auto-scales with Kubernetes
// ✅ Type-safe with full IntelliSense
// ✅ Hot reload in development
// ✅ Production-ready deployment

Let developers write business logic. Let Gati handle everything else.

What Makes Gati Different?

🧠 Business Logic Only

No more infrastructure code. No Docker files. No Kubernetes manifests. No CI/CD pipelines. Just write handlers, and Gati generates everything else.

// src/handlers/posts/[id].ts
export const handler: Handler = async (req, res, gctx, lctx) => {
  const post = await gctx.modules['db'].posts.findById(req.params.id);
  res.json({ post });
};

That's it. Gati handles:

File-based routing
Request validation
Error handling
Logging and tracing
Deployment manifests
Auto-scaling policies

📦 Cloud-Pluggable Architecture

Deploy anywhere with zero configuration changes:

# Deploy to local Kubernetes
gati deploy dev --local

# Deploy to AWS EKS
gati deploy prod --cloud aws

# Deploy to GCP GKE
gati deploy prod --cloud gcp

# Deploy to Azure AKS
gati deploy prod --cloud azure

One command. Any cloud. Zero DevOps.

⚡ Lightning-Fast Development

Hot reload in 50-200ms. Change your code, see it live instantly.

# Start development server
pnpm dev

# Changes reflect in < 200ms
# No restart needed
# Full type safety maintained

🎮 Visual Debugging

Built-in Playground with three visualization modes:

API Mode — Postman on steroids with version switching
Network Mode — 2D map of your distributed backend
Tracking Mode — 3D visualization of request lifecycle

Debug your backend like never before.

🔄 API Versioning (Coming M3)

Timescape will revolutionize API versioning:

// Ship breaking changes without fear
// Old clients continue working
// New clients get new features
// Automatic data transformations
// Zero-downtime deployments

"I want the API as it was last Friday" → Just works.

What's Available Today?

✅ M1 & M2 Complete (November 2025)

We've shipped a production-ready foundation:

Core Runtime

Handler execution engine
File-based routing with auto-discovery
Global and local context management
Module system for reusable logic
Middleware pipeline
Structured logging (Pino)
Request tracing

Development Experience

Project scaffolding with npx gatic create
Hot reload (50-200ms)
Development server
TypeScript-first with full type safety
Comprehensive error handling

Deployment

Local Kubernetes (kind)
AWS EKS deployment
GCP GKE deployment
Azure AKS deployment
Auto-scaling (HPA)
Load balancing (Ingress)
Health checks
Rolling updates

Infrastructure

Automated CI/CD pipeline
npm publishing workflow
Documentation deployment
Comprehensive test suite
9 packages published to npm

📦 Published Packages

All packages are live on npm:

@gati-framework/core - Core types and configuration
@gati-framework/runtime - Runtime execution engine
@gati-framework/cli - Development and deployment tools
gatic - Project scaffolding command
@gati-framework/cloud-aws - AWS EKS deployment
@gati-framework/cloud-gcp - GCP GKE deployment
@gati-framework/cloud-azure - Azure AKS deployment
@gati-framework/playground - Visual debugging interface

Get Started in 5 Minutes

1. Create Your First Gati App

# Create a new project
npx gatic create my-app

# Navigate to your project
cd my-app

# Start development server
pnpm dev

Your API is now running at http://localhost:3000 🎉

2. Write Your First Handler

// src/handlers/hello.ts
import type { Handler } from '@gati-framework/runtime';

export const handler: Handler = (req, res, gctx, lctx) => {
  const name = req.query.name || 'World';
  res.json({ message: `Hello, ${name}!` });
};

Available at: GET /api/hello?name=Gati

3. Deploy to Kubernetes

# Deploy to local Kubernetes cluster
gati deploy dev --local

# Your API is now running in Kubernetes!
# With auto-scaling, health checks, and monitoring

That's it. You're production-ready.

What's Coming Next?

🚧 M3 - Timescape & Type System (November 2025) - IN PROGRESS

I'm currently working on the revolutionary API versioning and type system:

Timescape Versioning:

Timestamp-based version routing
Automatic schema diffing
Bidirectional data transformers
Parallel version execution
Zero-downtime version deployments

Module System:

Enhanced module contracts
Module interfaces and types
Dependency management
Isolated module execution

Type System:

Branded types with constraints
Contract-based validation
Runtime type checking
Schema generation

Ship breaking changes without fear.

🔌 M4 - Module Registry & Marketplace (February 2026)

Public module registry and marketplace for sharing and discovering modules:

Module Registry:

Public npm-like registry for Gati modules
Semantic versioning
Dependency resolution
Module discovery and search

Marketplace:

Browse and install community modules
Module ratings and reviews
Usage statistics
Revenue sharing for module authors (70/30 split)

Module Types:

Database connectors (PostgreSQL, MongoDB, MySQL, etc.)
Authentication providers (OAuth, JWT, SAML, etc.)
Cache systems (Redis, Memcached, etc.)
Queue systems (RabbitMQ, Kafka, etc.)
AI/ML integrations (OpenAI, Anthropic, etc.)
Custom business logic modules

Install modules like npm packages:

# Install a database module
gati module install @gati-modules/postgres

# Install an auth module
gati module install @gati-modules/oauth

# Search for modules
gati module search redis

Build and publish your own modules, earn from the marketplace!

📊 M5 - Control Panel (Q1 2026)

Live monitoring and configuration dashboard:

Real-time metrics and logs
Configuration management
Version management
Deployment controls
Performance insights

Observe and control your backend visually.

🛠️ M6 - SDK Generation (Q1 2026)

Auto-generated typed clients:

gati generate sdk --platform typescript
gati generate sdk --platform python
gati generate sdk --platform go

Type-safe clients for any platform, automatically.

☁️ M7 - CDN & SSL (Q2 2026)

Global distribution and security:

Automatic CDN integration
SSL/TLS provisioning
Multi-region deployment
Edge caching
DDoS protection

Global scale, zero configuration.

Why I Built Gati

As a developer, I was tired of:

Spending 70% of my time on infrastructure
Fearing API changes that might break production
Writing the same boilerplate over and over
Fighting with Docker, Kubernetes, and cloud providers
Maintaining complex CI/CD pipelines

I wanted to focus on building features, not fighting infrastructure.

Gati is my answer. A framework that:

Understands your code and generates everything else
Handles versioning so you can ship fearlessly
Deploys anywhere with zero configuration
Scales automatically based on demand
Provides visibility into every request

Real-World Example

Here's a complete user management API:

// src/handlers/users/index.ts
export const handler: Handler = async (req, res, gctx, lctx) => {
  const users = await gctx.modules['db'].users.findAll();
  res.json({ users });
};

// src/handlers/users/[id].ts
export const handler: Handler = async (req, res, gctx, lctx) => {
  const user = await gctx.modules['db'].users.findById(req.params.id);

  if (!user) {
    return res.status(404).json({ error: 'User not found' });
  }

  res.json({ user });
};

// src/handlers/users/create.ts
export const handler: Handler = async (req, res, gctx, lctx) => {
  const user = await gctx.modules['db'].users.create(req.body);
  res.status(201).json({ user });
};

That's it. Three files. Zero configuration. Production-ready.

Gati automatically provides:

✅ Routes: GET /api/users, GET /api/users/:id, POST /api/users/create
✅ Request validation
✅ Error handling
✅ Logging and tracing
✅ Auto-scaling
✅ Health checks
✅ Deployment manifests

Community & Open Source

Gati is MIT licensed and open source. As a solo developer, I'm building this in the open and actively looking for contributors and testers!

I Believe In

🌍 Community-driven development
📖 Comprehensive documentation
🤝 Welcoming contributors
🚀 Rapid iteration
💡 Transparent roadmap

How You Can Help

I'm looking for:

🧪 Beta Testers - Try Gati in your projects and share feedback
👨‍💻 Contributors - Help build M3 features (Timescape, modules, types)
📚 Technical Writers - Improve documentation and tutorials
🎨 Designers - UI/UX for the upcoming Control Panel
🌍 Community Builders - Help spread the word

Get Involved

⭐ Star on GitHub - Show your support
📖 Read the docs - Learn how to use Gati
💬 Join discussions - Share ideas
🐛 Report issues - Help improve quality
🤝 Contribute - Build with me

Every contribution matters! Whether it's code, docs, testing, or just spreading the word - I appreciate all help.

The Vision

My goal is to make Gati the backend framework that builds, scales, and evolves itself.

I'm building a future where:

✅ Developers write only business logic
✅ APIs never break (Timescape - coming Nov 2025)
✅ Deployment is one command
✅ Scaling is automatic
✅ Monitoring is visual
✅ Infrastructure is invisible

Backend development should be about solving problems, not fighting tools.

Current Progress

✅ M1 Complete - Core runtime and handler engine
✅ M2 Complete - Cloud deployment and CI/CD
🚧 M3 In Progress - Timescape, modules, and type system (Nov 2025)

Want to be part of this journey? I'm looking for contributors!

Learn more about the Module Registry: Gati Registry Documentation

Try Gati Today

# Get started in 5 minutes
npx gatic create my-app
cd my-app
pnpm dev

# Deploy to Kubernetes
gati deploy dev --local

# You're production-ready! 🚀

Resources

📖 Documentation: krishnapaul242.github.io/gati
💻 GitHub: github.com/krishnapaul242/gati
📦 npm: @gati-framework
💬 Discussions: GitHub Discussions

Community Support

See who's supporting Gati: View Stargazers

Be part of the community! Star the repo to show your support and stay updated.

Join Me on This Journey

Backend development is changing. Infrastructure is becoming invisible. Deployment is becoming automatic. APIs are becoming unbreakable.

I'm building Gati to lead this transformation.

As a solo developer, I'm just getting started, and I'd love for you to be part of this journey.

How to Get Started

🚀 Try Gati - Build something with it
⭐ Star on GitHub - Show your support
💬 Share feedback - Tell me what you think
🤝 Contribute - Help build features
📢 Spread the word - Tell other developers
🧪 Beta test - Try M3 features when ready

Together, we can build the future of backend development.

Special Call for Contributors

I'm actively working on M3 (Timescape & Type System) and would love help with:

Testing Timescape versioning features
Building module system components
Implementing type system contracts
Writing documentation and examples
Designing the Module Registry UI (Feb 2026)
Designing the Control Panel UI (Q1 2026)

Interested? Reach out via GitHub Discussions!

Module Registry Specs: apps/gati-registry

Managing Access Tokens in React or React Native with Axios and Context API.

Krishna Paul — Sat, 19 Feb 2022 11:50:56 +0000

When I started developing Stateful Applications in React or React Native, I had to balance the ease of development as well as usefulness of the functionality while dealing with the statefulness especially while calling APIs.
I started with using redux and it was easy but with extra boilerplate code to be written with it. Here comes Context API, I have not used Context API before. However, for this application, it seems perfect.

Benefits of using this approach:

Less code to write, less code to be tested, less prone to errors.
The main changes happens at only one place.
Ability to cover more functionalities.
Faster than redux approach.

Limitations of using this approach:

Code newbies might have hard time understanding it at first.
Some scenarios might be difficult to debug.

Process:

Create and export a function which manipulates default axios options.

import axios from "axios";

export const HOST = 'https://api.example.com/v1';

const basicToken = 'cGXysWJlcJhdsSJdIUP873mVzaFYxLTEyM1NlY3JldA';

export const configureAxiosHeaders = (token: string = basicToken): boolean => {
    try {
        axios.defaults.baseURL = HOST;
        axios.defaults.headers.common['Authorization'] = 'Bearer ' + token;
        axios.defaults.headers.common['Content-Type'] = 'application/x-www-form-urlencoded';
        console.log("Configured Axios")
        return true;
    } catch (error) {
        console.log(error);
        return false;
    }
}

Create a React Context.


import React, { createContext, useState, useEffect } from "react";
import AsyncStorage from "@react-native-async-storage/async-storage"
import { TokenDetails } from "../redux/slices/user";
import { configureAxiosHeaders } from "../api/config";
export interface AuthContextProps {
  auth: TokenDetails | null;
  setAuth: (auth: TokenDetails | null) => Promise<void>;
}
// Create a context
const AuthContext = createContext<AuthContextProps>({
  auth: null,
  setAuth: async () => {},
});
const AuthProvider: React.FC = ({children}) => {
  const [auth, setAuthState] = useState<TokenDetails|null>(null);
  // Get current auth state from AsyncStorage
  const getAuthState = async () => {
    try {
      const authDataString = await AsyncStorage.getItem('auth');
      console.log("authDataString", authDataString);
      const authData: TokenDetails | null = authDataString !== null ? JSON.parse(authDataString, (key, value) => {
        switch (key) {
          case 'status':
          case 'error_description':
          case 'access_token':
          case 'refresh_token':
            return String(value);
          case 'error_code':
          case 'user_id':
          case 'login_logid':
            return parseInt(value);
          case 'accessTokenExpiresAt':
          case 'refreshTokenExpiresAt':
            return new Date(value);
          default:
            return value;
        }
      }) : authDataString;
      // Configure axios headers
        if (authData !== null) {
            configureAxiosHeaders(authData.access_token);
          setAuthState(authData);
          console.log({authData});
        } else {
          setAuthState(null);
          console.log("authData is null");
        }      
    } catch (err) {
      console.log("Caught Auth Exception", err);
      setAuthState(null);
    }
  };
  // Update AsyncStorage & context state
  const setAuth = async (auth: TokenDetails | null) => {
    console.log("Try Setting Authentication")
    if (auth === null) {
      console.log("Setting Authentication to null")
      await AsyncStorage.removeItem('auth');
      setAuthState(auth);
    }
    else {
      try {
        console.log('Set Authentication', {auth});
        await AsyncStorage.setItem('auth', JSON.stringify(auth));
        // Configure axios headers
        configureAxiosHeaders(auth.access_token);
        setAuthState(auth);
        console.log('Setting done.')
      } catch (error) {
        console.log('Caught Auth Exception', error);
      }
    }
  };
  useEffect(() => {
    getAuthState();
  }, []);
  return (
    <AuthContext.Provider value={{auth, setAuth}}>
      {children}
    </AuthContext.Provider>
  );
};
export {AuthContext, AuthProvider};

Using it in sign in page when sign in is successful.

await setAuth(data);

calling this function will update the Context State and provide the state to other components.

While in step 1, we have automatically have the state replaced when setAuth is called with new props. Due to the configuring of default axios options, it automatically use the latest available token provided in Auth Context State.

That's all for today, I didn't explain the code in step 2 because the code is readable enough already.
Thank You for reading this post.

Managing freelance project as solo developer.

Krishna Paul — Sun, 06 Dec 2020 16:33:09 +0000

So, you convinced a client and bagged a project. You're really excited about this project and ready to dive into code.
But wait, Hold your horses. Diving directly into code is not a good idea especially when you are new.

Here are some tips to start your project:

1. Write a Project Proposal:

A project proposal is very important before beginning the coding.
Why? Because it documents the deliverables, basic functionalities, estimated time, estimated cost and a description of the project.
Any Problem here? Yes, before specifying the deliverables, you must make sure you have the skills and tools to deliver those. We all learn continuously, but you should not promise something which you have never done before. Basic functionalities are tricky, some functionalities require much more effort than others. Try to keep them as level as you can. The most tricky part is estimation of cost and time. For this part, you need prior experience of something similar. Only then you could predict closely.

2. Prepare a basic structure of the project:

You have to divide the project in multiple parts, where each part is independent as much as possible. Do this recursively to each part until you get file level granularity.
Why? Because without such vision, your project would most likely fail to finish on time.
Any Problems Here? Yes, You would surely miss something (probably many things). Still, some vision is better than no vision. With such vision, future increments will be easier.

3. Always use source control:

Whether you like GitHub, GitLab, Azure DevOps or some other service, but you should use source control. Always maintain a main/master branch where your code is properly tested and working. Do all other enhancement in another branch and merge on successful testing.
Why? If your code breaks on some change and you forgot the change, you will have something to fallback and start again.
Any Problem Here? Most of new developers find it to be unnecessary overhead. But if you really do it, it will help you out.

4. Use a Project Management Tool:

Adding issues, assigning yourselves, working on them and closing them. This would look like waste of time at first. But this helps in the development a lot.
How? By tracking issues and continuously adding them, you can estimate the time and effort required in the project. Your knowledge about the timeline grows and you will be better equipped when the next project comes.
Any Problems Here? Keep the issues as unit as possible. Big features should be milestones and issues are the stepping stones to reach there.

Solo development is difficult, you will loose the motivation sometimes, especially when you see no sign of progress. Hence, follow these tips to see the progress and the vision as well.